Tag Archive for "Stock Market"
August 17, 2009In what many are calling the end of the “sucker’s rally,” the stock market tumbled by about 2.5% Monday as measured by the S&P 500 after a disappointing report on Japan’s economy and growing indications that nothing in the US economy is getting any better than it has been.
Continue Reading “‘Green Shoots’ Turn Brown As Market Craps Out” »
As more road blocks are thrown in the way of Barack Obama’s socialist agenda, the stock market has shown increasing strength that is not readily explained by earnings reports or economic data.
Continue Reading “Derailed Obamagenda Boosts Stock Market” »
How did the Dow Jones Industrial Average wind up +172 at the close after having been down almost 300 points earlier in the day?
According to traders on the floor of the stock market, it’s because the Presidential race tightened.
The unreported dirty secret of this steady stock market decline is that it is largely being driven by the prospect of higher capital gains taxes and a tougher business environment under an Obama administration. So when polls start to show McCain within a point or two, things get decidedly more cheerful on the floor of the Stock Exchange, and everyone’s 401(k) goes up.
Continue Reading “Maria Bartiromo: Market Bounce From Good McCain Poll Numbers” »
John McCain has unveiled a financial rescue package focused on individuals, the primary beneficiary of which will be older Americans who have seen the investment accounts holding their retirement money dwindle in the face of the country’s current economic troubles.
The package, which McCain will officially announce here in Pennsylvania today, features common sense proposals like cutting capital gains taxes, suspending mandatory retirement account withdrawals, and suspending the tax on unemployment benefits.
Continue Reading “McCain Introduces Common Sense Individual Rescue Plan” »
The chart below, which I pinched from The Club For Growth, shows the level of the S&P 500 as it relates to an inverted chart of Intrade’s “Obama Wins” contract.
Intrade is a futures market where investors can purchase contracts on world events. Contracts trade in a pricing range from $0 to $100, where a $0 contract means there is 0% chance the event will happen, and a $100 contract means there is a 100% chance the event will happen.
For example, you believe John McCain will win the election, so you buy a “John McCain Wins” contract at $45. At that moment, the market is saying there is a 45% chance John McCain will actually win the election. If, on election day, John McCain wins, there is now a 100% chance the event will happen, because it has. The contract goes to $100, and you make $55. If, on election day, John McCain loses, there is now a 0% chance the event will happen, because it did not. The contract goes to $0, and you lose $45.
As we sit and watch the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunge below 10,000 (down to under 9,800 as I write this), I feel compelled to note that no one has to sit and watch their entire investment portfolio evaporate into the thin air Democrat mandated bad lending decisions have created.
I want to start off by saying, first and foremost, I am not any sort of financial advisor or investment guru. Everything I write is written as a layman. Don’t take my word for things, or anyone’s word for that matter, without doing your own personal research and evaluating your own personal situation.
An Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) is a bundle of investments built like a mutual fund but trading on the open market like a stock. Few people are aware that there is an entire class of ETF that moves inverse to the stock market. They are called Short ETFs. In simple terms, if the market moves down 1% these funds are designed to move up 1%. In practice, on severe down days like today, they move a little less than the market sector they are supposed to represent because they are sold at a premium.
Not recommending any particular fund family here (could I possibly post any more disclaimers?), but you can get a general sense of the type of Short ETFs out there by looking at the list of ProShares Short ETFs. You’ll see that contrarian funds exist for just about every major market index and sector.
Like any investment, there is inherent risk in these investment tools. One school of thinking on a day like today is that the market is making a bottom. Buying a Short ETF at the market bottom would be like buying a stock at it’s top: It would be all downhill for your portfolio from there.
Again, I’m not recommending that anyone put their money into Short ETFs or that anyone pull their money out of any investment. But I do strongly believe that everyone should be aware of all the investment options available to them and make their own decisions, and it seems that not many people in the financial press or on channels like CNBC and FOX Business are making investors aware that this option exists.
Financial market expert Jim Cramer of CNBC’s Mad Money relayed information he’s heard indicating that the steep stock market plunges we’ve seen in recent weeks could be the result of “financial terrorism.”
Continue Reading “Cramer: Market Plunges Could Be Financial Terrorism” »
