S&P down 10 at 723

DOW down 100 at 11:50

Had anyone suggested a few months ago the Dow would sink below 7000, I'd have called them crazy. Things just couldn't be that bad. Live and learn, I guess. Is it going to get below 6900?

So why has the stock market tanked so much since Obama was elected??  Is he not spending enough of someone elses money?  The investors of this country have no confidence in this boy..

Ron, he promised change..and it just continues to change.

all we are going to be left with is change...

~Ronmexico~...because NO ONE has a magic pill to make things better or that magic wand...it's going to take time...just like if you cut yourself---it takes time for it to heal....

Please tell me that you're not one of those kids that wanted everything done right now...or if you didn't have it your way---you'll hold your breath and turn blue....

Anyway...it was Daffy Duck's and Porky Pig's administration that dropped the ball...so leave the boy alone--unless you have that magic wand.....IMO

DJIA when Democrats took over Congress...  12500.  DJIA now.  6900.  You tell me who is dropping the ball.  Deficit spending has exploded since 2006 when Democrats took over congress. YOu tell me who is dropping the ball.  Bush is out of office. 

But it was his fair-haired boys and girls that made the house of cards fall--asleep at the switch while the master of the universe rolled the dice and gambled everyones money away---and you guys wanted 4 more years of the same way of thinking...

Bush crawled under his bed thinking that it will all fix itself in time....he didn't have a clue and wasn't about to stick out his neck as to a solution--cause he and his band of renowned didn't have one

I remember when it went above 10,000.  Wasn't that fun?  That wasn't that long ago, either.  Ohhh--those were the days.

Thing is, stock speculation is just that--speculation.  Put in terms of the housing prices, when the prices were sky-high, that's not what the houses were worth.  The prices doubled within a couple of years.  It was all hooey.  It was hubris.  The prices were going to come back down again--they had to, and they did.  Now the market has contracted below what it was before the perfect storm of the HGTV/Home Depot/Rat Race Rush of home buying. 

Same with the stock market.  When the market crashed in '29, real nest eggs were lost, but most of the money lost was "dream money,"--money that never existed and that was purchased with even more "dream money." 

Just because you have a lottery ticket doesn't mean you're a millionaire.

The stock market is starting to "get real."  It was manic, and now it's time for it to be depressed.  Maybe now it will go on regulation meds and mellow out some.

[And that was a stock market outsider's (waaay outside) opinion of the DOW.]

Reminds me of that song many moons ago----" What goes up--must come down...spinning wheels..gotta go round..."

Mexico wants  Obama to fail in the same way as his mentor, Rush Limbaugh wants Obama to fail.
Wit and Mexico are taking their marching orders from Limbaugh.
No matter what it cost our nation or it’s people. Obama must fail.
How they think that will improve their chances in the next elect.
Defies logic.

The DOW is a 6892 down 170.

But this has nothing to do with Obama. It is a world wide failure of the stock market.

It had to happen. It was a pyramid scheme.

Prices were not based on the actual product of the company.

It was strictly speculation and hope that kept it going so long.

Mexico,
The DOW was 10,900 when Bush was elected
It was 7070 When bush left office.
8 full years of losses

 

-3830 in 8 years - Bush

-2625 in less than 8 weeks - Obama

(your figures)

"The stock market is starting to "get real."

That's right, Catherine.  That's what I have been saying.  No bailout or stimulus will restore an illusion that people have lost faith in.

Unlike someone here who has been promoting his economic recovery idea (and I make an effort not to get down on people who are making the effort at producing ideas, even if I think they are very wrong), homes should never have been considered as part of the money supply or regarded as a quasi-stock investment in the first place.

Stop and think.  Home prices are one of the few things that bear absolutely no relation to the cost of the goods and labor that go into building them.  It costs not a cent more to build a 1,200 sq. ft. house on lot XYZ when it's prevailing selling price is $300,000 than it does when its price is $100,000.

Reality will return to real estate when we begin thinking of it as the durable hard good that it is: a good whose selling price is made up of the cost of goods and labor plus a typically reasonable profit margin.  It is not a stock future; it is a durable hard good with a production cost plus a markup.

Nancy,

Obama has been president for 39 days. The Market was at 7070 when he took office.

Mexico,

Crude down 4 bucks.
Gasoline down 7 cents.
Now think back to Reagan years and the 80's.  What did the Republican plan do to the oil patch.

Remember. Think hard.

It destroyed the price of crude.

I warned you over 1 1/2 years ago. And Obama was not thought to have a chance at winning the presidency then.

