Bear Market

Okay, it’s March of 2011 and I see stock advisors in general are getting very bullish on the stock market. I start to predict a decline for stock prices. I even make an audio/video presentation stating that I predict stocks will start to collapse on May 2, 2011.…

Don’t let them fool you… Yesterday, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) reported that the number of contracts to buy previously owned U.S. homes jumped a surprising 8.2% in May from April. News reports were quick to call the bottom of the U.S. housing market and a few…

Both commodity and equity markets are moving in the same direction these days. If oil, gold and corn are going up, so seemingly are stock prices. It’s really a simple analysis I suppose. The marketplace figures that, if commodity prices are going down, then so is global demand.…

It looks like the current trading action in stocks is the correction/consolidation that we should have had earlier in the year. Investor sentiment was perhaps too optimistic and economic reality has now caught up to the marketplace. The only things that investors really care about are the numbers,…

The latecomers to the gold bull market have been feeling the heat the last couple of days. After reaching a record high of $1,540 an ounce only seven business days ago (on May 3), the price of gold bullion has fallen $55.00 to $1,485. But it’s not the…

As an individual investor, at a certain point, you really need to wonder whether the market is rigged, or, at the very least, if we stand a chance against the big players in the market. Here are some startling examples… The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE/GS) is the…

The good old times must be back. So far this month, 31 major companies have filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to go public, the highest number since the summer of 2007. Corporate earnings? They’re booming again, too. Just look at some of these first-quarter earnings…

What a decade it’s been. We witnessed a terrorist attack on American soil (Twin Towers, September 2001). We’ve experienced the biggest real estate boom market we’ve ever seen (2003-2005) and the bust of that market (2007 to today). It’s been a decade of interest rates at record lows.…

Wow! Things must be good again. The stock market just had its best first quarter run in a decade, up 6.4% for the calendar quarter ended yesterday. The U.S. Labor Department said that 216,000 jobs were created in March and the unemployment rate has fallen to 8.8%. Good…

What a day for the stock market Wednesday! The Dow Jones Industrial Average has come within only 41 points of its post-crash high set in February of this year. The Russell 2000 Index of small stocks sits at its highest level since October 2007. The S&P 500 will…

When the stock market started falling off the cliff during the credit crisis of 2008, one of the most common questions I was asked back then was, “Is this the start of the next depression?” My answer was, and still is, we do not have the same conditions…

My take on what happens in the financial markets and what you hear from reporters and see in the media are two very different things. I guess you know that or otherwise you would not be reading my column. The facts are the facts. Since the crisis in…

They moved quickly… While I’ve been talking (maybe screaming) about getting out of U.S. government bonds because I think interest rates are headed higher, the folks at Pimco, who run the world’s biggest bond fund, took real action. Pacific Investment Management Co. (“Pimco” for short) eliminated all government-related…

There’s so much going on in the world today…so much to tell my readers…and I believe it all boils down to one opportunity for investors. This morning we wake to hear the terrible news of an 8.9-magnitude earthquake hitting Japan. It’s Japan’s biggest quake in 140 years and…

Exactly two years ago today, at the depth of a severe recession not seen since the Great Depression, a bear market rally in stocks was born. Hard to believe, but two years ago, on March 9, 2009, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was trading at 6,440. Today, it…

Phase two of this bear market has been “long in the tooth” and, for the benefit of our over 30,000 new readers who joined PROFIT CONFIDENTIAL last month, I want to explain the three phases of a bear market, where we are today with it, and when we…

If it’s getting more difficult to buy low and sell high because the stock market has done so well, investors who wish to speculate in stocks have only price momentum to help with their trades. Individual stock-picking is difficult at the best of times and, no matter what,…

It would probably be a good idea to consider investing in real estate over the next two years. According to the numbers, it seems like the housing market is at a multi-year low. If you want to invest in stocks, there’s still opportunity, but don’t forget that we’re…

As you read my regular column section below, “Where the Market Stands; Where it’s Headed,” you’ll see that long-term interest rates have hit a new eight-month high. In fact, the yield of the U.S. 10-year Treasury is up 45% since October 2010. Most consumers are oblivious to the…

What a difference six months makes. Last summer, investor sentiment was so bad that stocks were selling off on good corporate news. Now everything seems rosy again. The stock market is going up, commodity prices are strong. All an investor has had to do over the last six…