http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_00/deden010100.html

Fair Use....yada, yada, yada

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When will it all end?

No one knows how much further it will go or how long it will last. No one can predict with any accuracy the length of these manias. One thing certain is that busts follow booms. It will be sudden, nasty and impossible to escape from it. Many thought that the Japanese market was ridiculous when it passed 50x earnings in 1988. But when the bubble topped at 70x earnings a year later, it went straight down with enormous wealth destruction consequences.

Many economists and commentators have speculated as to what the catalyst is likely to be. The answer is that no one knows as there is a great deal of emotion involved. Irrational markets cannot be expected to function within rational expectations. Perhaps a sudden rise in a commodity, a surprising loss in a large company, the insolvency of a financial institution, or a further rise in interest rates might turn greed into fear and then panic. In addition to loss of confidence or rise of suspicion, several exogenous events could also spark an exodus from the US dollar and the resulting bust of the stock markets. What is certain is that the longer this boom lasts and the further it expands, the greater the ensuing turmoil it is likely to produce. No reassuring words from a benevolent Fed will succeed in corralling the fear of a mob running for cover.

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Folks, we are inside the bubble. The first words out about the IT screwups that are going on and it will burst.

Hold on the ride will not be smooth.

The article says it all, please read, learn, and hunker down.

-- LM (latemarch@usa.net), January 01, 2000

Answers

"Learn and hunker down.???????" When I saw all the big fireworks dislplays going off perfectly, from those "countries who aren't nearly as advanced as the US," and when I saw no rogue missiles or terrorists or UN white vehicles or chemtrails or subliminal messages from God, or TPTB heading for bunkers, I knew it was going to be a big party for 2000 and a big nothing for Doomers. I

-- gilda (jess@listbot.com), January 01, 2000.

Look more carefully at common stocks and you'll see a different story than the DJIA (30 large capitalization stocks) or Nasdaq Composite (dominated by a few dozen large capitalization stocks):

Data as of the end of November 1999:

- The average NASDAQ stock peaked in October 1997. - The average NYSE stock peaked in April 1998. - A majority of S&P 500 stocks were down (for January through November 1999) In mid-December 1999, I checked a list of over 200 Michigan stocks tracked daily in a special section of the Detroit Free Press: Approximately 3 out of 4 were down or had gained less than 5% from January through mid-December 1999.

Not every stock is a QUALCOMM!

-- Richard Greene (Rgreene2@ford.com), January 01, 2000.

Folks,

Learn to devise your own radar. Fine tune it with a selection of news sources that have proven track records.

GoldEagle creates news pieces to spook you and to get you to buy precious metals.

Sure, the market may tank. But the bears have been saying this for more than 10 years. Wake up and smell the coffee, you cannot hide in the 'doom closet' for years hoping to be eventually right. If you want to make wise investment choices, base them on wise investment information. If you followed the doomers for 10 years you got nothing. You should have been in the market at least until Spring of 1999. If you were not due to fear you wasted time and money.

-- hamster (hamster@mycage.com), January 01, 2000.

And a decline in value of only 30 or 40 companies is not that likely to translate over into a catastrophic market crash. 1987, incidentally, was by no means catastrophic.

-- Paul Davis (davisp1953@yahoo.com), January 01, 2000.

Paul,

Don't be so foolish as too make a rash generalization like that. 30 or 40 of the top companies collapsing in price could well bankrupt the system, In fact 10 of the right ones might just do it.

Actually all it takes is 1 company...the right one, but they won't unless its by gunpoint... I speak of the Federal Reserve and no they're not the US government but a private enterprise.

-- Dick Moody (dickmoody@yahoo.com), January 01, 2000.

It will end when it ends. Markets are totally unpredictable. If it makes you nervous, get out now. What's the big deal? Probably you have been out for years and have missed all this bubbling and that pisses you off. Me too. My guess, and I'm almost always wrong, is that the bubble has a way to go. I am reduced to a cliche--we are in a new paradigm.

-- Lars (lars@indy.net), January 01, 2000.

Well, the Fed is not likely to collapse unless the government goes first. Their level of backing is tremendous. They have made it through some VERY rough times in the past, I don't see them going belly up in the future unless Congress votes to withdraw backing from them. Not going to happen in the near future.

Anyhow, we were talking about the stock market. The Fed doesn't trade on the Exchange, unless you want to count bonds, which is another market entirely.

-- Paul Davis (davisp1953@yahoo.com), January 01, 2000.

{Arnuld accent} Ya, the optimistic investor invented dis new perpetual motion machine, its called the NASDAQ. It runs on enthusiasm and greed. NOTHING can stop it!!

-- Guy Daley (guydaley@bwn.net), January 01, 2000.