Sorry, Ron Mexico and other Neocons.

The plummeting stock market cannot in any way be attributed to Obama.

The suggestion that Obama is at fault for the financial meltdown debacle is plainly and simply disingenuous. It might even be laughable if the situation created by Republican incompetence was not so dire and its consequences so devastating for the nation and the world.

Despite the denial of die-hard conservatives, it is an absolutely incontrovertible fact that the nation and world's current financial situation was manifested during the past several years of Republican government beginning with Reagan.

The global economic collapse and the  markets' downward slide was undeniably spawned during Republicans' failed trickle-down, no-regulation administration of recycled Reganomics, spurred by Republican legislation like the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and other dumb legislation, which allowed allowed banks to become brokers and speculators dealing in the financial services industry trading exotic financial derivatives like securitized mortgage bundles and credit default swaps.

It also didn't help that Republicans in charge sat back in denial and extolled the vibrant health of the "fundamentally sound" free market system to the very end while scammers gamed the flawed and corrupted system and drained the country's coffers.

The Dow Jones Industrial Averages and other major stock indexes crashed toward the end of Bush's term.

Period.

The market correction was inevitable after share prices were artificially driven up by mega traders and speculators far, far beyond realistic values.

It seems that people just can't seem to grasp the fact that the proportionate value of a share of stock should be determined by the true value of the company and cannot truly rise unless the true value of the company increases.

But the unfettered system allows stock prices to be manipulated to unrealistic levels while executives cook the books and siphon off billions for themselves until the bubble bursts.

The system sorely needs fixing and freedom from greedy manipulators producing nothing for society but bogus paper and who don't really give a rat's rectum about your portfolio.

It's going to take a long and painful time to fix the abused and broken system, especially while ignorant people are screaming socialism, fascism and communism and demonizing those trying to repair what the ignorant broke.

The days of the fallacious expectation that shares of stock can just grow fat and healthy like prize steers while being starved and bled to death are hopefully over.

Time to wake up and smell the coffee, conservatives. The country is in deep, deep doodoo, and Romney, Gingrich, Palin, Jindal, etal, and other conservative clowns aren't going to pull us out of the deep hole dug by the Republican incompetents who ran the system into the ground.

ALL the people I've talked to are scared.  Scared of losing their jobs. scared of losing their homes, scared of not being able to feed their families.  These people are NOT partisans, I have no idea what, if any political party they belong to because we don't talk actual politics.  They're just mostly young to middle age people trying to survive, and not sure they'll be able to.

No sense in getting worked up over things you have no control over....the masters of the universe on Wall Street are rolling the dice again---round and round it goes--where will it stop..nobody knows...

 The system sorely needs fixing and freedom from greedy manipulators producing nothing for society but bogus paper and who don't really give a rat's rectum about your portfolio.

So the Obama and his NeoMarxists are going to fix this? Apparently they care about my rectum and portfolio....Lets see how that trickles down to everyone else....

On the flip side, if you have some money, it is a great time to invest for a 10-15 year return. Especially in renewable energy stocks.

From AP: "The Dow Jones industrial average plunged below 7,000 Monday for the first time in more than 11 years as investors grow even more pessimistic about the health of banks, and in turn the economy.

A staggering $61.7 billion in quarterly losses at insurer American International Group Inc. touched off fresh fears about the health of the nation's financial system.

The worries pushed the blue chips below 7,000 for the first time since Oct. 28, 1997. The credit crisis and recession have now slashed half the average's value since it hit a record high over 14,000 in October 2007.

Investors are fleeing financials after the government said it would give AIG another $30 billion in loans, besides the $150 billion it has already given the company. Investors are worried about European financial companies, too. HSBC PLC, Europe's largest bank by market value, reported a 70 percent drop in 2008 profit and said it needs to raise $17.7 billion and cut 6,100 jobs.

"As bad as things are, they can still get worse, and get a lot worse," said Bill Strazzullo, chief market strategist for Bell Curve Trading. Strazzullo said he believes there's a significant chance the S&P 500 and the Dow will fall back to their 1995 levels of 500 and 5,000, respectively.

The "game-changer," he said, will be the housing market and whether it can stabilize.""

I was just on yahoo news~ hit any financial news web site and I imagine the headlines are all the same~ EU "newer nations" in trouble,oil down, China says its stimulus is working(we trust them to be honest? sure we do),Sony shake up,consumer spending slightly up but expected to drop,construction down....Mr Warren Buffet is losing money.That's all I can remember off the top of my head~

This is a world wide reality check,it will be a hard,ugly and a one tough hike back up the hill.

