It is becoming increasingly difficult to be optimistic about the world economic situation. Fuel costs are rising with no end in sight, margin trading is rampant, market manipulation has become obvious and technical glitches are increasing. Couple this with the recent pronouncements of notables such as Greenspan, CBS Marketwatch and USA Today, who are sounding more and more like the editorial writers of Gold Eagle.

Is tomorrow "The Day"? When do you think the bottom will fall out, if ever?

-- Market watcher (@ .), February 21, 2000

Answers

A guess of a major correction would be somewhere between May 10th to May 20th,2000.

-- Maggie (song bird@iwon.com), February 21, 2000.

02-22-2000? Might as well be, I don't know when of even if it'll happen. If the "Big One" is going to happen, I'd rather it happen now, while I'm still young enough and resourceful enough to survive it, and so we can get on with the recovery.

-- Powder (Powder47keg@aol.com), February 21, 2000.

not onlythta ... its Twosday .....

-- Squirrel Hunter (nuts@upina.cellrelay.tower), February 21, 2000.

Market watcher---I don't know, in some ways I can't believe that the Bull Bubble has lasted THIS long, given all the fundamentals to consider. I guess it'll hold as long as the Powers That Be have the power to keep it holding together, or until a huge crash would serve the interests of that Unholy Oligarchy. I personally hope the crash comes soon...I'm running out of fiat greenbacks to pay bills with and would love to see my physical gold holdings increase enormously! I know that's selfish and very narrow, but our society is based on nothing but "confidence" anyway, we no longer follow the Constitution in so many ways, and we are losing our national sovereignty and our personal freedom. Any series of events that restores our Republic and our freedoms and returns at least the U.S. to a solid, honest money system, I would welcome. At some point, such an adjustment is inevitable anyway.

-- SounDollar (goldbug@dingtoolies.net), February 21, 2000.

Market watcher:

From the CNN web site- http://cnnfn.com/markets/world_markets.html

I downloaded all the markets into Excel. I deleted all the closed markets and any market with a change of zero. The average for all the world's markets is -1.01%. Does this sound like the making of Black Tuesday to you?

The market crash has been predicted since 1974. It hasn't happened yet. It will at some point in the future....but the future can be a long time.

-- Jim Cooke (JJCooke@yahoo.com), February 21, 2000.

Maggie,

I'm interested in your prediction. Can you tell me why your think May 10-20 might be the time for a stock market correction?

Thanks.

-- nabi (nabi7@yahoo.com), February 21, 2000.

"Oil prices rising with no end in sight?"

Silly. Above $30 and severe pressure comes to lower prices, both by governments who buy oil and by OPEC members who want to make a quick buck by selling more oil. Texas oil becomes more worthwhile to pump. Not that much more, and even oil shale is worth extracting oil from.

Hopefully, in a few years there'll be enough hybrid and electric cars to take a lot of the strain off the oil supply.

-- lurker (lurker@lurker.lurk), February 21, 2000.

Nabi,

as I said,it was only a guess on my part,it was based on the transiting planets of Jupiter(exspansion) conjunct Saturn (restriction),both in the solar 2nd house (financial) squaring Uranus (sudden,unexpected changes). I am not an expert by any means,it is just a hobby of mine. The post ask when we thought the bottom would fall out,if ever, so I wrote my uneducated guess.

-- Maggie (song bird@iwon.com), February 21, 2000.

The financial collapse will take place over a period of months. And, it will be years, perhaps, before we will be able to understand the full extent of our dilemma.

-- Farouk Madjurian (fmadjurian@hotmail.com), February 21, 2000.

Someone else got it right when they said it will happen when it benefits TPTB. Until then, the TPTB will keep the market floating along, unless they let down their vigilance or have an accident. Green span and his team have been very vigilant and skillful, yet humans do make mistakes but we have no way to predict when such a mistake will occur. We know that they messed up in Oct of 87 and again in Oct 89.

The real threat may come in the form of runaway oil prices inflating the entire world economy. TPTB want to stop this. So why haven't they? Is it because of the obstinance of OPEC? Nahh...? Seems like there are strong hints out there that oil industry production problems are Y2K related. Thus, they can't just magically wave their wands and have it go away. If she blows out, maybe it will be Y2K-related after all, but we just won't realize the connection? Food for thought.

