But won't this hurt American families and small businesses?

The negative feedback loop continues.

Banks preservation mode- pullback on lending- hurts economy and loan performance-banks pullback even mo0re.

guess they won't be making it up in volume

So, I imagine in like 3 or 4 years bank failure Friday is going to be really dull again. Note to self: short Dominoes in 2012.

Bad nuz GOOOd!

Oooga Boooga!

to the moon!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

YouTube - Sesame Street Classics: "I Don't Want to Live on the Moon"

ECB official warns of negative feedback loop

"STRASBOURG, France (AP) -- European Central Bank board member Lucas Papademos warned Tuesday of a negative feedback loop between Europe's shrinking economy and risk-wary banks that is hurting new lending and economic growth."

"There are emerging signs of a negative feedback loop between the real economy and the banking sector," he told the European Parliament's economy committee."

Today's stock market is amazing, no snide comment can suffice. The banks being threatened with dilution are up the most--even after Obama demonstrated he will go for default with Chrysler. It's a game of chicken where the loser throws good money after bad--great expectations with little to no chance for success.

It's funny but locally they've been advertising small business loans on the radio basically without restrictions. Saying things like "We've been ordered by the government to loan as much as possible!"

I don't know if they're serious or not. But if so I eagerly await all the new bubbles, scams, and ponzi schemes that's going to come out of this.

Exciting times we're headed for.

The Great Re-Bubble is coming along nicely.

ac

http://www.candyfavorites.com/pi/2384.jpg

Today's stock market is amazing, no snide comment can suffice.

But not at all unexpected - complete economic disassociation and insanity is precisely what you would expect from attempts to restore economic health with inflation and easy money.

Again, it's just like treating a cancer patient with speedballs.

"Yay! I'm all better... to hell with this chemotherapy stuff!"

Hooray! Got my property tax notice. It's higher than last year. No deflation here! Price of gas going up too. Everything coming up roses, red thorny roses.

ac

http://www.candyfavorites.com/pi/2384.jpg

Haha... Triple Bubble more like it.

Oil back over $54 now.

Let the good times roll...

Let me act surprised...

Well, at least the first $700 billion was enough to unlock credit & get the economy out of recession --

Ha ha ha ha ha ha !!!

Obama and Geithner announce (MSNBC video link) plan to crack down on overseas tax hiders, remove subsidies from creating overseas jobs, and add 800 IRS agents to enforce the tax laws on corporations and wealthy overseas tax shelter 'investors'.

This will not be received well by the financial oligopoly (mild conclusion, heheh).

it's only been since Jan 6 that the DJIA had a 9 handle

Lending standards, eh?

Are 20% DP requirements (and no cheating) here yet? Are rates over 7%? No? Then I guess I won't be buying yet.

" ac (profile) wrote on Mon, 5/4/2009 - 11:29 am

People I know are getting pretty excited because of the stock market."

That is the whole point I think. Restore confidence through another asset bubble. Think about it, we had 6 years (2002 - 2008) of unwarranted economic growth due to the last asset bubble. Why wouldn't you start another one?

the bulls are back in town! join the fun!

uh-oh ... market below 900 ... where are the dip buyers ???

Mel:
Today's stock market is amazing, no snide comment can suffice. The banks being threatened with dilution are up the most--even after Obama demonstrated he will go for default with Chrysler. It's a game of chicken where the loser throws good money after bad--great expectations with little to no chance for success.

To everyone who're in amazement about the market recently. Why not switch the question around and figure out if there are any scenarios that will make the market's reaction perfectly sane:

1. The market is pricing in not just a recovery, but a complete recapitalization of all the banks in 6 months or so. Who capitalize them or how much isn't a problem (unless they stop the actual capitalization). The point is, if the banks no longer facing imminent bankruptcy or nationalization, then they're worth money, hence the bid up.
2. The market is betting that USD will reset to a lower value in 6 months or so, or some combination of worldwide synchro-printing will cause strong inflation to occur worldwide. Many such variations: Interest rate is about to go negative, USD is about to resume controlled descent. In such a scenario, owning equities is the place to be, UST and bonds is not.
3. If the Govt/Fed is believed to be able (ABLE being the keyword, intent is well known for a while now) to backstop all current and future losses; then there's no scenario that would yield cascading defaults left. Meaning, the only possible outcome from this point on is either resumption of growth, or hyperinflation, both of which favors equities and asset ownership, including CRE, REITS, assets, etc.