To blame any one person is the height of simplicity or even the "other party".There will be time to blame later,now we need to do what the American people always do~ fix it and take care of each other as much as possible.

Sure, people are scared, Nancy, and they should be.

As the economy of the nation and the world continues to tank, millions more jobs and homes will be lost before the carnage is over.

Powerless, all we can do now is hope that lots of money thrown at the problem will slow the slide and mitigate the damage and destruction to the system while we figure out how to modify and strengthen it for future stability.

It's clear that unfettered, unregulated free markets are not the answer.

 Obama has been president for 39 days. The Market was at 7070 when he took office.

Another lie by our resident neoMarxist water boy.  On Jan 16, the last day of trading under the Bush Administration, the Dow was at 8281.  In a stunning sign of "no confidence", the Dow dropped 300 points during Obamas first day to close at  7949.  So the Dow has gone from 8281 to less than 6800.  You NeoMarxists need to get your facts straight..

The are probably many solutions to this problem, and I'm sure our best and brightest economists are working on it, but there's only one solution that will actually be used:

We'll keep slapping each other and throwing blame poo at the "other" party.  We'll reach back 60 years if we have to (and we have!) to place blame on the "other" party.  We'll all have to brush up on the political parties of our founding fathers to get it all straightened out.  We'll sort out the blame and find a political reason for everything EVERYTHING and Wall Street will sail on by, secure in the knowledge that we're to stupid to ever realize that Wall Street and the Government are two different entities. 

So I'm ready.  Have fun Wall Street! 

 It's clear that unfettered, unregulated free markets are not the answer.

What nation has unfettered and unregulated free markets??

What's encouraging, Catherine, is to hear so many financial pundits suddenly lauding the more down to earth financial principles that I have been saying for some time.  Pundit after pundit is calling this a "time to straighten out our values."

I put my ideas out for all to see, and people can take them, leave them, call them conservative, or liberal, or just plain crazy.  ;)

I don't intend to gloat, but I am one person who is not scared, so my ideas can't be too crazy.

You NeoMarxists need to get your facts straight..

remember RM..their mantra is if your lie is repeated enough, it becomes truth.  Look at the crap Al Whore is pushing...global warming, errrrrrrrrrrrrrr   sorry, climate change (i wonder what he will rename it in a few months when scientists prove him wrong AGAIN)???

spam code WEBUP

AD--I agree.  Ya know, you never (or rarely) hear financial pundits talking about caution or pendulum-swinging when the market is up.  Oh no--it's all about the excitement, the wheeling and dealing, and then who deserves the credit.  Why?  Because mania is fun!  It's not that I don't think there are cautious financial pundits out there--I'm sure there are, but they're a drag.  They don't get airtime.  Why should they when Bozo the Happy Pundit can generate two minutes'-worth of 24-Hour-News excitement?  The problem is that Joe Nest Egg, who put all of his retirement into a form of gambling that he knows nothing about, gets all of his information from Bozo and none from Cautious Borington.

[And the reason I'm only a Stock Market onlooker is because I think gambling is risky!  I think Vegas has better odds--especially right now.]

http://stockcharts.com/char...

Wall Street runs on rumor,myth and pathos ~ that chart is quite interesting. A light blue "Historical Charts" at the top when clicked takes you to the other indexes.

Sigh.

Ron, there is nothing to be gained by arguing your misinformed views.

If ignorance of the facts, distortion and hatred of Obama and all things liberal brings you comfort, then by all means please enjoy your delusion.

Limbaugh, “incendiary” and “ugly.”

In a little-noticed interview Saturday night, (RNC’s) Steele dismissed Limbaugh as an “entertainer” whose show is “incendiary” and “ugly.”

From:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/pol...

Right now the GOP will latch on to anything that creates enthusiasm., as illinifan17  commented,   "Rush is, to the Republican Party, the equivalent of oxycontin.  He is masking their pain.  The trouble is that when the high wears off massive injuries have occurred because there was no pain to warn against them".

 The stock market is nothing more than a mirror of the economic health of a nations business.    Even the most dense observer knows by now corporations are comprised of stockholders and stockholders are: Schools,cities, counties, states,moms,dads, grandmothers and grandfathers.  (doubt this?  Look at the recent news articles regarding municipal retirements tanking)

A corporation's future is predicated upon the ability to raise funds to promote their business (sell stock) and when the funds are not available, those who invest in the corporations (stockholders) bail out.  Those who try to weather the storm are left holding a worthless portfolio. (Schools, cities, etc,etc)

The current market free-fall of the stock market is a vivid indication stockholders have no confidence in their ability to make a profit by investing in Americas corporations in the current economic climate.  This cause of this lack of faith is multi-faceted and the current resident of the White House and majority party is only one (albeit large) component of this lack of faith.  (If Warren Buffett is losing money it's time to start seriously worrying!)

