mlsoft--
Well, I s'pose in the short term the market is the market and the economy is the economy -- and only sometimes do the two meet.
I figured we'd get a powerful seasonal rally from the October-bear-killer crowd, so the magnitude of this bounce doesn't surprise me much. (What does surprise me is the sloppiness of it, with all of these insane gaps littering the charts.) I was stupidly keying more off the Nasdaq than the SPX, though, and so was looking to position for a bounce off of the 1995/1996 support line around COMP 1000 rather than the SPX 770 area. I had it in mind that we'd get a QQQ-led upswing, rather than a SPOOS-led run. Rookie mistake--. <G/NG>
One thing I am surprised at, with respect to the market's ability to ignore the fundamentals, is that there's absolutely no worry about the consumer right here. Last week's consumer confidence number was appalling, although I can see how analysts could choose to write that off because of poor correlation with actual consumer spending. But the retailers are reporting poor numbers week after week, the employment picture is grim and getting worse with a round of white-collar layoffs just getting underway, and the skyrocketing interest rates will put an end to the refi-mania that has put so much cash in consumers' hands these past many months. Add to that the fact that people buying cars on all of these special financing deals are soon going to have to start paying for them: "No payments until 2003!" -- well, it's only about seven weeks to 2003 right now.
I may join you in gold soon for a trade, depending on the overall market: watching XAU 58/59 and 54/55 to monitor the health of the miners.
Good luck,
Lane
AI
Market Data 
Markets 
