No reason to worry! Portfolio insurance is gone, and circuit breakers are in ...

Plus, derivatives now allow sharing of risk, and hedge funds now hedge risk.

And there's so much private equity, that lots of the risk isn't even IN the public markets.

Anyway, our creditors wouldn't let our markets fail, would they?

well they managed to put in a strong close in the last 15min. - looking forward to the WIR.

Last 15 minutes? It was a ~90 point rocket from 2:30pm on, JUST THE TIME IT USUALLY TURNS.

An even funnier question of the day is ‘why did the market rally so much in the last hour of the day?'

Folks, forgive Bill when he gets overly excited when the market falls. This is what happens to people that are predominantly holding cash. See Bill's entry on the night of November 27 about the Nikkei falling for another instance of Bill getting really excited.

Bill's been wrong on the direction of the market for over a year now. But of course, he'll only remind you readers of calls that he called right. It's his routine: make lots of calls, remind readers of calls you made right, and stay silent on calls you didn't get right.

How's your short position on the XLF Bill? You shorted it at 29.13. It's now at 35.49. A 22% loss. Add in the 2% dividend, and it's a 24% loss. Ouch.

Cramer comes clean on his wrong calls, even puts Post-It notes on his forehead. How about you?

Claire,

Take your refund for all the money you have paid to Bill and move on!

And if you have better calls to make, go and get a blog and you will get millions of readers..

There are very few Reader comments like yours but they really irritate - if you are looking for some stock calls, go and pay money to Stock newletters - they give you details of gain/loss on each of their calls - don't you understand this basic thing?

Lots of readers, myself included, come to this Blog everyday to learn and find it refreshing that there is an expert player who is sharing his wisdom and knowledge for no monetary gains - and as far as few calls going wrong, I have been long enough in the market to know that there is none out there who has made consistently correct calls! Nobody has made money that way! What Bill tells, if you want to know and learn, is how to play this market by reducing your risk and getting the profits where they are available (Did you invest in KRY, KRI.TO, AET, and others when Bill mentioned them?).

It is a request to the people who are unhappy with what Bill writes to stop coming to read this Blog and let Bill continue to write without this un-necessary irritation.

Claire:

I've followed JJC for quite some time. And I can offer incontrovertible proof that he does not fess up to his mea culpa's. He does it enough to provide some required humility.

Regarding Bill's XLF call, I'm quite sure that as a profesional, he realized his mistake and closed his short position. When I posted my lament to the board at my being early on XLF short (I was not reading Bill and was unaware of his XLF discussion), he was kind enough to note that his bloggers would be quick to remind of his own error on XLF.

If you are going to condemn, why don't you proffer up some of your own observations and insights that might provide a constructive counter to Bill's or any other's point of view expressed here.

Otherwise, kindly save your patronizing "Folks, forgive Bill" for another venue. Bill appears to me to be less in need of forgiveness than your need for an audience for writing something vindictive. It's odd behavior to be sure. I see it on Ritholtz's blog as well. I don't bother trying to understand it, and even responding to it gives your comment more credit than it deserves.

Being forthright, whether one makes the right call or the wrong call, that's not to much to ask for, is it?

But if one is to pump-up the correct calls and stay quiet on the wrong calls, that's not exactly being true with the readers.

Oh-oh,...here we go...

I read Bill's blog every day, though I confess I do not read EVERY post of every word of every reco.

I do know this: Bill has repeatedly talked about weaknesses in the underlying economy, all the while acknowledging the current price action and urging we watch that closely.

This is not a trading service. I really don't think he has to go over every mention of every company/etf.

Sounds like you made a bad trade based on something you read here.

I'll let Bill speak for himself. But the beauty of it is, unlike thestreet.com, we don't have to pay Bill a dime, nor does he owe us anything in terms of what he chooses to bring up or not.

Unlike Cramers lunatic show, we don't even have to view a single ad here, either.

I think we are talking on this blog, in general, about much larger issues than a given stock being up or down. It's kind of sad that you don't see that.

On Bill's behalf, I'll happily refund the price you paid for his insights on this blog.

Mike
NYC

Claire,

If you don't like the shopping experience at a particular store would you keep going back to complain about it or just move on to a different store? You really need to move on, but maybe you don't because you like the free handouts at Bill's store....

If you want perfection, go try it yourself. You won't find it, but you might learn something about temperament.

No readers of this blog need to be saved from or reminded of Bill's market calls.

The simple question to ask is what are Claire's motive(s). Either she bought or sold stock based on something she read here which turned out with a bad result; or she is jealous of Bill's success as a blogger. I can't think of any other motives that make any sense for such petty remarks.

Hope everyone has a great weekend.

