Where do you invest your money during a recession?

same place if there is not a recession. You do not know if you are in a recession until after the fact. Impossible to time the market, so I have a well rounded portfolio and work with that.

gold, government or municipal bonds or T-bills

i don't know about you place of residence, but if u are in India, still the banks are the best option to put ur money.

in the stock market. Buy low, sell high.

CD's and precious metals.
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Consumer driven companies like Coca Cola, Proctor and Gamble, etc. People still buy their stuff during a recession smart money knows that.

Metals are not smart, commodity prices usually fall when demand is off and metals are a commodity.

low risk stock- major brands that dont suffer much in sales during a recession- people still smoke, drink beer, and eat the same stuff

high yield savings account at emigrantdirect.com, INGdirect.com, HSBS.com

savings bonds or CDs

invest on shares

If you are confident that the recession is short term then you would be able to invest in stocks. However you will have no income from it during the time of the recession as the businesses will probably not be paying out dividends, they also need to somehow survive the recession!!
Anything that is controlled by the government is good (such as government bonds) as long as the government isn't also affected by the recession (with deflation a governments tax income also goes down...)
Gold can be good if prices are low... though the onset of a recession will send prices up quickly because people automaticaly turn to gold when things get rough.
An own business needs to plan ahead for a recession to make sure it can survive a recession. A recession is a good time to find businesses being sold and shop for rent signs will start going up everywhere. If you buy a business when the economy starts getting better you will have a cheap business that will profit from a once again expanding economy!! While you wait and decide what to do with your money, put it in a big and very safe bank, beware of the signs of deflation so that you can keep your money under the matress or convert to gold so your money doesn't dissapear (even in a bank, as was the case in Argentina between 1999 and 2002).

Hope this answers your question. Hope you are not living through or are expecting a recession!

There are several ways to play a recession. When you start to see signs of a recession or the market becomes real volatile, you want to move your money into consumer stocks - Kellogg's, Coke, Pepsi, Safeway, P&G, Altria (Kraft), etc., utilities and healthcare stocks. During a recession people are not going to stop buying their cereal, toothpaste, detergent, cheese, etc. paying the electric bill or stop going to the doctor. So you want to keep you money in the consumer, utilities and healthcare sectors since those are usually the safest when our economy starts receding. Plus, many of these big companies like Altria pay dividends. So although these stocks typically will not grow by huge amounts, but because they are value stocks you can get the added bonus of getting paid dividends.

The thing to watch in a recession is the GDP, Feds and the interest rate. When and if the Feds lower or raises the interest rate based on the GDP is completely related to how the market behaves.

During a recession, the Feds starts lowering interest rates to get money moving through the economy again. As the rates come down and money becomes cheaper, people start refinancing their house, buying a car on 0.9% financing, etc. As the Feds start coming down on interest rates, you want to be in auto stocks, home builder stock & electronic stock, etc. Any stocks that require people to take loans gain in value, because money is cheap and people are taking advantage of buying when interest rates are down. Just look at the market right now. Interest rates are high and auto manufactures and home builders stocks are down.

As the Feds start leveling off the interest rates or raising them you want to sell your auto, housing stocks, since as interest rates go up less and less people will buy those large ticket items.

I'd be careful with gold. People tend to move their money into gold when a recession starts, but as the Fed lowers the rate and money becomes cheap - gold is not as valuable. It is a delicate balancing act to be in gold before a reccession and sell as when interest rates are low. Plus, some of golds biggest gains are when the Feds start to raise rates and the economy is recovering.

If you are young (under 40), just continue to buy more stocks. However, if you are 5-10 years till retirment, you should be more conservative (60% fixed income, 40% stocks)

Short ETF's

They are a great hedge which means you don't have to sell as much.

In a country with a growing economy.

Some type of stable fund like a money market account or CD.