(no subject)

[ceebeegee]

Goddammit, people. Fucking get a grip and STOP PANICKING.

Jesus. STOP SELLING. There's nowhere for the market to go.

Comments

[minstrel70.livejournal.com]

Mutual fund redemptions, which would cover the vast majority of stock selling by the average Joe, were $45B last week. That's a drop in the bucket, and nowhere near enough to account for all the selling. It's going to get really ugly on that side when people start reading their 3Q reports on their 401Ks this weekend.

What seems to be causing this is a massive amount of shorting by hedge funds, as a hedge against their long positions that are tanking.

So yell at the hedge fund managers specifically (and then at the people next week, if it continues), but consider this rather delicious irony: share prices are at bargain levels right now, some people (and institutions) are starting to realize that we're oversold, and the hedge funds could get pillaged in a vicious self-reinforcing rally if enough bargain hunters come into the market soon (self-reinforcing because as shares rise, the hedge funds will have to cover their shorts by buying into a rally).

Some stuff I've been reading leads me to believe we may see a 20% up week soon, if this scenario plays out.

[ceebeegee.livejournal.com]

I gulped and checked my trust fund today. And believe it or not, it hasn't tanked--I should probably buy some more shares. Naturally though, my 401(k) is in the toilet. Haven't checked my Roth IRA yet.

It'll all even out. It's driving me crazy hearing the woman for whom I work getting upset about it, though. She canNOT stop talking about it.

[minstrel70.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's a rough year for most people's 401K. I started out heavily invested in international funds (betting on the weakening dollar) and boy, has that hurt! But dollar-cost averaging will come to the rescue. Worst two things that anyone can do to their retirement savings right now are 1) stop investing and 2) rebalance (although some prudent changes to the investment allocation are not a bad idea). Markets will recover -- they always do. Just a matter of patience.

[nppyinzer.livejournal.com]

I never thought I'd say this, but I'm kinda glad that I never refilled my IRA after I cashed it in.

(Granted, I'm very happy that I cashed it in, because that's how we paid for some unexpected legal fees relating to Jack's adoption, but I've always felt terrible that I didn't make putting the money back a higher priority.)

[catseurat.livejournal.com]

It's like Mary Poppins - get your money out of the banks, now.

[minstrel70.livejournal.com]

Best pay no attention to the market on Friday. It's going to be brutal. As I write this, Asian markets are all down 7-10% in their first two hours. Dow futures are down over 300.

Several things going on to make it an ugly day. The ban on shorting "financial" stocks (I quote it because a lot of non-financial companies were on the list) expired Thursday morning. There's an enormous auction for credit-default swaps (unwinding the mess that was Lehman Brothers). GE (a Dow component) reports earnings (god help us if they miss).

I'm hoping this will be the capitulation. It has to happen eventually if the market is ever to recover. We'll see. My gut feeling as of 11pm the night before: we're going to see a trading halt before lunch (Dow -1100) and a close around Dow 7500 (roughly a 12% drop).