Blog
A Laughable Market Moment
This Wednesday’s rally was a textbook case of ‘the market moves, and a cause is found’. The cause? Two words: “just below”. Fed Chairman Powell stated that interest rates were Just below the....
Even a Constitutional Crisis Will Not Matter to This Bull Market
Even a Constitutional Crisis Will Not Matter to This Bull MarketWe have pounded the table with the fact that news, whether financial or Geopolitical, does not drive the stock market. However, you....
Pattern Similarity: 2000 and 2018
Bull markets are driven by fear, and powered by fundamentals. Bull markets end in euphoria, and weak fundamentals. Despite the uncomfortable ride the market experienced this week, our first....
Markets and Projectiles
In some ways, the market is like a projectile; it launches, it reaches a maximum height, then it falls. The maximum height reached by a projectile depends on its initial conditions: angle of....
A ‘Sure-Thing’?
The following financial news was released on September 7/18, at 8:30 a.m.:Non farm payrolls in the United States increased by 201 thousand in August of 2018, following a downwardly revised 147....
Don’t Just Play the Market. Read it.
No one has access to the future. The ‘talking heads’ on business shows may try to make you believe they know the future; we know no one can know. Yet, as humans, we plan, make decisions, and take....
It’s All About Fear
It is a waste of time to try and assign cause to moves in the market. Market systems are both complex and chaotic; complex because there are so many variables, and chaotic because, even if we....
Stocks Are Not Overvalued
Last week, we wrote:Even if the Lira falling was, in fact, the reason why the market dropped on Friday Aug. 10/18 (which it’s not), what good would that do for us as investors? Up until Friday,....
Looking For an Excuse
Suddenly, everyone is blaming the Turkish Lira for Friday’s (Aug. 10/18) 0.67% pull-back in the S&P 500. Human behavior never changes. We are always looking for “meaning” in everything that....
Rumors of the End, Are Premature
According to the St. Louis Fed, the velocity of money “is the number of times one dollar is spent to buy goods and services per unit of time. If the velocity of money is increasing, then more....
This is why we get better at modelling the weather, but no better at modelling the stock market…
This is why we get better at modelling the weather, but no better at modelling the stock market; the weather is not conscious of our models while the market (participants) are. In addition, the....
To Remember, You Have to Forget
Why do investors tend to forget more about bull markets than about bear markets? After all, bear markets are shorter in duration and in size (on average) than bull markets, so one could assume....
Fear is All That Matters
News, or any broadly-reported information, simply does not drive the market. The most recent and obvious proof of this comes from the insane (in the literal sense) behavior of Donald Trump. Trying....
The Never-Ending Story
Despite all the rhetoric, the political class is not in control. They are just the “front” for the true masters of the universe; big money. Money directly installs the politicians (of both....
Humanity is a Team Sport
“Being human is not about individual survival or escape. It’s a team sport. Whatever future humans have, it will be together.” Douglas Rushkoff The quote applies to international trade as part of....
When It’s Obvious
June 30, 2018Weekly SummaryIn the market, what is obvious, is obviously wrong. Along with that, comes the inability to know why the obvious was wrong. Take trade wars for example. It is obvious....
The Perfect conditions For a Bull Market
June 24, 2018Weekly Summary Mr. Market does not react in a consistent way to fundamentals, which is to say that it does not consistently react to economic data the way we logically think it....
This Has Never Happened Before
The JOLTS report for April (Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey) showed something that has never happened since data collection started in the year 2000; there were 6,698,000 total job openings....
It’s Irrelevant
This week, once again, the market demonstrated that it is not driven by news. If it had been driven by news, it would have gone over a metaphorical cliff when it heard that the....
It is Good That the Market Ignores Politics
Rantings emanating from the oval office are not what drives the market. That is proven to be true week-after-week, and the latest week was no different. The Donald, went from accusing America’s....
The Stock Market is Undervalued
Despite all the digital ink that has been spilled promulgating the idea that stocks are overvalued and in a bubble, especially over the last several years, the reality is that “valuation” is more....
What is Learning?
All learning can be reduced to just one simple function; pattern recognition. That goes for both humans, and machines. Artificial intelligence (AI), or machine-learning, is simply a class of....
Historically, the most advanced economies have always been the most technologically advanced.
Historically, the most advanced economies have always been the most technologically advanced. By definition, technology is the use of science to make labor-saving devices. With AI, we will be....
The Bias for Gold is Now Down
Recently, we pointed out that, since the beginning of the year, gold had stopped correlating normally with interest rates and inflation expectations, but that it had recently returned to its....
The Bull Gently Sleeps: It’s Not Dead
Our working hypothesis is that the only constant factor in the stock market is human emotion, and that these emotions are imprinted in the market’s historical record as repetitive patterns.....