Cover Your (Financial) Shorts

Is is time to stop betting against financials? Yes, according to Dennis Gartman, founder of The Gartman Letter and a well-known investment strategist.

He's been short on banks, that is betting against increases in their stock prices, for several months. But now he's stopping those bets.

"Historically when you get dividend cuts, such as we've had, especially with Citigroup the other day, that tends to mark the lows," he said on CNBC's "Squawk Box" Thursday. "I think most of the fun of being short of the financials is probably behind us. But it's long way from covering shorts to being long." (See the full interview in the accompanying video).

Gartman says he's still shorting some higher-end luxury plays, like Tiffany , Starbucks , and Harley-Davidson.

"That's the ultimate high-end commodity retail thing ... People just buy a Harley hog because they got money to spend," he quipped.

Is he long on any thing financial? Yes, Chimera Investment , which has been "sniffing around trying to buy real estate that's being thrown up upon.... It's a financial but not a bank or anything like that."

But for the most part, he's bracing. And he advises others to do that too.

"It's a bear market," he said. "I hate to say that and no one likes to hear that."

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