THREAD WARS - A REALITY CHECK / WAKE UP CALL !
FWIW - I thought it might be of interest to point out the performance of the various indicies & sectors that are addressed on this thread - since the outbreak of the "THREAD WARS" in late October.
The "THREAD WARS" broke out over many threadsters here having allready taken OSX profits off the table on the OSX's move to new highs of 140 in Aug/Sept & many suggesting selling all Nat Gas stocks into the early strength & calling a "top" on Dec 31 (which it was) and seeing the Nasdq fall from 4000 to the low-mid 3000 level as a shorting & not a "max margin" opp in Sept/Oct.
What occured was a shake-out of those interested in a diversity of opinion; those who did NOT want to just hear the "good news, just the good news & nothing but the good news" & those who remembered that the Oilpatch - "is, was and will allways be - a CYCLICAL SUBSECTOR... and that there is no "percentage" in trying to be the last pom-pom waving cheerleader standing at the "exact" cyclical top... and that yes; "Pigs get Fat, but Hogs get Slaughtered" - perhaps in cyclicals - more than anywhere else...
Those who talked about playing "defensively" and raising CASH (can't buy the dips - when you were allready on max margin) and about selling into strength - let alone shorting tech; were met with a barrage of ankle bites & general chastisement.
Well folks - here is a reality check from the exact watershed event day (Oct 25) that JQP went "MAX MARGIN" - which set off the aformentioned "THREAD WARS"... read 'em & weep ~
siliconinvestor.com
1. + 33.9% - HUI/unhedged golds (keyword "unhedged" !)
2. + 15% - XAU/broader golds/copper
3. + 11% - XNG/ nat gas
4. + 2% - XOI/ oil majors
5. even - OSX/ service-drillers (not 10ft tall, or bulletproof ?)
6. - 4% - DOW
7. - 16% - S&P
8. - 42% - NASDQ
--- someone might do ole kollmnh, JQP & kodiakbullshyster a fav' & crosspost this "reality check" over to the "plastik-fantastik" thread (VBG) ~ show them the light...
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.... and you wonder just how much pain has been out there for the Perma-Bull, ankle biting Cheerleaders ? - read this:
By the Editorial Board
20 March 2001
US stock market investors suffered their greatest ever one-week losses during the week of March 12-16. The Dow Jones Industrial Average experienced three sharp declines in five days, including a drop of over 400 points on Monday and a 227-point drop on Friday, with a total weekly decline of 821 points—a loss of 7.70 percent. The S&P 500, a broader average of Wall Street stocks, showed a 7 percent decline, while the high tech-dominated NASDAQ index fell 8 percent.
The Dow Jones index fell below the 10,000 mark for the first time in six months, while the NASDAQ index plunged below 2,000 for the first time in three years. Since its March 2000 peak, the NASDAQ has fallen 63 percent, the biggest percentage drop in a major US stock index since the 1929 crash. Over the same period the Dow is down 16 percent and the S&P 500 down 25 percent.
Measured by the amount of paper value wiped out, the financial debacle in the American stock exchange is already among the worst in history, with no indication that a bottom has been reached. BusinessWeek magazine reported in its market watch column that there were hopes on Wall Street that a support level for the NASDAQ would be found at about the 1,350 mark—indicating a further 500-point decline in the high tech index was widely anticipated, which would bring the total plunge to 73 percent.
The combined losses on the NASDAQ and the New York Stock Exchange topped $4.6 trillion by the end of the week, nearly five times the losses from the October 1987 Wall Street crash. The NASDAQ by itself has fallen from $6.7 trillion in March 2000 to $2.7 trillion. The sheer magnitude of this decline is staggering. The $4.6 trillion in losses is:
* Greater than the entire publicly held federal debt
* More than the combined Social Security and Medicare trust funds
* The equivalent of the world losing the economies of Japan and South Korea
* The equivalent of the United States scrapping its auto, steel, electrical machinery and oil industries, all at once
The equivalent of the loss of the entire housing stock of the United States
* Two to three times the total value of Bush's proposed ten-year tax cut
* 1,000 times the amount that Bush would cut taxes this year, in the name of providing a stimulus to the economy and offsetting the threat of a recession
So rapid was the collapse in share values during 2000 that US household wealth saw its first net decline since the federal government began keeping such figures in 1945. Every postwar recession has only slowed the rate of increase in household wealth. But with more than 60 percent of US household assets now accounted for by the stock market, the NASDAQ-led slump produced a 2 percent drop in 2000.
wsws.org |