Any of these would make it sane to buy in the current market and not sell, regardless of news. Of course, an "overbought" condition could still occur if we still continue to ascend, but we're not there yet.

Comments?
PS: I also lost a chunk of money trying to short recently. Although I've since closed my positions and am licking my wounds.

"The short term is frustrating, but in the long run, the stock market will only pay out what it really earns. "

Exactly. That is why bonds have outperformed - they actually pay something to investors.

But an investor in CSCO (just to pick on my favorite)? They haven't received a single dime in dividends. Nothing.

If you bought CSCO at its high of $80 in March 2000, you would be down 75% on your investment today, in nominal terms.

Same could be said for the S&P - pays an estimated dividend yield of 2.50%, 68bps less than a ten year treasury (even with the Fed holding down treasury yields).

Buying most stocks is just a bet that someone down the line will pay more than you did - pure greater fool theory. Works great as long as there are greater fools.

Anyone else feels that we are heading towards the iceberg at full speed even though it is visible? The PTB are almost aiming for the iceberg..

Now you know how the passengers on those 4 hijacked planes felt like..

With regards to the stock market, I need to act like George did on the "Opposite Action" episode of Seinfeld.

I need to get out of cash and buy winners like banks, retailers, and REITs.

Fun comment thread from eight weeks ago

"uh-oh ... market below 900 ... where are the dip buyers ???"

....buyers?.....they dont have money any more.....just a whole bunch of angry bears......

Luci,

I had a very good friend on one of those jets. Your comparison is both inapt and offensive....

Jay.D.

"they dont have money any more.....just a whole bunch of angry bears...... "

And that's gonna be YOUR problem. Someday.

another dip below 900 ...

Daisy, if you're that sensitive use the ignore button. Should I be equally offended if you say we're headed towards a car wreck? Because I know people that have died in a car wreck? Get over yourself. It's a metaphor.

I do think the way forward is to insert your straw into the gov't provided capital pool and suck as much as you can before it goes dry. Unfortunate.

Daisycolorado,

Let's see

Ideology driven hijackers- check
No resistance from passengers- check
Passengers believed it would end like past occurences- check

the fed has forgiven the banks, blessed be bernanke

The Treasury is now the biggest SWF on the planet, by FAR.

The PTB seem to forgotten that they are only human..

Jay.D,
I believe this is the table. I'm reasonably sure everyone is familiar with it.

Bear market rallies during the Great Depression

November 1929 - April 1930: +48%

June 1930 - September 1930: +12%

December 1930 - February 1931: +21%

May 1931 - June 1931: +27%

October 1932 - November 1931: +35%

First rally after final low:

July 1932 - September 1932: +72%

Question: if the Fed does successfully trigger hyperinflation, even milder forms of inflation like 5-10%.

Isn't that more painful to everyone, even rich people and foreigners, than just deflation?

Why would the banking clan be rooting for that? I don't get it.

" Lucifer (profile) wrote on Mon, 5/4/2009 - 2:47 pm
Anyone else feels that we are heading towards the iceberg at full speed even though it is visible? The PTB are almost aiming for the iceberg..
Now you know how the passengers on those 4 hijacked planes felt like.."

Lucifer,
I lost a good friend named Al Filipov that day, and I've often thought about how he and the rest must have felt. In all but the case of the plane that went down in Pennsylvania, I suspect that the passengers had no idea what was happening. There was probably an instant where they said to themselves "what the..", and then all went black, or white, or whatever happens when one dies. I pray this is all that Al and the others had to deal with.
Cinco-X

Inflation benefits debtors.

Market (S&P) is up approximately 35% from its low of 666. That was my trigger point.

"OK men, wait until you see the whites of their eyes.... Now, fire!"

Bought more puts today.

"Bought more puts today."

But not without trepidation...

reptillian:
Inflation benefits debtors.

Exactly! and thus inflation should only help the poor debtors and not the rich, who own the capital to lend to the debtors...

Why would the rich be complacent with an inflationary outcome is beyond me...

I would think they would much rather root for a deflation outcome, to solidify their riches to beyond the means of "mere folks", rather than inflate the value of their capital away.

But what do I know? Seems every rich and powerful wants inflation; so they must know something I don't..

hc,

The problem with any of those scenarios is that the 10Year and 30Year treasurys should be spiking, and they're not.

