[steveplace]

Some other things you can do:

1) Reduce your portfolio delta. If you're exposed to the long side, you can pick up some shorts, buy some puts on existing positions, or sell vertical calls to overlay.

2) Collar your positions. That involves buying a put and selling a call at the strike. This should be a net gain which reduces your risk (and reward) to the market.

3) Diversify into non-correlated investments. That means expanding out of one asset class (in your case fixed income) into several others that may not necessarily move with the market. That can include some inverse ETFs.

4) Go cash until you have a plan.

Disclaimer: Use at own risk. Due diligence is your friend.

[rickd]

Thanks Steve! Like I said before, I've gone fixed return and/or cash where I can. And I'm working on the planning constantly.

Unfortunately I have a ton of money in 401k type investments where the selection of investment vehicles is limited (and all are performing poorly). It's hard to know whether to cash out and take the tax hit assuming the portfolio loss will be higher- roll over to funds/management that offers more choices/etc. Or one of the other myriad of options.

I'm a programmer, not a financier- so it's hard to find good objective advice with limited exposure to the field. It's hard to figure out who is trying to make a quick buck with their advice on offer, or to actually help "regular" investors like me.