The DOW to hit 10,000 today? Looks like it

[Thrill]

:)

[SoCalDem]

1. I'm sure all the unemployed people will pop their champagne corks

:grr:

[GoCubsGo]

10. Those of us with 403(b)s will not be complaining

I can't touch mine now, but the one to which I contributed when I was employed lost 40% over the past few years. It's moving back up to where it was when I got laid off 2 years ago. It's bad enough I haven't been able to contribute to any retirement funds since losing my job (temp jobs have no benefits), and I am happy to see the hit I took on the funds I do have being rectified.

[MercutioATC]

2. Make money when you can, but be vigilant.

There's some real ugly right around the corner.

[DaveinJapan]

3. Still feels like a pinball machine on "tilt" if you ask me.

What the heck percentage did this sucker swing this year, anyway?

Extreme volatility is not usually considered a good sign. fwiw. :hide:

[dmallind]

25. Sure it is - but we haven't had any for months. NT

Oh those suckers are up 50% already by the way..

[Statistical]

30. VICs (means of volatility) is at 52 week low. So I agree it being low is a good sign.

[paulsby]

38. volatility is cyclical

far more so than price fwiw.

imo, the VIX this low is SCREAMING buy for puts.

that's just my opinion of course.

also remember the VIX measures IMPLIED volatility, not volatility.

iow, it measures the premium that options traders are placing on risk.

a low vix means that options traders are exchanging options while placing a small premium on risk.

that means that, ceteris paribus, puts are cheap, for example. at least on a relative basis.

options traders are engaged in a zero sum game (the options market is zero sum. the stock market isn't).

every option position necessarily has an equal and opposite position. iow, unlike the stock market, no wealth is gained or lost in the options market in aggregate (apart from commissions), because if i am long a put and another is short the same put, he loses what i gain or vice versa on any move in price

[TwilightGardener]

4. Awesome. My oft-bitched-about 401k is almost back to where it was before the crash.

[AllentownJake]

5. Well banks tend to succeed

When they've had their losses absorbed by the Tax payer and their earnings can be paid out in bonuses to the executives.

:shrug:

[cbdo2007]

6. Alright!!! I can almost feel the money in my pocket...

[DainBramaged]

7. Wait. Let me find a way to celebrate since this will affect me greatly

[raccoon]

8. What a relief, the recession is over. :sarcasm: nt

[Mari333]

9. it will help peoples 401 ks at least. nt

[nevergiveup]

12. Sell Sell Sell

[Statistical]

21. Of course people were also saying to sell at DOW 6500.

If he did that then he wouldn't even need to worry about selling now 50% higher.

[vadawg]

11. ill wait and see how its doing in 20 years, andill start to worry in 15years

though i amagine if you are thinking of retiring soon then its good news...

[NOW tense]

13. Does that mean the banks will start lending again?

I figure they have been making the money back that they lost by investing our money we gave them while not lending. I have been waiting for this number to come, to see just how greedy they will be.

[AllentownJake]

17. This may answer some of your questions on the banks

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=6771506&mesg_id=6771506

[NOW tense]

19. Wow! thanks. n/t

[paulk]

14. Wall Street set for $140 billion dollar payday

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2009/10/14/140-billion-payday-for-wall-street/


how fucking wonderful! Now if I just had all my investments back, you know, the ones I had to liquidate in the last year and a half to live on, I would be just jumping for joy!

a job would be nice, too!

[the other one]

15. I bet "NO"

And probably not ever.

[Statistical]

16. Never? Not in a year, not in 10 years, not in 1000 years?

Ok. :rofl:

Guess you should sell some DOW 10,000 calls and retire.

[Nye Bevan]

28. You lost your bet at 1:21 PM

[earthside]

18. Big Deal.

It means almost nothing to 95 percent of us.

Don't believe that the stock markets are just another casino?

Take a look at this:

High-Frequency Trading Can Be Troublesome by Aldo Svaldi/Denver Post

High-frequency trading has left corporate executives and investors alike struggling to know the true value of stocks.

"We have created a market that best serves those who don't want to hold anything," Tim Quast, managing director of ModernIR, warned a gathering of Denver investor-relations professionals Tuesday.

About 70 percent of daily stock- trading volumes now results from high-frequency trading, where mostly automated, mathematical systems try to profit from tiny differences in stock prices in fractions of a second. ...

... Small traders are gunned down before they can even push the enter key on their computer.

Although some investors like to blame hedge funds, Quast said the stock exchanges themselves are encouraging high-frequency trading.

"The market is absolutely synthetic," Quast warned.

If that assessment is correct, then stock markets could unravel in a big and dramatic way for reasons people don't see coming until it is too late, he said.

Sorry to bust anybody's bubble, but the 'soaring' DOW is no testament to Obama's economic policy -- it is just another example of our bifurcated culture where the elite corporate insiders get rich at the expense of all the rest of us poor suckers.

Indeed, for most of us, the stock markets may very well be a contra-indicator of things to come.

