Ahhh, the media. If a story doesn't exist - fabricate one! For example, here's a headline posted today on ABC "news"...

Dow Slips to First Losing Week of 2012

Yes, the Dow Index did post its first losing week of 2012. But is that a headline?  Come on now - we're not even a month into the new year and we are reporting annual statistics? The fact is that the market has been stronger than horseradish, and the S&P and NASDAQ both closed out the week with gains. I wish I could say that this is the first stupid headline I've read this year, but it is neither the first - nor the last. Yeesh!

JD

Our Dow and S&P 500 targets were hit a few days ago, and we have now reached our target for the NASDAQ Composite! We couldn't have asked for a better path to these targets, but what now? I think our first clue should come from the due to the major resistance that it is currently testing.

The chart above shows how we resting right at this resistance level. Next week should provide us with our first glimpse of where the market goes from here. The strong and consistent march to the upside makes the market look extremely overbought. Momentum seems to have slowed as well, but getting bearish on the market now is strictly a gamble - let's see if we can get the Dow to tip the markets hand in the next couple of days.

JD

We have just updated our index analysis, and we could 't be happier with how well our latest projections have played out! The Dow and the S&P have already hit their targets, and the NASDAQ looks poised to ring the bell in a couple of days. So what's next?

Good question. We have formidable resistance to the upside, the never-ending Europe saga still dragging on, the Feds making Q3 noise, and Iran getting poked and prodded by the West. The good news is that the charts are at a critical point. In the next few days,we hope to see the indexes tip their hand. We have been on a steady march to the upside for the last few weeks, and a few earnings reports could really drive the market in either direction. We'll be watching closely (but ignoring noise) and update our projections once we see how things shape up. 

JD

Everyone has heard the story about how the stock market generally rises in December. This phenomenon has been dubbed the Santa Clause Rally. But I wanted to know if the Santa Clause Rally really existed, or if the market was actually leaving us lumps of coal.

I took a look at the chart for the S&P 500 index and used Nirvana Systems Seasonality Module to see if there was any evidence of a Santa Clause Rally. I was surprised to find that not only was their evidence, but the market is downright bullish in December!

Since 1990, the S&P 500 has posted gains 77% of the time. Not only that, but the index averaged a gain of almost 2% - that's a holly jolly Christmas! In fact, December is the most bullish month of the year, beating the next most bullish month, April, by over 4%.

We're currently in the red in December of 2011, but if history is going to repeat itself, we could see a strong upward move to round the year.

JD

We thought it would be a good idea to let me post some educational content and abrasive comments on the market. We might be very, very wrong, but here we go! This first post is a test, and only a test. I'll try and post something of nominal interest in the near future.

JD