Is Now a Good Time to Buy Stocks?

You can become a television star -- or at least make a lot of appearances on business and investing shows -- by pretending you know how to time the stock market. Saying you know that the bottom has been reached or that stunning new lows are coming will get a pundit a lot of attention.

It's also silly. Nobody can know if the equities market has hit the bottom of any given cycle or if new lows are coming. Nor can they predict market peaks -- any number of experts spent the latter half of the last decade prognosticating that the long bull market was "just about to end." Those who listened to them missed years of share price gains.

Trying to guess which way the wind is about to blow on Wall Street makes you a trader -- not an investor. You don't need to know when a stock has hit a cyclical low in order to be a savvy buyer. Instead, focus on buying shares in great companies that are well-positioned to deliver value in the long term.

Source Fool.com