[Statistical]

20. You are slightly off. 95%?

You think only 5% of the country has wealth tied up in the market? It isn't 1906 anymore.

Nearly 60% of Americans have some sort of retirement vehicle (401K, Ira, Roth IRA, 403b) and virtually all of those have at least some % of their money in the market. Hate to be the bearer of band news but unless you have a pension you have NO CHOICE but to plan for your own retirement and some (not 100% but some) exposure to equities is important unless you are considering retiring only on Social Security.

Even those with traditional pension benefit. Pension funds have market exposure and the market recovering strengthens the pension funds and reduces the risk of insolvency.

So sorry to burst your bubble but you line of thinking that only the rich = short guys dressed like the character from Monopoly game increase wealth when markets rise is about a century out of date.

My plan max out Roth IRA each year, and put enough into 401K to max employer match. I figure by the time I retire taxes will be much higher than now making a "traditional IRA" a bad deal. Each time I change jobs I rollover 401K to an IRA then convert it into Roth (paying one time tax on amount). My goal is to amass as much wealth in Roth IRA which the govt can NEVER EVER EVER tax. A million dollars goes a long way if it is tax free.

[NNN0LHI]

22. +1

[earthside]

34. The point is ...

... that 95 percent of us are just along for the ride.

If the market goes up it's mostly because of what the other five percent are doing -- the small, 401K investor has little power to influence or predict the market.

So, the DOW hitting 10,000 today is not about investors deciding to own stock because company profits are going to go up because of new prosperity -- it goes up because gamblers and high frequency traders made a bet.

[janx]

41. "rich = short guys dressed like the character from Monopoly game"

:rofl:

By the way, someone suggested I invest a small amount of money in a Roth IRA--this was many years ago. Not taking that advice was suicide.

[tridim]

39. The Market is also psychological

And a steady upward trend means businesses may start thinking about hiring again.

That is a good thing for EVERYONE, especially the unemployed.

[pampango]

23. It always goes up during Democratic adminstrations and down during repub ones, so if it

doesn't happen today it will happen soon. Democrats have proven to be better at managing the economy than repubs who talk a good game of economic management, but always screw it up. ;)

[Statistical]

24. I don't think it will happen today.

As we get close people who were planning to lighten up will do so and selling pressure push it back down again. Maybe by the end of the week or month though.

S&P 500 @ 1200 by Jan 2010 isn't out of the realm of possibility.

[Thrill]

26. It happened

[Statistical]

27. lol. I came to respond to my post..... and u beat me to it.

Yeah briefly 10,001.58. Made me smile to see 5 digit DOW again. Didn't last long though back into 9980 range.

Likely won't CLOSE above 10K (maybe I will be 0 for 2 in predictions today). :)

[Statistical]

32. 0 for 2 in predictions today. Closed at 10,015.86

[yodoobo]

29. Yet another Proof that Obama's plan is working

take that repigs.

Thank God we won.

[Rex]

31. Bout dam time, will it stay above 10k?

Hope so.

[Statistical]

33. Close - Oct 14 : 10,015.86

[TexasObserver]

35. It's one more bit of good news. Let's hope it leads to more jobs soon.

Confidence returns to the markets over time, and the stock market resurging is one part of that.

I am very hopeful we see employment pick up in November and continue to make gains into 2010. We're not getting down to 5% unemployment in the next year, but we might be able to get back down to 6-8% unemployment.

[Statistical]

36. Unlikely.

If you look at other recession unemployment didn't peak until 9-12 months after GDP turned positive.

GDP likely turned positive at some point in Q3 so lets say August. 9 months would be April 2010. 12 months would be Aug 2010.

Likely unemployment will continue to rise until it peaks around 10% between April & August 2010. Even if we then gain a net of 300K jobs (pretty good start) we are digging out of a hole of 15 million.

That would be 3.6 million in first year after the peak which drops unemployment to about 8%. Say it grows to a very good 400K it would still take another year to get back to full employment = 5%.

So by SWAG is:
jobs losses slowly shrink to <200K per month going into 2010.
Unemployment peaks in April-August 2010.
We are looking at around 8%+ unemployment by August 2011.
Maybe down to full employment (5% unemployment) by August 2012.

Anything faster than that would be off the charts and the greatest recovery in American history.

[TheWebHead]

37. judging by all the pissing on the Dow Cheerios I've seen here today

I had to double check the URL to make sure it wasn't at freerepublic.com.

[flyarm]

40. my son and daughter in law just sold their condo in LA, 1 street away from Bev Hills..

then the bank sent in a company to appraise ..and it didn't appraise for what they bought it for 2 years ago..nor the price they sold it for..so now they lost the sale!


So i guess we should just be lining up and celebrating, with nothing but fucking jollies for the bastards of wall street, who will con enough people to stay in the market, while they pull their/your bucks out, so they can keep their money safe...

ahh they are drinking martini's tonight ..i assure you ...

what fucking fools americans are.