As I was painfully beginning to realize that the Santa Clause rally wasn’t coming at Christmas, my daughter was watching the Grinch for the first time. Halfway through, she asked if the Grinch really stole Christmas. In order to avoid traumatizing my child, I informed her that it was not real (while simultaneous admitting to myself that the rally had indeed been stolen). At the end of the show she asked me if the Grinch would steal Easter. I got a good laugh out of it (from the mouth of babes), but I think the last laugh may be on me.
I say this because, I am now thoroughly convinced that we are headed to the bottom of the channel we have been running in for the last two years and will be there within a week or two – which coincidently takes us somewhere just south of Christmas prices (and Tom gets his blessed pullback). So there’s my buy in point, after a retest of the channel lows and established support - Christmas week prices: C-Fund around 13.60, S-Fund around 16.30.
However, what is really bothering me is that such a blatant reiteration of this pattern for the third time makes a fourth iteration unlikely, simply because the cycle has been progressively tightening with each iteration like a rising wedge. If the market drops from here this would keep us from going into territory not quite charted in early 2000 – which fits the mood. But the other side is that a recession following an inverted yield curve usually takes a couple of quarters to kick in, and I still firmly believe the election mudslinging will be the harbinger of the four year curse. Also, I should not forget to mention the Iran thing is still hanging out there like a time bomb (literally?). I don’t see these factors yielding a recession for at least another 5 to 6 months – just enough time for one more cycle in this channel.
I’ve thrown in the towel for March, but it will be the FOMC meeting on the 23rd, that will make or break April. The Grinch (aka Bernake) may indeed steal Easter, and send us into a full market reversal if the fed does not make a move toward fiscal sustainability (This goes beyond Bernake – the circus down in DC needs to turn down the music – and listen to themselves for a few minutes).
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