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Saturday, September 08, 2018 9:15:00 AM
“Parah Parah,” Time to Sell Rosh Hashanah
By: Almanac Trader | September 7, 2018
Happy Jewish New Year to you all! I enter this High Holiday season on the Jewish calendar with a new perspective having just returned from an amazing journey through Israel with my family in celebration of my son’s bar mitzvah. I took the above picture of the Dome of the Rock two weeks ago from the roof of the Austrian Hospice in the middle of the Muslim Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem.
We circumnavigated much of the country from the beaches of Tel Aviv to King Herod the Great’s famed port city of Caesarea to the Golan Heights to the Sea of Galilee (or the Kinneret, it’s a lake), down the River Jordan to Jerusalem. Then we trekked down to the Dead Sea, ascended Masada by cable car and visited a plethora of ancient sites and natural treasures.
As a secular Jew with a relatively progressive outlook and open mind, I was amazed at how easily the many cultures and historic narratives blend and coexist in the Holy Land. There are still many obstacles and resentments there, as there are here in the USA and everywhere. Nevertheless, Israel continues to thrive and advance technologically, while at the same time reveling and preserving the wonders of antiquity.
Perhaps the most important thing I learned was during my discussions with our guide about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the peace progress. He told me about an old Hebrew saying: “Parah Parah,” literally “cow cow.” It comes from an old story about dealing with one cow at a time and it emphasizes the mantra of handling certain things in life “one thing at a time.” Our guide intimated that this could be the key to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the peace progress.
He suggested that the first thing the world, the Israelis and the Palestinian Authority should be focusing on is improving the quality of life for the Palestinian people, first and foremost. Once they are happier and living better, then we can begin the peace process.
Anyway, as the High Holidays approach you may remember the old saying on the Street, “Buy Rosh Hashanah, Sell Yom Kippur.” Though it had a good record at one time, it stopped working in the middle of the last century. It still gets tossed around every autumn when the “high holidays” are on the minds of traders as many of their Jewish colleagues take off to observe the Jewish New Year and Day of Atonement.
The basis for the new pattern, “Sell Rosh Hashanah, Buy Yom Kippur,” is that with many traders and investors busy with religious observance and family, positions are closed out and volume fades creating a buying vacuum. Holiday seasonality around official market holidays is something we pay close attention to (page 88 Stock Trader’s Almanac). Actual stats on the most observed Hebrew holidays have been compiled in the table here.
We present the data back to 1971 and when the holiday falls on a weekend the prior market close is used. It’s no coincidence that Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur fall in September and/or October, two dangerous and sometimes opportune months.
Perhaps it’s Talmudic wisdom but, selling stocks before the eight-day span of the high holidays has avoided many declines, especially during uncertain times. This year the high holidays commence on Monday, September 10, and end in the middle of the September options expiration week. The current news flow already has folks selling ahead of the Jewish High Holidays, setting up the market for further declines in treacherous September.
DJIA, S&P 500 Up 8 of Last 9 Years Day before Rosh Hashanah
Although not an official market holiday, Rosh Hashanah is observed by many New York area schools and many Jewish colleagues will also spend time observing the holiday with family and friends. Their absence can dampen trading volumes as positions are squared ahead of the holiday. This year Rosh Hashanah begins at sunset on Sunday, September 9. So Friday, September 7 is the last trading day before Rosh Hashanah..
Over the last 22 years the day before Rosh Hashanah has been up more than 50% of the time, but there have been some large declines that result in average losses across the board while Rosh Hashanah (or the next trading day) has recorded average gains. More recently DJIA and S&P 500 have been up 8 times in the last 9 years (NASDAQ up 7 of 9) on the day before (and six straight) but those gains have been short-lived as the next day has been weaker, down 5 of the last 6 years.
http://jeffhirsch.tumblr.com/post/177841213273/parah-parah-time-to-sell-rosh-hashanah
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Click on "In reply to", for Authors past commentaries
By: Almanac Trader | September 7, 2018
Happy Jewish New Year to you all! I enter this High Holiday season on the Jewish calendar with a new perspective having just returned from an amazing journey through Israel with my family in celebration of my son’s bar mitzvah. I took the above picture of the Dome of the Rock two weeks ago from the roof of the Austrian Hospice in the middle of the Muslim Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem.
