Until things start looking better economically, which is linked to this infection and long term recovery,
I don’t foresee anything other than a depressed market for higher end custom cues. If you look at a
cue as a investment, how much should it be correlated to the worth of the dollar or the stock market?
Every single economist worth their salt says we are in a big recession. And if things don’t improve with
this infection soon, America could reach an economic depression. Even the Sec’y of Treasury forewarned
that 20% unemployment was a possibility and if the nation has to essentially shut down, over 30%. Just
keep in mind that FDR had unemployment of almost 25% and there were bread lines. Right now no one
knows how bad things are going to become but everyone agrees it is going to get a lot more worse before
better. Testing is just getting started and look at the rate of increase. In Italy, the Italian Army has been
using military transport trucks to carry the dead bodies in the middle of the night to avoid being seen.
Reality says we don’t know what awaits us and what the after effects will be or how long it takes for any
normalcy to return, let alone economic prosperity. This economic downturn involves more than just the
value of your retirement account shrinking day by day. The stock market can bounce back in months, and
maybe even weeks, but restoration of jobs, business infrastructure, rebuilding the workforce, integration of
all the pending graduating seniors both from HS and college, the looming tax increases we’ll all bear since you
just can’t add 2 trillion, 3, 4, maybe 5 trillion dollars to our national debt that’s already skyrocketing beyond belief.
So when a person looks to get a cue, shouldn’t a cue be subject to the same economic downturn in value
that other things also suffer? In a recession, let alone a possible depression if the right decisions aren’t soon
rendered, pawned items receive less value because there are less buyers. Pawn your Rolex in a week vs. say
a year ago, and see how much less you get. Cues are the same and probably more so since it has a smaller
audience of buyers, at least the better, more expensive customs do......IMO. Sometimes it takes awhile to
sell those cues even in a better market than right now.
All in all, until there’s less uncertainty & improved economic outlook, my take is there’ll be less demand
for custom cues. Now I might be wrong. This is just my opinion. But I forecasted this market downturn
after that Friday afternoon RoseGarden speech 1 hr. before the stock market closed. The handwriting was
on the wall how bad things were going to become. My post and prediction is in the non-pool related forum.
I was so certain this would happen I assumed short positions in the market & you can see how that’s turned out.
With this virulent virus spreading across the nation, both our economy & the world economy is gradually
shutting down. And buying a custom cue has always been a questionable investment but right now it seems a
little frivolous given the state of affairs. Like I wrote earlier, this is only my opinion and I could be mistaken.