No?

hc:

With low volumes and low starting prices, you can give the appearance amazing gains, percent-wise, that is.
If $1 goes to $2 -- rtn=100%, correct?

the rich and powerful don't hold debt. they hold assets.

inflation is good for assets.

Taxpayers hold debt. Haven't you been paying attention?

WFC to raise 50 billion is that right???

last 1/2 hour coming up ... may be decisive ... place your bet in the legal online casino, if you dare

Doomers, bah!

No sense of humor.

km4,

Please, let me finish your though:

km4 (profile) wrote on Mon, 5/4/2009 - 3:14 pm
"Iceland’s de facto bankruptcy with debt at 850 percent of G.D.P saw its people are hoarding food and cash and blowing up their new Range Rovers for the insurance—resulted from a stunning collective madness ..."

... brought on from watching too much "Lazytown."

There. That's better.

Oil ends at five-month high on home sales, China

Wonder what that's going to do to real incomes in this country...

What do you call a lawyer who died from the mexican flu?

an improvement!

Somebody (either the bulls or the bears) has made a terrible error of judgment here. Stay tuned for the next chapter. It's gonna be a pageburner.

Turning some of the coals loose (MEE). Don't be a pig.

Just an FYI, national debt as of 5 minutes ago was about $11,208,076,192,300.55

$11,208,076,192,300.55

So long as we can make the monthly payments.

anoddamoose (profile) wrote on Mon, 5/4/2009 - 3:43 pm
Just an FYI, national debt as of 5 minutes ago was about $11,208,076,192,300.55

---

Not to worry ... we owe it to ourselves.

Yahoo Finance headline read:

Stocks Keep Foot on Gas

yeah, right until the moment of impact (that way the intentions are clear).

"Here's where the funds came from today. Bastards. "

And the 10-year didn't budge... Print Faster! Print Faster!

Alchemy/financial engineering 101 - how to turn toxic assets into AAA gold
Michael Milken for Debt Czar
THE BARRICADE » Blog Archive » Financial Engineering/Alchemy 101 - turning toxic waste into AAA gold - Contrarian Grapeshot for a Teetering World

And TIPS got hammered down from 101.40 to 99.16

sm_landlord:
And debtors, who can repay with cheaper dollars.

I would further qualify what you said with:

SOLVENT debtors who can service the debt and not roll it over.

In a high inflation environment, rolling over debt is financial suicide (think confiscatory interest rate, or even no capital avail)... So only debtors that can eventually repay their prior debts will benefit. NEW debtors may still be screwed depending on their solvency going forward.

Better to convert those US taxpayer preferreds after 300% goose in the shares so the taxpayer get triple-screwed.

Just a quick scan of the "Total Par Amount Accepted" for all the Fed Treasury Purchase operations shown (in Gav Hath's link), I see about $50B of purchases today.

Can that be right?

Dead Hotels Walking: Hotel REITS up about 13% today:
Hotel REITs Index (*REITT) at tickerspy.com

Ponzistate: where there is always a bubble, house prices are always increasing, the stock market only goes in one direction, the returns are stated and guaranteed

..... that was painful.

"Bought more puts today."

But not without trepidation... - SC

I'd guess the pricing is getting better though - y/n?

lawyerliz,

Told you so.. of course you can always believe the ivy leaguers.

//Actually seems the flu is a nothingburger, except for parents (like my secy) whose kid has a slight cough--allergies maybe?--who is sent to a room full of really sick kids and told not to come back without a dr's note. Drs are supposedly swamped.//

Oh, I see the email alert link is on that same page ...

"Actually seems the flu is a nothingburger"

I'm posting 101 Pandemic jokes around on conspiracy sites but nobody is laughing yet.

Q: Is the flu spread by contact, blood or air-borne?

A: None. It's spread by the government!

Wow.

The FED is on twitter: New York Fed (NYFed_data) on Twitter

"S&P 500 now up 0.4% year to date"

RED HOT!

lol each of the Fed's twits links to exactly the same web page.

Good for those who are too lazy to pull up a bookmark. ... an awkward entry by the Fed to the world of Twittering.

..... that was painful.

Actually had a really good trading day even though I didn't make a dime:

I learned my lesson about "not fighting the tape".

I've spent most of the past few weeks with the short positions I have completely hedged in the futures market (I don't cover the shorts because they get hard to borrow).

