Do you feel like there's been no place to hide in 2016!?

The S&P 500 is down 11%. Eight of its nine sectors are firmly in the red. And two-thirds of individual stocks have already slipped into a bear market.

As the list of stocks hitting new lows grows by the day, the smell of fear in investor's behavior is getting stronger and stronger. And that means panic behavior might be just around the corner.

So today I want to show you how to profit from fear and panic, rather than succumb to it.

I want to show you how to rise above the “caveman mentality” that stands between you and investing success.

You see, individuals tend to mimic the actions of those around us… even when those actions are irrational or in direct conflict with our best interests.

This “herding” phenomenon is precisely what sends financial markets into bubble territory, with historical examples dating as far back as the infamous tulip mania bubble in 1637.

But there's a more subtle aspect to the herding phenomenon that often goes unnoticed…

It's a phenomenon I call “scatter fear.”

And by detecting this fear among investors, I was able to identify two of the year's top-performing investments by mid-January – the only stock market sector in the green so far and a bond market that hit new highs just yesterday.

So let me tell you about “scatter fear,” which really just comes down to one thing…

And that's human nature.

The herd mentality and herding behavior exist because human beings are hard-wired to stick close to the group.

In caveman days, individuals who lumped themselves in with the group were better protected from predators than those who boldly struck out on their own. Over time, more of the “I'm-with-the-group” individuals survived and reproduced than those of the “I'm-on-my-own” kind.