We circumnavigated much of the country from the beaches of Tel Aviv to King Herod the Great’s famed port city of Caesarea to the Golan Heights to the Sea of Galilee (or the Kinneret, it’s a lake), down the River Jordan to Jerusalem. Then we trekked down to the Dead Sea, ascended Masada by cable car and visited a plethora of ancient sites and natural treasures.
As a secular Jew with a relatively progressive outlook and open mind, I was amazed at how easily the many cultures and historic narratives blend and coexist in the Holy Land. There are still many obstacles and resentments there, as there are here in the USA and everywhere. Nevertheless, Israel continues to thrive and advance technologically, while at the same time reveling and preserving the wonders of antiquity.
Perhaps the most important thing I learned was during my discussions with our guide about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the peace progress. He told me about an old Hebrew saying: “Parah Parah,” literally “cow cow.” It comes from an old story about dealing with one cow at a time and it emphasizes the mantra of handling certain things in life “one thing at a time.” Our guide intimated that this could be the key to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the peace progress.
He suggested that the first thing the world, the Israelis and the Palestinian Authority should be focusing on is improving the quality of life for the Palestinian people, first and foremost. Once they are happier and living better, then we can begin the peace process.
Anyway, as the High Holidays approach you may remember the old saying on the Street, “Buy Rosh Hashanah, Sell Yom Kippur.” Though it had a good record at one time, it stopped working in the middle of the last century. It still gets tossed around every autumn when the “high holidays” are on the minds of traders as many of their Jewish colleagues take off to observe the Jewish New Year and Day of Atonement.
The basis for the new pattern, “Sell Rosh Hashanah, Buy Yom Kippur,” is that with many traders and investors busy with religious observance and family, positions are closed out and volume fades creating a buying vacuum. Holiday seasonality around official market holidays is something we pay close attention to (page 88 Stock Trader’s Almanac). Actual stats on the most observed Hebrew holidays have been compiled in the table here.
We present the data back to 1971 and when the holiday falls on a weekend the prior market close is used. It’s no coincidence that Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur fall in September and/or October, two dangerous and sometimes opportune months.
Perhaps it’s Talmudic wisdom but, selling stocks before the eight-day span of the high holidays has avoided many declines, especially during uncertain times. This year the high holidays commence on Monday, September 10, and end in the middle of the September options expiration week. The current news flow already has folks selling ahead of the Jewish High Holidays, setting up the market for further declines in treacherous September.
DJIA, S&P 500 Up 8 of Last 9 Years Day before Rosh Hashanah
Although not an official market holiday, Rosh Hashanah is observed by many New York area schools and many Jewish colleagues will also spend time observing the holiday with family and friends. Their absence can dampen trading volumes as positions are squared ahead of the holiday. This year Rosh Hashanah begins at sunset on Sunday, September 9. So Friday, September 7 is the last trading day before Rosh Hashanah..
Over the last 22 years the day before Rosh Hashanah has been up more than 50% of the time, but there have been some large declines that result in average losses across the board while Rosh Hashanah (or the next trading day) has recorded average gains. More recently DJIA and S&P 500 have been up 8 times in the last 9 years (NASDAQ up 7 of 9) on the day before (and six straight) but those gains have been short-lived as the next day has been weaker, down 5 of the last 6 years.
http://jeffhirsch.tumblr.com/post/177841213273/parah-parah-time-to-sell-rosh-hashanah
• DiscoverGold
Click on "In reply to", for Authors past commentaries
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