I also remember Black Monday clearly. Mostly because on Friday I sold all of my stock assets and at that point was fully in a cash position. On Friday, the Dow 30 Industrials had crossed under the 200 day moving average for the first time I believe in a year or longer. That was a big deal in technical terms at the time as far as indicators go. Today is different in that the 200 day line is at 11,470 ema. So from that perspective this moment in time is different. How did I know to get out ahead of the move? At that time the largest mutual fund newsletter was the Telephone Switch Newsletter by Dick Fabian. He used the Dow 30 200 day as his indicator to sell everything. That was part of the problem with Black Monday. Mutual funds had to sell stock to handle all of the sell orders. Especially Fidelity Investments since Fabian picked most of his investment plays from their funds. I always kept an eye on the 200 day line in IBD.

Bill, I recommend you offer an "ignore this user" function. 1 to 1 customization for valued members. lol. Claire who?

My guess is that "Claire" doesn't exist.
My guess is that someone or some organization, far more evil than our ditzy Claire, is checking to see what effect they can have here.
A salvo, if you will, over the bow.
Look at the timing of "her" remarks (Friday close). Has anyone ever heard from her before?
Very suspicious.
IMHO, cut her off. Waste of time.

Claire
Speaking of Cramer, he is now all over Yamana and down in the dumps on his old fav. KRY, a lot of TH's are really pumping this falling USD story, whats up?

Hi Jock:

I´ve tried to send you an email but the link with your name doesn't work.
Send me an email to saberinvestir@yahoo.com and give your email so we can talk.

Now in portuguese:

O meu nome é Vitor.
Terei o maior gosto em falar sobre Portugal e ajudar a conhecer este pequeno país...

Um abraço

Vitor

Claire... lets get some facts straight here.

"Bill's been wrong on the direction of the market for over a year now"

Wrong: He called a 'Year of the Metals' .. he called the May Crash.

"Bill's entry on the night of November 27 about the Nikkei falling is another instance of Bill getting really excited."

And a good thing he did get excited about that.
I don't hear anyone else in TH land speaking out about the weakness in the Asian market.
On CNBC they are ignoring it.
So Bill has done you and readers a favor again.
In fact even thought the NIKKEI recovered a bit - Hong Kong has been hit with hard selling since the end of November.
Did you take the hint to lighten up on any Asian equities you may own?

"Cramer comes clean on his wrong calls, even puts Post-It notes on his forehead"

To compare Bill to Cramer is laughable.

---

Now as to your original question Claire:

"An even funnier question of the day is ‘why did the market rally so much in the last hour of the day?'"

I would like to answer that for you.

There are several reasons.

1st off - anyone short wants to even up before the weekend and they usually close their positions by 2:30 because they are going home.

Buying programs often suspiciously like to kick in around GANN times - so shorters that have not covered get caught here – especially if the market's downside momentum has been subsiding – they are forced to cover as the market is rising.

Another reason is that people 'in the know' may be expecting news such as a merger or a big deal on Monday - another reason to close out short positions or even go long.

*More importantly the Yield fell a lot today – so a lot of ‘black boxes' or ‘institutional algs' that trade in the last hour will now see stocks cheaper on a yield basis - their computers are programmed to buy in this case.

Finally and most importantly - there are often imbalances in trading during the final hour (and often at lunch time)
Dealers MM's and specialists can take advantage of this to move the market.
In this case the price will move in the direction of the imbalance if there are not enough offsetting orders and the MM/specialist has to take the stock into his own account.
This can sometimes also occur right at the close if there is a MOC imbalance – in this case the market can scoot up in the last 10 minutes quite quickly.

So Claire I hope this answers your question.

And I also hope you see that much knowledge can be gleaned from Bill and his blog and equally from the many commentators who post.

So why ‘dis such a great blog??? Makes no sense to me.

‘enough said….

Concur and kudos to T'man and all who answered the flame. I can't believe some of the whining that goes on in FREE blogs about opinions, calls, etc. Mind boggling.

Hope everyone caught g034's repost regarding trading in gold. There are one or two other absolute nuggets out there on this topic from g034 and others for those with time, patience and the knack of running google-searches.

In fact, there's a wealth of free information on this blogsite for those with the same attributes to discover. I've pointed out the "Best of Bill" from time to time but will not repeat it. A lot of Bill's book is right in these pages I bet. I've likely read 90% of his posts, even the archived TraderWizard stuff.....

"To compare Bill to Cramer is laughable," so true Tradesman, Jim has ran a real hedge fund and made real money for clients.

Over a year ago, Bill also called for the Dow to drop to 8200, later upped to 8800. Still waiting...

