Arkady's Thoughts

As of today the market has lost 22% since Obama won the election. Can we attribute this decline to Obama? Not completely. There are several factors that must be taken into account. 1) We are in a bear market (this is the prevalent direction) 2) There has been a disruption in natural market activity via the bailout. 3) Least important, some economic news is worse than expected. However, under normal circumstances there are these considerations 1) We are in the seasonally best time to be in the market (November to January) 2) We only had one appreciable bear market rally (week before election) 3) Commodities have been falling at a tremendous rate (oil especially) and this alleviates inflation. The fact that this market has been unable to mount any kind of serious move despite the substantial drop in commodities and considering that government intervention has been largely priced in, there remains only one major wild card . President-elect Obama. As discussed in a previous article, the

Plan to give U.S. automakers billions in government-backed loans is on life support after Dems cancel today's vote Well, at least there is some good news coming out of Washington these days. I will be watching the stock market to see how Wall St. reacts to this relevant piece of information, given how they reacted to that stupid bailout of the financial markets I suspect this will be treated as 'bad news'. As you know the market has broken down local support, this means that supply and demand has shifted to the point where Dow 8,000 is no longer attractive. Expect another leg down which could send the Dow down to 7,000. Still, the auto bailout - err I mean - UAW bailout was such a painfully obvious decision, that I am reluctant to give Congress any credit on this. Things to watch for. 1) Today's stock market 2) Obama's administration handling of the auto industry in the first 100 days. (I have a sneaking suspicion that the Big3 might try to hold out for 2 months k