It's rewarding not getting your butt kicked because you stuck with your plan. Not something I would have been able to do a couple of years ago.

dryfly,

Actually, only about half my bids (for Put options) were accepted.

Even though they have gotten cheaper, not quite cheap enough....yet. The percentage drop in stock price required (to get the return I want) is getting larger. So to me that suggests that put owners are loathe to give them up.

I am in awe of this pump and am very glad I am on the sidelines.

sm_landlord
Great point about TIPS.
As for the equity rally, it could end this week it could stay up until August. Downside is at least 4x the upside during that period. This is the time to return to the table

Haha... just after the first 5 or so comments it's awesome.

Blechh. Thanks for bringing that back, Nemo. That's the last time I post my discomfort point--it's like running away from a predator.

Only 200 points to go.

anoddamoose - That frikin hilarious.

I was expecting the following tweets:
NY_FED: Printing
NY_FED: Printing
NY_FED: Printing
NY_FED: Bought more ink
NY_FED: Printing
NY_FED: Printing

broward (homepage, profile) wrote on Mon, 5/4/2009 - 12:37 pm reply Ignore user
What do you call a lawyer who died from the mexican flu?

An immigration attorney. [Lawyers are only at risk this time because it is proven to cross species from humans.]

"I would actually think that maybe the world found a way to grow despite of the USA problem... I say hooray if this is true, because that is exactly the solution the world needs.

Maybe this is the decoupling that's actually happening now? "

If true, Peter Schiff will be hugely vindicated.

Maybe this why they are pulling back

Fed Says U.S. Banks Expect Deepening of Loan Losses (Update1)

Fed Says U.S. Banks Expect Deepening of Loan Losses (Update1) - Bloomberg.com

EHP;

Now if I just knew for sure what it meant. I'm thinking it means "get out of the USD".

On your equity point, are suggesting any shorts?

Arbitrage_Macht_Frei, a friend of mine cashed out of the market last year before the big drop, and his pill of choice became AT&T a few weeks ago. Put everything in it. He knows something I don't I guess. Hope it works out for him.

FAZ off a cliff today. Ouch

MEXICO CITY, May 4 (Xinhua) -- Mexican Health Minister Jose Angel Cordova said on Monday that four new deaths from the A/H1N1flu have been confirmed, bringing the death toll to 26, with 727 total cases reported and 2,164 samples tested.

Cordova said that the disease had a comparatively low R0 number, which means it is not much more contagious than normal seasonal flu.

"Mexico has calculated the R0 at 1.4, varying between 1.3 and 1.8," Cordova said. "With seasonal influenza this index is a little lower. It is 1.3," he said.

The higher the R0 number, the faster a disease spreads. A R0 of one means that each infected person infects one other, if R0 falls below one, the disease will die out of its own accord.

Mexico confirms four more A/H1N1 flu deaths, toll reaches 26_English_Xinhua

If we assume regular flu lethality, in the 0.1% to 0.2% range, then Mexico has experienced ~13K to ~26K cases to date to generate that number of deaths - this seems more likely than the flu changing dramatically even given its mutability.

The R0 is an oversimplification in many ways, but speaks to the ease and rate of transmission. If the Mexican authorities are correct in their assessment, the peak numbers of new cases would occur four to five months from the beginning, barring some act of the divine or otherwise random occurrence changing the influenza.

annadamouse and Gav Hath,

I got the $50B from scanning all the "Operation Results" summaries on that Federal Reserve web page that Gav Hath linked. In each summary, they listed "Total Par Amt Accepted (mlns), with an amount next to it. I just summed up the total for all ten operations (roughly, in my head), and it was somewhere around $50B.

"Actually seems the flu is a nothingburger..."

We don't know that yet.

Long, partly off topic cross post from Zacks,

Some of the most far reaching reforms of the New Deal were the financial regulations that FDR put into place. Conceptually one can think of them as a three legged stool. The first regulation effectively said that investors have to have good (and fair) access to information. This is the essence of what the SEC is all about. Firms need to publish annual and quarterly reports (10-K’s and 10-Q’s) so investors can see the balance sheets and income statements. People with special access to information should not be allowed to profit from it at the expense of other market participants (i.e. no insider trading or front running). Conflicts of interest need to be disclosed. There is much more that the SEC does (or is supposed to do) but most of them fall in the general category of making sure that accurate information is available to investors. As the market has changed, the sorts of information that investors need changed. Unfortunately the SEC was not able (or willing) to keep up. This is particularly true with respect to derivatives.