Thank you, tradesman.
I don't have the time to deal with idiots.
Please make sense, a****, or stop talking.
What sends us such a big red flag is your foolish logic and "soft" thinking.
Spare us please.

Claire,

Bill has been right, and Bill has been wrong. But I believe his intent is to share his knowledge and to help us be better traders by exposing us to the techniques he uses.

Have you learned to be a better trader by reading this blog? I have.

Would you rather be right 9 times out of ten and make a dollar, or wrong 9 times out of ten and make a hundred. How many times Bill is right or wrong is not the issue.

He's a teacher, not a tip sheet.

...david...

"Bill's been wrong on the direction of the market for over a year now. But of course, he'll only remind you readers of calls that he called right. It's his routine: make lots of calls, remind readers of calls you made right, and stay silent on calls you didn't get right."

That is a very narrow minded statement to make about Bill. I don't think there is any doubt in the mind's of longterm regular readers of billcara.com that the information presented here is of high quality - the agenda IMO is clear - 'get the information out to THE PEOPLE on how the system works'. Study, observe, react, reflect. There's transparency, objective reasoning and more importantly independent thinking. Your agenda on the other hand - i'm not quite sure.

He's human - there are external variables - many of which he cannot control - adjustments must be made along the way and timing it all - well that's a different story altogether!

What will you be saying if the market hits 8200/8800 sometime in the future?

If you were making a genuine attack on XLF in particular or even the 8200/8800 DOW call - and it's not a personal thing - than why not ask how he managed the XLF trade/DOW call or better yet try to figure it out for yourself if it didn't go your way either.

MarkM - you are correct - it was 2:30 - my mind was still in the intra mode as I was watching the YM for an entry near the end of the day.

Tradesman - that post on market internals for the DOW was interesting - thanks.

Claire I suggest you show more respect for Bill per the notion to "agree to disagree;" then again there are thousands of other sites to frequent if you insist on being a jerk. I may not like or WANT to agree with all of his statements/positions (e.g. on General Electric since it is the anchor of my IRA per my purchase in late 2002); however in the process of my training and education I hope to be a better manager of my own wealth as a result (e.g. Bill's alternative to GE being ABB hence I have researched the firm).

Choking on any trade simply proves you cant get them all right; hec if I had made a call like KRY I can honestly say I would be pating myself on the back with one hand and administering a fatty "parade wave" with the other.

Sorry, all, for the use of course language.
End of a very good week, thanks Bill, and here comes this "person" who chooses to attack without reason or explanation.
Hello, "Claire", why don't you give us a little background, CV, who the hell are you?
We,I think, are very happy interacting, making $, and assimilating a trading system that has served Bill very well over many years.
Got any better ideas?
Please tell us.

Please, you're all being too harsh on my dearest Claire!

Claire has begged me to explain and share her HUGE problem with y'all and she desperately needs your love, understanding and sweet sympathy.

It all began in 1995 at the age of 5 when Claire ordered her first Baskin Robbins - Ice Cream Jamoca Almond Fudge with all the toppings. She's never been the same physically and mentally since. She loved it so much, she was forced to order another and then another and then another. In fact she loved BR JAF icecream so much she stared eating it for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Now at 16 years of age and topping the scale at 750 lbs plus she's decided to take action: File suit against Baskin Robbins!!! SUE THOSE DEVILS!!! Sure, Claire continues to eat there 24/7, BUT THAT"S NOT HER FAULT THAT ICECREAM MAKES YOU FAT!!! SHE'S ADDICTED AND IT"S THEIR FAULT THAT IT'S DELICIOUS AND LOADED WITH CALORIES!!!

Well dear friends, Bill has the same effect on Claire. She's in love with him, his blog, with you, and spends all her time here! SHE'S ADDICTED!! AND IT'S ALL BILL'S FAULT!!!

AND IT'S ALSO ALL OF YOUR FAULTS THAT SHE DOESN'T HAVE A LIFE - THAT SHE CAN'T GO TO CRAMER'S WEB SITE WHERE SHE TRULY BELONGS!!!!

Thank you sweet people for understanding Claire's uncontrollable affliction, her attraction to Bill's Addictive Blog. Be gentle.

Sweet kisses,

Claire's girlfriend

Technically I find the bulls maybe , just maybe are losing their grip.

Cramer tonight ... Wow. That guy is over the top. Anyway he gets people into the market and thats what the sellers need. Sheep. LOL.

sktrader -

Question re Fabian's '87 call. If Fabian put out his sell signal Friday night, and subscribers phoned in Monday 10/19/87 to sell their funds, they couldn't have been out till Monday night. (More than likely, they couldn't have reached their fund companies that day.)

