S & P's BEST MONTH EVER SINCE OCTOBER 1974

[THE-BEAKER]

hahahahahaahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahaha

if this had happened on the downside the fed would have shut the markets and launched an investigation.

i really hope this rally continues because the pain to come is gonna be huge

 

[the1]

Ummm....it did happen on the downside in July/Aug. The market is still open. Perhaps there will be no pain. Perhaps this is the beginning of the healing process? We are smack dab in the middle of a Technological Revolution that dwarfs the Industrial Revolution. The financial crisis' are mere speed bumps.

 

[antelope]

Quote from the1:

Ummm....it did happen on the downside in July/Aug. The market is still open. Perhaps there will be no pain. Perhaps this is the beginning of the healing process?

...uhmm, if its so, I guess banks are going to start lending millions to Small Businesses, Companies will hire like hell and EU and US are going to cut taxes. The recession is over let's all start enjoying the miraculous boom that followed the non-crisis!

 

[masterm1ne]

Quote from the1:

We are smack dab in the middle of a Technological Revolution that dwarfs the Industrial Revolution. The financial crisis' are mere speed bumps.

Can you pls explain this? I guess you mean that a technological revolution will occur because right now all the incentives are based on industries that don't create anything (financial) and this is not sustainable?

 

[MKTrader]

I explained the seasonality in more detail on another thread. For now, let's just put this year in some perspective:

January-July: Overall a small rally for stocks. Lots of ups and downs.

August-September: horrible

October: wonderful

Overall: stocks are basically flat for the year. Nothing to get excited about. No need to call for the end-of-the-world...or a huge boom like the 80s-90s, either.

My guess for the rest of the year:
November-December: positive, but not as booming as October (strong seasonality for end-of-year plus it's a pre-election year.) Everyone from HFTs to their grandmoms have been anticipating the late Fall/Santa rally already, so a good bit of it is probably baked into the cake.

2012: Anyone's guess. Mine is not-so-good for stocks.

 

[hayman]

Yeah, so glad that the World's Financial problems were solved in the last 2 days. From recession to ebullience.....in less than a week. Oh, Happy Days !

 

[failed_trad3r]

It's very interesting to watch the angle of this ascent. It's quire steep. It's what you expect from a momentum rally before a crash. This rally will run at this angle or maybe a bit flattened for months, drawing in every last sucker, even the ones who sweared they would never invest again.

Look at the angle of this rally. It's so telling. This is the last one. The big one. The rally that will squash all shorts and draw in everyone long, until everybody is long.

 

[denner]

Quote from hayman:

Yeah, so glad that the World's Financial problems were solved in the last 2 days. From recession to ebullience.....in less than a week. Oh, Happy Days !

This is the very thing that should scare everyone to death. Essentially, there are no "free market" solutions to any crisis. Since there is a perpetual risk of "contagion" should one ridiculously levered bank bite the big one, every solution has to be political in nature.

Nowadays every outcome is a binary event. The markets literally sit on the razor's edge of one mis-step.

+20% in 3 weeks seems to be viewed in a positive light, there are many others who see this sort of illiquid volatility as far more ominous for the future of this patched together financial system.

So here we are with the Euro back where TPTB want it, oil prices screaming higher, the dollar getting knocked back down, interest rates at artificial "teaser rates" for the "foreseeable future" as BenB would like it...

i.e. anything and everything to preserve the Status Quo.

 

[denner]

Quote from failed_trad3r:

It's very interesting to watch the angle of this ascent. It's quire steep. It's what you expect from a momentum rally before a crash. This rally will run at this angle or maybe a bit flattened for months, drawing in every last sucker, even the ones who sweared they would never invest again.

Look at the angle of this rally. It's so telling. This is the last one. The big one. The rally that will squash all shorts and draw in everyone long, until everybody is long.

I see your point and in years past I'd agree with what you are saying.

It's just that nowadays after years upon years of "intervention", whether overt or covert, the liquidity of these markets (the real liquidity as in investor interest) has been killed. The volume in the markets (the real buyers not HFT's churning the same shares a million times a day) has been decimated. Essentially, colusion has become far easier to orchestrate since there is much less resistance in the form of natural buyers/sellers. An illiquid market will make absolutely jaw dropping moves in both directions. Some third world markets come to mind, which is what the US market has been looking like for some time now.

 

[failed_trad3r]

Quote from denner:

I see your point and in years past I'd agree with what you are saying.

It's just that nowadays after years upon years of "intervention", whether overt or covert, the liquidity of these markets (the real liquidity as in investor interest) has been killed. The volume in the markets (the real buyers not HFT's churning the same shares a million times a day) has been decimated. Essentially, colusion has become far easier to orchestrate since there is much less resistance in the form of natural buyers/sellers. An illiquid market will make absolutely jaw dropping moves in both directions. Some third world markets come to mind, which is what the US market has been looking like for some time now.

Maybe, maybe not. I think when we see headlines like DOW at all-time highs one year from now, some people will get drawn in the craziness. Especially when we'll see unemployment tick down for a quarter or two to 7-8%, before it shoots up again above 10%.