Dow Jones Industrial Average

One of the great myths about investing that we’re told by the mainstream investment education is that we should “buy and hold” for the long term. Let's look at the numbers...

December 5th 1996: After rising 210% off the 1987 crash lows, Alan Greenspan speaking at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, asks: "But how do we know when irrational exuberance has unduly escalated asset values, which then become subject to unexpected and prolonged contractions as they have in Japan over the past decade?" The next day, the Dow Jones Industrial Average slumps by 1% to close at 6,381.94; over the next three years, the market nearly doubles...then crashes...then doubles... then crashes... and then triples in the last five years... "rational exuberance"

The ongoing slump in oil prices looks set to take their toll on London’s “super prime” property markets with attendant consequences for the rest of the London property market. Foreign money that had been flooding into the UK from a whole array of international sources and parking in London real estate is drying up.

Because nothing says "spend on Black Friday" like a fractionally positive Dow Jones Industrial Average closing in the green with a last minute surge that gets its from red to just barely green... and completely unrigged. 

Following the October swoon, stocks have vaulted to all-time highs. As we discussed previously in "Sentiment Is Off The Charts Bullish," there have only been few occasions where investors have felt so "giddy" about the financial markets. Such periods of exuberance have never ended well for investors as they were deluded by near-term "greed" which blinded them to the building risks. One of the things that we pay attention to is the ratio of the S&P 500 compared to longer duration bonds.

Something is dreadfully wrong in America.

Isn't it amazing what 2000 Dow points will do to a Federal Reserve member's perspective of 'the economy' and 'inflation expectations'. Bullard is back again today:

*BULLARD: INFLATION EXPECTATIONS REBOUNDED SINCE MID-OCTOBER
*BULLARD: FED TO RAISE RATES IN 2015, TIMING DETERMINED BY DATA

So basically calling off QE4 until the next 9.9% correction... Dow-Data-Dependent indeed

“Keep in mind that even terribly hostile market environments do not resolve into uninterrupted declines. Even the 1929 and 1987 crashes began with initial losses of 10-12% that were then punctuated by hard advances that recovered about half of those losses before failing again... The 2007 top began with a plunge as market internals deteriorated materially, increasing day-to-day volatility, and a tendency for large moves to occur in sequence." Investors should interpret recent market strength in its full context: we’ve observed a fast, furious advance to clear an oversold “air-pocket” decline.

Congress gave the Fed a mandate to “promote maximum employment, production, and price stability”; it never explicitly authorized propping up stocks. Yet through a remarkable theoretical stretch called the “wealth effect,” that’s exactly what the Fed is doing.

"...the underlying cause of a crash will be found in the preceding months or years, in the progressively increasing build-up of market cooperativity, or effective interactions between investors, often translating into accelerating ascent of the market price (the bubble). According to this ‘critical’ point of view, the specific manner by which prices collapsed is not the most important problem: a crash occurs because the market has entered an unstable phase and any small disturbance or process may have triggered the instability."

Nobody in the economic intelligentsia is implying that the IMF is staffed by paranoid cranks. They continue to ignore and belittle the Austrian school. This pompous and undeserved behavior will go on until it’s too late. In the process, the ivory tower disciples of Keynes will only further prove their intellectual bankruptcy. The average person never trusted them to begin with. And things certainly won’t change now.

"I see deflation flirting with America." Retail sales equals consumer spending equals velocity of money. And unless the money supply is rising, hardly likely in the taper, less spending is deflation by definition. Forget about PMI and all that kind of data, it’s much simpler than that. Central banks can do all kinds of stuff, but they can’t make us spend our money on things we don’t want or need. Let alone make us borrow to do so. And if we don’t, deflation is an inevitable fact. That doesn’t mean prices for some items won’t go up, but that’s not what counts. It’s about how fast we either spend the money we have – if we have any left – or how much we borrow. And if time is money, then borrowed money is borrowed time. So we really shouldn’t.

• Dallas County May Declare State of Disaster From Ebola Virus (BBG)
• Markets on edge after worst turmoil in four years (Reuters)
• Central bankers may have no quick fix as markets swoon, economy weakens (Reuters)
• Risk of Deflation Feeds Global Fears  (Hilsenrath)
• U.S. health official allowed new Ebola patient on plane with slight fever (Reuters)
• Texas Hospital Fights Allegations About Ebola Protocols (BBG)
• Treasuries Gain as Oil Drops Below $80 While Stocks Slide (BBG)
• Greek Bonds Slump on Bailout Concern as Spain Misses Sale Target (BBG)
• White House shifts into crisis mode on Ebola response (Reuters)
• Obama Confronts Slippery Slope as Islamic State Advances (BBG)

If central banks have learned anything since 2008, it's that waiting around for the panic to deepen is not a winning strategy. Put yourself in their shoes. Isn't this what you would do, given the dearth of alternatives and the very real risks of implosion? Anyone in their position with the tools at hand would not have any other real option other than to buy stocks in whatever quantity is needed to reverse the selling and blow the shorts out of the water. If $1 trillion doesn't do the job, make it $3 trillion, or $5 trillion. At this point, it doesn't really matter, does it?