After the bubble bursts

After the bubble bursts, a couple of things can happen.

The first is that the country will slip into a recession. You will see reports of layoffs and falling corporate profits. The Fed will actively drop interest rates, which will, in a year or so, respark the economy. The immediate impact of lower interest rates will be an increase in car and house sales. Seeing this, investors will anticipate the revival of the economy and jump back into the market. This time, though, they will be investing in the big names -like GE and Hewlett-Packard - that have earnings. They won't chase after the once-hot bubble stocks. Those stocks are dead until they begin earning money.

If the Fed's dropping of interest rates doesn't revive the economy, the country will slip into a depression and stock prices will really go to hell. It happened in the early 1920s, and the ensuing crash made 1929 pale in comparison. If that happens, you are in a major recession/depression and the stock market will be giving companies away. Value investors, including Warren, dream of such an opportunity, while the rest of the world dreads it. That's because Warren is a selective contrarian investor with a ton of cash and a long-term perspective.

However, Warren Buffett does not buy or sell baseed on what he thinks the market will do. He is price-motivated. This means that he will only invest when the price of the company makes business sense.