Booman Tribune ~ A Progressive Community

Deep Thought

by Steven D
Fri Feb 20th, 2009 at 11:54:09 AM EST

Stolen from bigmike ...@gmail.com, someone who clearly doesn't care for the way our free market system is working at the moment:

WOULD YOU RATHER THE DJI HITS 3000 OR A T REX CHASED YOU THRU CENTRAL PARK bigmik..@gmail.com - 2 minutes ago (1 post) [Note: DJI stands for the Dow Jones Index, the most popularly referenced stock market index in America]

I suppose for a lot of people there really isn't much of a difference. Getting eaten by a dinosaur might be quicker. Certainly it would put a lot of stock traders out of their misery.

Over the last decade financial advisers have been telling people nearing retirement age that they need to keep significant amounts of their retirement savings in the stock market because our average life expectancy is longer. People who took that advice have watched 50% of their savings (more or less depending on the specifics of their portfolio) evaporate, with more losses all too likely, I bet a lot of them right now are wishing they'd cashed out 2 years ago. Then again, I imagine quite a few of them are having regrets about the Bush/Republican/Greenspan policies that inflated the value of their homes and the markets without creating any real wealth based on production rather than accounting tricks and speculation.

Deep Thought | 8 comments (8 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Deep Thought (none / 0)

In a similar vein.

"If you look for the social economic motive, you will not have to wait for history to tell you what was propaganda and what was truth." - George Seldes

by Real History Lisa (lpeaseRemoveThis@gte.net) on Fri Feb 20th, 2009 at 12:13:37 PM EST

Re: Deep Thought (none / 0)

I'd rather be carried away by a pterodactyl.

by BooMan on Fri Feb 20th, 2009 at 12:24:06 PM EST

Re: Deep Thought (none / 0)

If you had told me two years ago that the Dow today would be roughly at the same level as it was back on October 27, 1997, I would have laughed at you.

We keep plummeting through every support level the numbers boys can come up with. We're screwed.

More at Zandar vs. The Stupid.

by Zandar1 on Fri Feb 20th, 2009 at 01:25:00 PM EST

Re: Deep Thought (none / 0)

at what point do you think we'll have bargain prices?

I hope we're getting close.

by BooMan on Fri Feb 20th, 2009 at 01:28:01 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Deep Thought (none / 0)

I'm honestly not seeing a bottom anytime soon. The whole talk of bank nationalization, or receivership, is scaring the crap out of stockholders who know they're going to get wiped out. Bank stocks are bleeding like stuck pigs right now. It's going to happen, just a matter of when.

The "when" is looking damn soon.

Home prices have to stabilize before there's any hope for the rest of the market to stabilize, and they're still waaaaaay overpriced compared to median incomes.

So yeah, home prices still have far to fall. Until that stops happening, everything else is going downhill.

More at Zandar vs. The Stupid.

by Zandar1 on Fri Feb 20th, 2009 at 02:09:54 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Deep Thought (none / 0)

Boo! This blog must be doing better than I thought.

;O)

A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned how to walk forward. Franklin D. Roosevelt

by Steven D on Fri Feb 20th, 2009 at 02:24:15 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Deep Thought (none / 0)

yeah, not really. Donations are always welcome, although I am trying to stick for asking for them at the end of each month.

by BooMan on Fri Feb 20th, 2009 at 02:47:45 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Pinning the Bottom (none / 0)

Here's some fake economics to help give folks some sense of where a DJIA bottom 'should' be:

<fakeEconomics>
Given:
All Fiat value in the global economy is destroyed when you are at 'The Bottom'.

Given:
Fiat value is roughly the current value minus what projected 'real' value is out there.

Assumption:
The Fiat value bubble began in earnest when the US went off the gold standard in 1971, ending the Brenton Woods Agreement of 1944.

Assumption:
Appropriate 'Real' value can be extrapolated from longterm growth rates between Brenton Woods and the end of the gold standard: doubling every 5 years over the course of 27 years. (Pretty good returns!) Any difference between the actual DJIA and the 'real' prediction represents the fiat or speculative value in the market.

Historical Values:
DJIA bottom in 1944: @140
DJIA bottom in 1971: @780

Historical DJIA in 1998: @7100
Extrapolated 'Real' DJIA in 1998: @4300

Historical DJIA this morning: @7250
Extrapolated 'Real' DJIA Today: @5900

Given:
During the gold standard, currency speculation was essentially capped at 4:1, so markets were inflated by 'trust' and 'speculation' even then.

Therefore we have two bottoms: The gold-backed bottom of @5900 and the speculation and trust free bottom of about 1/4 of that or a DJIA of @1475 ("Welcome to Bartertown").

</fakeEconomics>

The T-Rex doesn't look so bad, especially if you have an understanding of it's supposedly very limited perception systems.

Declaring the bottom is the only way back up..

by anarchronarchist (mincers (-at-) hotmail (-dot-) com) on Fri Feb 20th, 2009 at 01:41:08 PM EST

Deep Thought | 8 comments (8 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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