All the way to 2018?

Today's Financial Express had a nice article on what an investor can expect from equity markets over the next decade. The article concluded with the following lines:

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The bottom line is the bulk of equity price declines are behind us, but the equity market is unlikely to recover quickly as a whole. Returns will come from stock picking not market timing or asset allocation decisions. But be aware that while in the past markets were overly optimistic, ignoring any bad news, we are currently in a position where markets are pessimistic and they appear to be ignoring an important bit of good news from the oil markets. So study your stocks now and creep back in, very, very slowly. Add to positions, no faster than 5% per week. The best traders are good averagers.
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I concur with the author of this article and am of a firm belief that markets hereon will indeed be a stock pickers heaven given that a large part of price destruction is already done with, nevertheless, on the whole I am not as bearish.

The entire article can be read here [link]

Inflation down to single digits; Dow down 400 points...

For the week ended November 1'08, inflation in India (as measured by the WPI) dropped sharply to 8.98%. [read here]. This is clearly a positive.

But, will we embrace the sharp the drop in inflation or will we discard it and follow stock markets across-the-globe to sink further?

Video - NNT on Risk & what lies ahead...

Uncertain Times: Threat or Opportunity?

Uncertain Times:

• Domestic Non-bank credit is as good as gone
• Overnight rates are on an average higher than 3-yr Fixed Deposits
• A sharp slowdown in the overall economy, led by the mfg sector
• Slowing sales and rapidly deteriorating profits and profitability
  
• Thanks to higher interest rates, rapidly deteriorating corporate India's performance, consumer demand too remains poor and is expected to only worsen hereon
  
• Stock markets continue their rapid journey down-south
  
• Serial bomb-blasts taking place across-the-nation, city after city
• National & a host of assembly elections coming up with no certainty or clue of who will form the new government
• Disputes amongst state politicians over jobs & reservations (Mah, Bihar, & Assam)

Testing times (that's quite an understatement) for the Prime Minister, the Finance Minister and the RBI.

However, as an investor, how should one see and behave in such a scenario? Is this a threat or an opportunity of a lifetime to invest?