Quote from S2007S:
I see no possible way the markets even see a hint of green, the news of the ponzi game on wallstreet and auto bailout news should easily keep the markets down to the close. I would be surprised to see the Dow stay above 8000.....
Logically you would think given the news of late that the markets would continue to tank. I would not be surprised to see the S&P head toward 650. But if so, when? Neither would i be surprised to see it hold its present trading range for months to come and maybe even break out to the upside, because, in fact, the economic news is so bad that it could result in buying as well as selling.
There are a number of factors at work, so it's a fools game to try and predict near term action. It is better, in my opinion, to take a longer term view without trying to be very precise about when something might occur.
It seems we are in a deflationary period, but after that the consensus seems to be that we are headed for double digit inflation. Frankly, i don't think the US has much choice but to try and inflate its way out of the debt spiral it has fallen into.
If i was someone holding dollars or US bonds outside the US, or even in the US for that matter, i would be very concerned about the potential for rampant inflation sometime in the next few years. I probably would want to either get rid of my dollar assets and convert to some other currency, if i could at a reasonable price, or if that's not practical because i hold many billions of dollars, i might like to start buying US assets in an attempt to protect against future inflation. And the best time to buy those assets would be during a deflationary period. The assets of US companies, and the companies themselves, can be bought by acquiring stock. Consequently there may be large buyers coming in whenever the market starts to dip lower. These could be foreign buyers and they could be partly responsible for holding up the market. Who knows? I know that i don't know what direction the market will take in the next few months. But i would think that the range bound market we have been experiencing, after a rather precipitous drop, may continue for some time, if indeed there are buyers waiting to step in every time we approach the bottom of the range. And, there seems to be!