I seriously doubt those in Washington can MANDATE corporations be successful.  Despite the rhetoric, realistically, all the elected leaders can do to stimulate the economy is remove impediments to corporate profit.  As yet, they have no inclination to do so.  As a result, corporate America seems to have little faith in the governments ability to rectify this economic downturn and thus it shows in the stock market and the cycle repeats.

One thing is certain:  It's gonna get a WHOLE LOT worse before it gets better!

Lets face  the sad facts.  In 2001 Bush and the Republicans gave the keys to the economic henhouse to the foxes - who just happened to be their biggest donors.  The Democrats stood by and said that "Its OK by me, so long as we get an egg or two every once in a while."  Now, the world is paying the price.

Curt,

You are right that things are going to get much worse before they get better.
And with regards to business of the past few years your history is quite true.
But the recent history is not one of capitalism.
Our recent business history is one of a pyramid scheme.
Corporations should be no different than any business. They should be in the business of selling a product. Not advertising a stock price.
The product should set the value of a company. Not a speech at a luncheon. 

Given the trends which started years ago, I think we'll see Dow 5000 before we see a sustained upturn.

Tkozy - The largest pyramid scheme to ever exist in he universe was concocted on Capitol Hill and it's known as Social (in)Security.   Believe me, when *THAT* Ponzi scheme tanks (and it will) there will be blood in the streets and Hell to pay!  

As for a corporation being in business to supply a product,  I agree.  However, small companies that want to be big companies MUST rely upon a stock offering to raise the necessary capital to expand.  Without the ability for a corporation to sell stock, there would be NO auto manufacturers, NO heavy industry - Heck, there wouldn't even be a General Mills to make your morning Wheaties.    

While stock speculation isn't the initial objective, the ability to make a profit on your investment is crucial to economic success whether it is a company offering stock for sale or a senior citizen investing their retirement funds in a "Blue Chip" stock.

If there is no expectation of profit for the shareholder, there will be no investors and no expansion of the company without regard to how "good" a company is.    Let's be clear,  the majority of corporations are NOT the cause of this economic mess.  It was the lending institutions and the politically-driven mania to offer mortgages to those who could never in a million years pay off the debt of the mortgage that's to blame.  While there were calls to end the toxic mortgages before it wrecked havoc http://query.nytimes.com/gs..., certain legislators (with their own agendas) assured the public Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were as solid as a rock.  Yeah, we all know how well *THAT* worked no don't we?  http://www.boston.com/bosto...

Any re-alignment of the banking laws *should* include a prohibition from inter-bank financial speculation and a prohibition on "selling" debt.  If the financial institution makes a bad loan, they should have to eat the loan.  (and people should lose their job for their poor performance) However, if they are profitable, they should not be penalized with onerous legislation.

Random -  Ummm, I think 4000 is a tad bit optimistic. I think it's going to get very (very) ugly before there is a turn-around.   We may well end up as a third-world banana republic before this runs it's course.

If and or when it does hit 4000-5000...maybe we'll see the return of public flogging on Wall Street

Sure glad I sold off my stuff last year. As it was I lost $6,000. May not sound like much to a lot of people but it was to me.

Curt,
Social security is an insurance and a annuity.  Just like all insurance companies. Some people collect on their premiums, some do not. That’s the heart of the insurance business. If everyone collected more than they paid in. The insurance would go belly up in no time.
Social Security is the best run insurance/annuity in the world. It operates at a 3 percent overhead.  And is backed by the full faith and credit of the USA. That’s a pretty good resume.

When the purpose of a corporation is to make profits for their investors.
They are no longer a producer of widgets. They are an investment banker.
Public corporations then become the ponzi scheme.
No one actually risking anything. Just parking some paper for a while in hopes that it will reproduce more paper.

The villager does not want to buy paper from the farmer. They want tomatoes.
Of course the farmer can make some quick cash over the winter selling stocks to the villager.
But If he does not get good tomatoes in the summer. He will lose the farm. No matter the value of the stocks.
American corporations have been selling stock over a long winter of many years.
Now today they have no tomatoes. And the value of the farm just went kaput.