Meanwhile, I'm not goin out on any more limbs predicting the demise of the stock market. I feel like Wily E. Coyote running off the cliff because I used stock market prediction software from the Acme Company. Gotta go now, I've gotta long fall beneath me.

-- Dick Moody (dickmoody@yahoo.com), February 21, 2000.

In the immortal words of the perennial Great Bear, James Grant (whose erudition I greatly admire; 'There has NEVER been a stock market boom that didn't go boom' (D.Moody, found terrific AU analysis, will e- mail you the link.)

-- robert gridlock (plutusx2@yahoo.com), February 21, 2000.

The major indices will turn around tomorrow by 10:30 EST. Once the lows of the day are retested and cannot hold, shorts will panic and a new upside record for a one day rise will occur.

Most traders and investors perceive the current prices as being at bargain basement levels.

Remember: When 80% fear doom, the opposite occurs, swiftly. And when 80% "know" new highs are imminent, a drop happens.

History will be made this week. It will be to the upside.

-- Joseph Almond (sa2000@webtv.net), February 21, 2000.

Naaaaaaaaaah - Tomorrow will be another cause to buy at "bargain" prices. However between now and March 21st? when the FED meets again to increase by another quarter percent, the DOW will continue to go up and down like a yoyo in the 10-11000 range and the NASDAQ will continue to set record highs like a yoyo. Something extraneous aside of interest rates and high oil prices will pop the bubble but I have no idea what it will be. Even if we have inflation the figures will be hidden to prevent rocking the boat.

-- Guy Daley (guydaley@bwn.net), February 21, 2000.

The uncanny thing about the market is its ability to discount future events, and therein lies its value as far as I personally am concerned. However, things are so marginally stable at the present that the market doesn't know what to do except be nervous. I expect when productivity figures come out for the first quarter in April, it will be painfully obvious to the market how to respond. If you believe Y2K has been a throw-away, you will need to exercise unusual creativity to explain these upcoming results. The coverups have been masterful, thanks to the corporate attorneys. Masking the oil problem has been well done also.

-- roy scruggs (rscruggs_13@hotmail.com), February 21, 2000.

Thanks Maggie.

Guy wrote: "Something extraneous aside of interest rates and high oil prices will pop the bubble..."

Could that something possibly be Chinese agression toward Taiwan? Of all the hot spots in the world, that one appears to be the one most likely to flame up in the short-term. What would a Chinese attack on Taiwan do to the markets?

-- nabi (nabi7@yahoo.com), February 21, 2000.

It has already happened. The question should be,,,, When will we SEE it. The answer? Soon.

-- Scotty (blehman202@aol.com), February 21, 2000.

Nabi,

I don't have an answer to your question. I do feel attention has been drawn away from real problems in the past and will be done so again in the future. I think we are starting to have major problems with oil shortages that will esculate(sp)into other areas. That is something that can't be hidden for long, the real cause of the shortage might well be blamed on something else, which is par for the course.

-- Maggie (song bird@iwon.com), February 21, 2000.

How about them Nato Exersises,just off the Coast of Venezuela,where a new, not too friendly Government has recently been elected,Intimidation or what??

-- real (???@///.com), February 21, 2000.

Gang,

When "Cost Average" Bob Brinker says he is out of the market you have to start to wonder what is going on.

Check out Gold Eagle for a really good analysis of what might happen.

LINK

Hope the link works.

Todd

-- Todd Detzel (detzel@jps.net), February 21, 2000.

Obviously screwed up. Here is the URL: www.gold-eagle/gold_digest_00/joubert021400.html

Todd

-- Todd Detzel (detzel@jps.net), February 21, 2000.

Hey , Market watcher ! Your stealing my thunder . Put this out last Friday , as Robert Cooke will verify . Also made two follow ups on different threads today .

