The Mistake Everyone's Making Now

There's bleak news as far as the eye can see. The credit market is still uncertain. Banks are failing left and right. Home prices have been dropping at a record pace. Layoffs continue. And all of this turmoil is hurting the economy, with most retailers reporting dour results.

In the face of all of this bad news, it's tempting to sell and wait for better times. When your portfolio falls by 15% in a month, a Treasury note's safe 3.5% annual return starts to look pretty good.

But going that route can be a huge mistake.

The safest way to lose money
While Treasury notes may ensure that you don't lose money in the short term, they can also ensure that in the long run, you don't have enough money for retirement. In fact, it's likely that in real terms, you'll actually lose money in T-notes.

Recently, 10-year T-notes have been paying about 3.5%. From this, you have to subtract taxes, which lower your return. But that's not all. In 2008, the U.S. inflation rate was 3.85%, eroding the value of both your principal and interest. When you add it all up, it's clear that if you take into account inflation and taxes, T-note investments are a time bomb that will cost you purchasing power.

In essence, you've reduced your risk by guaranteeing that you'll lose money.

Maybe you'll claim that T-notes are just a short-term hedge, and that you'll buy back into the stock market when the volatility is over. But by the time you see nothing but blue skies, there's a good chance that the market will have rallied, and you will have missed out on a large chunk of the profits.

Lower-risk investing
However, there is a strategy to both reduce risk and achieve huge profits in the stock market. And the strategy actually works best in a choppy market like the one we have now.

Just buy stocks for much less than they're worth.

The reasoning is simple. If you pay $30 for a stock that's worth $50, it's much more likely that the stock will jump to $50 than fall to $20. So you've reduced your downside risk. At the same time, you still have a huge upside because you can be confident that the stock will eventually return to its fair value. Buying undervalued stocks helps to ensure that you buy low and sell high.

Some cheap stocks
Right now is the ideal time to look for bargains. Just look at how cheap some of these stocks are:

Data from Morningstar.

These are all big names that aren't directly tied to the current housing and debt woes. They all have significant competitive advantages in their niche. Sure, these businesses will feel the effects of a recession, but it's likely that they will survive any short-term turbulence. Yet they're all trading at significantly lower valuations than they have for the past five years.

These stocks can be bought more cheaply now than they could have been in the past (although the P/E is a rough measure of value). But if you wait for everyone to be happy with the economy, it's likely that you'll miss out on much of the upside. That's why, in a market like this, you should be particularly active in identifying undervalued opportunities.

The Foolish bottom line
What's more, these stocks -- although cheap -- aren't even the best opportunities in the market. Our Motley Fool Inside Value newsletter service focuses on finding the cheapest stocks that have the best potential for extraordinary returns.

We've identified several hugely undervalued stocks that we believe will outperform in this choppy market. If you're interested in checking them out, we offer a free trial.

Already subscribed to Inside Value? Log in at the top of this page.

This article was first published Jan. 8, 2008. It has been updated.

Fool contributor Richard Gibbons sat in the house all that cold, cold, wet day. He does not own shares of any company mentioned in this article. Novartis is a Motley Fool Global gains pick. The Fool's disclosure policy is jolly.