Phantasmix Stock Market Blog

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$BKX, Bank Index

This is in a very ugly territory. It hasn’t been this bad since the start of the 2008-09 “event”.

$BPNYA, NYSE Bullish Percent Index

Crazy sharp drop. Once again, hasn’t been this bad since ’08-09.

$BPSPX, S&P 500 Bullish Percent Index

Same as above

$NYSI, NYSE Summation Index

It’s in the negative territory (dotted line), but I’m most interested here in how it correlates to market prices. It’s pretty good for showing direction but not the size of the move.

$VIX, Volatility Index

An obvious inverse relationship here.

Looks very choppy, sort of a deciding moment.

I think most of these indicate there will be 4-12 weeks of basing action and a continuation of the bull market, but wouldn’t bet real money on it.

Investors have heard many decry the decade of the 2000s as the “lost decade.” A dollar invested in the S&P 500 on the first trading day of 1999 saw it worth just 65 cents a decade later (3/31/09 is our cutoff point). This “underperformance” is seen by many as a failure of the U.S. economic engine.

If we look at the Top 20 performers of the S&P 500 during that same time period, we see a vastly different story. Instead of a 35% loss during that time, the Top 20 earned an average 426% return in stock price, excluding dividends. What accounted for this differential performance during this “lost decade?”

The rest is kind of TLDR, but if you’re curious, the source:
Lessons from S&P Recession Survivors [PDF]

A bear flag on S&P index. Frankly I expected something like a June bottom, but it doesn’t look like that so far. Maybe it will move up after a quick retest?

I haven’t sold anything yet, still holding March SPY puts, April SPY calls and some now-penny-stockish t*rds BEE and LYG.

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