Our
leaders aren’t tending to chores,
as
our debt and insolvency soars.And it’s really a shame,
that the one that they blame,
is the head guy at Standard and Poors.
-
Skip
Jordan, Portsmouth (letter to the editor, Virginian-Pilot)
I
expected a longer bounce...so much for expectations. We only got a one-day bounce since today we gave back
yesterday’s gains. That may change
though because it looks like we made a double bottom today on lower volume and
I think that a lot of people will buy it tomorrow and maybe for a few days
after. After a short respite, I think we
will resume the downward price action.
The
market is pricing in a recession. I must
say that I agree with the market, just based on the comments from experts I
have mentioned in previous blog posts.
A
couple more comments on the drop in Productivity reported by the Labor
Department yesterday: It was the first back to back drop in productivity since
the second half of 2008. That was the
crash half. I noted that the labor costs
were up 2.2%, but I didn’t realize that labor costs had already risen 4.8% in
the 1st three months of the year.
Sentiment
is a counter indicator – low sentiment is Bullish. The NTSM Sentiment indicator dropped below
30% today, meaning that less than 1 in 3 investors are bullish. That in itself is bullish. Unfortunately, that is the only Bullish
indicator we have now and I’m not sure we should treat it as a Bullish
indicator since that looks like the smart money right now. In other words, sometimes the herd is right.
The
NTSM analysis indicates Hold today so we remain out of the market per our last
Sell signal.
I sold on the 27 July sell signal and I am defensively
positioned with only a small amount of my portfolio invested in stocks. (Zero
stocks in the 401k.)