If the shareholders expectation of profit comes from the quality of the product. All is well. But that has not been the case. There has been a expectation of profit merely from the act of placing some paper into play. That’s bad. That’s the pyramided scheme.
The financial institutions at the heart of this mess are in themselves some of the largest corporations in the world.
They are the petro industries at the heart of the commodities crisis
Nobody was forced to make even one loan.
No one forced the petro industry to sell gas at 4 bucks per gallon.
Every loan was made because of the fear someone else might make profit off that deal.
Every nickel was charged per gallon of gas. Because they thought they could.

No one thought about tomorrow. They thought about greed. They thought about selling some paper stock. They had no concern for the quality of product that was the heart of their business.

The result?
Today their paper is worthless. And their product is junk.

If the DOW goes to 4000. The run on the commodities futures market will be overwhelming.  Contracts  will be sold in order to aquire cash. And 2 dollar wheat and 6 dollar crude might be the new norm for a while.

Investor confidence.  The Dow was at 9625 on election day. 6763 today.  That is a 30% *dive* in investor confidence in the policies and philosophy of 0bama. 

But have faith.  That "trickle up" economics scheme is gonna lift us up any minute now.

Drill,
That  is a lame argument.
The DOW was at 11900 on Bushes second election.  It  went to 14000 in August of 2007. That’s when the steady fall started.
The fall didn’t start on election day 2008. In fact there was a brief 1000 point up tic from election day through Dec 29th.
It is then that the truth depth of the calamity was obvious. 

 Tkozy - Your definition of the Social Security program is what it SHOULD be not what it is in reality.  In reality the Social Security system IS a Ponzi scheme - As long as the majority of people die off and never collect (or collect a minimal amount) all is well.  

However, modern advances in medicine have skewed the formula.  People live longer.  Believe what you wish to believe, smarter people than both of us combined have said there is going to be a day of reckoning regarding Social Security.  As a general rule, I am a skeptic and don't believe ANYTHING that comes out of Washington, DC but I do believe Social Security is a mess and it will be the "Next Crisis/Emergency" to rear it's ugly head.   As for being backed by the full faith and credit of the United States all I can say is BAH!  I haven't had much faith in our government for a while now and as for ANY politician having credibility, I can't print what I think of that!

I disagree with your analysis vis-a-vis the petrochemical industry.  I don't recall Exxon being linked to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.   Like it or not, it was the proliferation of toxic mortgages that caused this mess.  Aided and abetted by those who think large sums of money should be lent to people without the means to pay it back.   Once the supply of credit dried up, the fit hit the shan.  

It's OK to disagree, heck, we can even agree to disagree!  In the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter a whit what we "little people" think.  The future of this country is dependent upon the idiots in Washington, DC.  With that in mind, anyone with a brain should be afraid.  Very afraid. 

1000 point uptick from election day to Dec. 29th?  Who's shorts are you smoking?  There is a link provided in my comment above yours that shows the Dow's trends for any time period.  Your sinking credibility just took another shot to the gut. 

But you are right in one respect.  The fall started in September when Obama went ahead to stay in the polls.

Comrade Kozy was saying earlier that Bush left office with the Dow at 7050.  I think he has been smoking that turd in his shorts.....

 No one forced the petro industry to sell gas at 4 bucks per gallon.

Ok, then why aren't they selling gas at 4 bucks a gallon  now??

Curt,

In the life insurance business. Everybody dies off. But are you  insinuating it is also a ponzi scheme?

 If so I will accept your train of thought. Just not agree with it.

What makes the life insurance business a shame not a  ponzi. Is their expectation that most will quit paying their premiums long before they die.  Those premiums collected  are pure profit. This does not happen (legally) with social security, everyone pays a a equal premium (%) for their life time or until they start collecting their benefits.

Social security is fine until 2041 without any changes.

A small adjustment in premiums can make it profitable for eternity.  No insurance company on earth can operate at the 3% overhead that social security/medicare operates at.  Just give SS the benefit of a premium adjustment the same as you do your vehicle insurance. And your attitude toward SS is bound to change

Reagan's commission extended the solvency of SS by decades with just minor adjustments. No reason it can't be done again.

I don't like the idea of life insurance. I would not pay for it. But the returns on social security are too great to pass up. If only for the disability insurance.

The run up in the petro prices ate up the first stimulus checks. This delayed any chance of averting the disaster we see ourself in today.  The fuel price was a draw on the creditworthiness of the public. The straw that broke the camels back.

Drill from your chart
Nov 20th 7552
Jan 6th     9015
That is actually a 1500 point rise after the election.