Fabian published a book in 2001 (The Mutual Fund Wealth Builder). To my surprise, I found no mention of that call.

Further, he presented his returns since inception, but didn't compare them to buy-and-hold. When I did compare them, I found he had UNDERPERFORMED buy-and-hold.

Disappointing ...

Making losing trades are part of trading if a person cannot handle such events then do not trade. I think I remember reading in Market Wizards that some of the best traders in the world are only right 30-35% of the time. However, because of correct implementation of position sizing they are the elite players in their field.

Peace to all.

Bill-

How much would goosing GM by 2% push the Dow? That's exactly the game that got playes end-of-session. Went from .5% down to 1.6% up in an hour and fifteen minutes of steady buying. My count shows 21 of 30 Dow stocks down and several down large otherwise. The GM post-Kerkorian short squeeze masked the underlying weakness IMHO.

Jock,
If I remember correctly, The 200 day was crossed on Thursday's close, and I got out on Friday. I cannot remember how he notified his client's of the crossing but many were irritated with him. He did post the notice in a special voice mail on Thursday evening but many did not listen to the notice because his regular voice mails were on Friday evenings. So although he shows clearly that he got his clients out of the way of Black Monday, most did not get out until the close of Monday. I remember he was on with the talking heads defending the situation because of the uproar.

A conmment on the distractor:
My opinion is that neither Bill or any of the regulars should respond to the ill posts that arrive here from time to time. It only gives them a venue to play. If no one responds they will go away and not come back. This was a thread about Black Monday. Only three of the comments were about that day.

I actually like the PPH chart (pharma hldrs). Has a lot of l/t support around 72. So a selloff back to that level would be a low-risk buy. Conversely, a break above 79ish works to 85 or so. If you buy near 72, you might see a run to 85 for an 18% gain plus 3%+ div. Not too bad, but hardly a mo-mo rocket. None of this indicates a "bull market", as Cramer says, but more within the context of a l/t trading range. Only a move above 85 on PPH would indicate that the pharma group has real legs here.

Less enamored of the IYH chart which is 65% pharma, though could see it run to the old 2000 high at 72. That's another 9%, which would basically coincide with PPH at 85.

So if your idea of a "bull market" is 9% max upside, then healthcare's your sector. Better than a stick in the eye, I guess.

If/when some of these broad h'care indexes legitimately break free of their l/t ranges (i.e, about 10% higher), then we can talk bull market. Until then, Kramer is just spouting bull.

Actually, at least in Market Wizards, some of those guys were still long going into Black Monday, so even some of those stellar traders made a big mistake. Most of the trend followers stated they were short. There were plenty of warnings going into Black Monday, particularly the fact that the bond market had been falling for months. I had very little in the way of assets at the time so fortunately it didn't hurt me much.

I read this blog for the precious metals stuff. Predictions of what the US stock market is going to do are interesting, but not all that useful to me personally. But I've really brushed up on my understanding of precious metals here. Before reading Bill, I knew virtually nothing about gold and silver.

Bill's approach involves deductive reasoning, which should work over time.

Conversely, inductive reasoning might say that the market has sped ahead relentlessly, and will do so forever, simply because it has recently. The faster you shovel coal into your engine on a finite track, the faster you will exhaust your supply, and reach the end of the line.

The permabull argument remains 'this time it's different' and that divergences between economic data and market action, or between the stock and the bond market, sentiment analyses, and so on, are simply meaningless. In other words, the behavioral economics that produced a Nobel Prize (Vernon Smith) as subjects repeatedly created bubbles is in play so will remain so - forever.

Mean reversion hasn't worked well since the summer, as everyone knows, but mean reversion in profit margins and earnings ALWAYS happens, although none of us can know when.

Just as the market cap to GDP of the US market continues to move further away from its historical mean, the bulls will just argue that 'price makes right'.

Of course, nobody can predict when "return of capital" will become more of a concern than "return on capital", but Bill's point about risk management seems more prudent than churlish and gratuitous bashing.

Re: "The permabull argument remains 'this time it's different' and that divergences between economic data and market action, or between the stock and the bond market, sentiment analyses, and so on, are simply meaningless. In other words, the behavioral economics that produced a Nobel Prize (Vernon Smith) as subjects repeatedly created bubbles is in play so will remain so - forever."

Excellent analysis. The "Price" Traders' Golden Rule: "trade the trend until it reverses, then trade the trend until it..."

Claire, if you are a young person as some have suggested, then hang in there and keep agitating. Cyber text(non-plagerized) is still free. In this medium you can even write "FIRE IN THE BUILDING! or WOLF! without physically harming anyone. Enforce your disagreements with facts and figures...the gloom and doomers may try and spin it, but can't ignore it.