To reiterate , the cracks will appear tomorrow .... the bottom will drop out Wednesday . Had it right two days before the crash of '87 ; but as someone else said , it will be a matter of weeks before the smoke clears . The markets have too many checks/close downs in place for a free fall. Just shows how manipuative Big Money was AND IS ! I felt last Friday , that with the drop in all indicies and the weekend to think it over , BOTH the world markets ( which normally follow ours , especially Japan/Hang Sang/Australian/Europe and had a chance to sell while we were closed ... Would ! And did !) and our own would sell on Tuesday , ESPECIALLY since the economy grew at 6.5% in the last quater , giving Greenspinning a reason to raise interest rates a HALF persent , NOT a quater !!! Eagle

-- Hal Walker (e999eagle@FREEWWWEB.COM), February 21, 2000.

Whoaa Hal Walker - That's pretty big talk. What do you have to back it up?

-- Guy Daley (guydaley@bwn.net), February 21, 2000.

Guy .... Just what I wrote, common sense from living thru the thirties depression AND fifty years of premonitions , where I have yet to be wrong . Not saying this is one of them . If I was certain , I would tell all , but none would listen , even if I could prove all the past fifty years . It's O.K. . That's human nature , basiclly . 99% of the people only believe what they want to believe or see happen .

Have seen it all many times . Tell them minutes ,days ,months and years before it happens . They only have questions AFTER it happens , and those are generally personal ones showing total indifference to the fact I was exactly right as to time ,place , results or how it happened . Don't know where it comes from , and can only recall these since college in '49 . Have about one every two years on average . Eagle

-- Hal Walker (e999eagle@FREEWWWEB.COM), February 21, 2000.

I don't believe that market activity can be closely predicted given the current turmoil in the world i.e....energy, interest rates, war related or threatened hot spots, etc. I totally agree that this extravagant bubble must eventually burst as perceived values outstrip actual values and expectation leaves reality in the dust.

No flame, but astrology simply does not fit into this discussion. Planetary hocus pocus has no bearing upon the manipulative greed of TPTB and their contempt for the ordinary citizen.

-- Irving (irvingf@myremarq.com), February 21, 2000.

Okay Hal, I can't verify your past premonitions but I'll be on top of your hunches this time (then you can use me as a reference). Cracks on Tuesday and the bottom falling out on Wednesday. I expect that strange email address of yours is real, right?

-- Guy Daley (guydaley@bwn.net), February 21, 2000.

C'mon people! TPTB certainly TRY to control the market (to the extent that it affects the economy). Also, I fully believe that the PPT stepped in after Oct. '87, and that Alan Greenspan stepped in during the LTCM mess. They do not have the capability to avert every disaster, though.

The system that is the global financial market is just too complex for it to be controlled perfectly all of the time. The LTCM bailout just postponed the inevitable, it didn't FIX the problem. This bubble will crash, and all the shenanigans available to those who will try to stop it from crashing will not work. Maybe not this Wednesday, but premonitions might be as useful as anything else when it comes to predicting the timing.

-- J (Y2J@home.comm), February 21, 2000.

Joseph Almond says stocks will go up because most investors think current prices are a bargain. Then he says the market goes in the opposite direction of what most people expect. Looks you've got a choice to make, Joe. I'm not into astrology, but some very successful investment pros are. Try www.astromoney.com BTW technical analysis and fundamentals are pretty negative for tomorrow.

-- rebel (with@ina.cause), February 21, 2000.

I wonder if someone could tell me how market curbs might affect a freefall of the market? It seems that every time recently when there has been a sizable drop, the curbs have been brought in and resulted in a temporary "freeze" of the drop. How many times in a day can these be used, and is there an option to halt trading if there is a drop of more than X%?

-- Gia (laureltree7@hotmail.com), February 22, 2000.

OK, dumb newbie here. When did Dow drop 300 pts. last? Don't be picky, I know it wasn't exactly 300.

-- canthappen (n@ysayer.com), February 22, 2000.

GIA- Skim the archives and you will find a discussion of curbs and halts as they are different. Curbs are for programmed trading and halts stop the market. Curbs are at 2% (or thereabouts) and halts are at 10 - 20 - 30%.

Chuck

-- Chuck, a night driver (rienzoo@en.com), February 22, 2000.