There's the risk that you could lose a significant part of your money in a down market. And there's the day in, day out volatility that erodes investors' comfort and leaves them with paper losses that reduce their ability to take out their money should they need it unexpectedly. In both cases, market timing reduces those risks. Over the past 11 years, our timing systems have reduced the volatility of stock market investments by about 50 percent. In addition, we have substantially reduced investors' exposure to bear markets, being in cash about 40 percent of the time.
Market timing is risky for investors who try to do it themselves.
It's a daily responsibility from which you never take a vacation in the true sense of the word. You have to watch the market and be prepared to take action every single market day. Yet many investors simply drop the ball when it's time to go on vacation, and I can't blame them. However, that is what I would call a high-risk way to do market timing, and it's one reason I believe smart timers will always have somebody else make the moves for them, automatically. However, that's not very good advice, as it violates the rules of a timing system by inserting trades based on personal convenience instead of the dictates of the system.