The second leg of the stool was that if you put your money in the bank, it is safe. That is why the FDIC was created. This meant that ban runs would be minimized. The Federal Reserve also plays a role in this regard, and its authority to lend to illiquid banks predated the Depression, but it was not aggressive enough in using its authority in the early 1930’s. The Fed can lend to illiquid institutions and thus provide the cash needed to pay out depositors during a run, without the bank having to shut down, but it is much better to prevent bank run’s in the first place. If people know their money is safe in a bank, they will not rush to take it out at the first rumor of trouble. The FDIC is funded by insurance premiums the banks pay based on the amount of insured deposits they have. If a bank got into trouble the FDIC would come in and usually find another bank to take over the deposits (which are bank liabilities) and most of the assets, and sell off the rest, doing so in the “least costly” manner possible.

The final leg of the stool was that if the money in the bank was insured, the bank would not be able to run off to Vegas with it. Banking would be a very conservative, boring almost public utility type business. Banks would not be allowed to take major risks with depositors money. This meant that for a half a century we had what was referred to as 3-6-3 banking. Bankers would take in deposits at 3%, lend them out at 6%, and be on the first tee by 3 PM. Yes, risk taking is a very important part of the economy. However, those risk taking activities, needed to be kept separate from that boring conservative world of commercial banking. As a result, Congress passed the Glass Stiegel Act. This required for example, for the House of Morgan to be broken up into a Commercial Bank, J.P. Morgan (JPM) and a separate Investment Bank, Morgan Stanley (MS).

Starting in the mid 1990’s all three of these pillars started to be eroded. The SEC was specifically prohibited from regulating many derivatives by the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. It looked the other way when banks and investment companies created Special Purpose Vehicles (SPV’s) which distorted the true nature of the balance sheets of many large financial institutions. It came to believe that markets tended to be self regulating and thus it could spend much of its time looking for minor paperwork infractions. Occasionally it was prodded into action by more aggressive oversight by State Attorney Generals (i.e. Elliot Spitzer in the wake of the Dot.com bust), but generally it took a hands off approach, particularly during the first eight years of this century.

Under pressure from the bank lobby’s Congress decided to limit the size of the insurance fund at 1.25% of insured deposits. This meant that for several years, banks did not have to contribute much to the fund. Clearly this was a mistake. Last year 25 banks failed, which drove the insurance fund down to 0.40% of insured assets at the end of 2008 from 1.22% at the end of 2007. So far this year 32 more banks have failed. We do not yet know how big the fund was relative to insured deposits at the end of the first quarter, but it is safe to say that it is well below 0.40%. Normally the low level of reserves in the fund would lead them to charge higher premiums to banks to replenish the fund, but that would mean sucking money out of the banks at a time when we are trying to recapitalize them. The FDIC did suggest a special assessment of $27 billion on the banks to shore up the fund but it got shout down by the bank lobby and the banker’s friends in Congress. Instead the FDIC has asked that its line of credit at the Treasury to $500 billion from the current limit of $30 billion.

Glass Stiegel was pretty much a dead item by the time it was formally repealed in 1999. The biggest exemption from the rules that was granted was allowing Citibank to buy Travelers Insurance creating Citigroup (C). The Secretary of the Treasury at the time, Robert Rubin, ended up as Vice-Chairman of Citigroup. Clearly he benefited from that exemption and the subsequent repeal of the Depression era law that kept the system stable for so long. The rest of the country…not so much. As the financial crisis hit, the response was mostly ad-hoc. The only port in the storm resulted in the country moving even further away from the idea behind Glass Stiegel. J.P. Morgan took over Bear Sterns and Bank of America bought Merrill Lynch. In the process, the too big to fail institutions became even bigger.

This brings us to the other Roosevelt, Teddy. He recognized that if companies got too big, they could act in ways that hurt consumers. Also that concentrations of that much wealth in one place are dangerous to Democracy. U.S. antitrust law came about due to late-nineteenth-century hostility toward large corporations. However, enforcement has been focused less on size than on specific anti-competitive practices. The Sherman Act of 1890 prohibited collusion among companies to constrain freedom of trade, for example price fixing. The Clayton Act of 1914 went further in specifying anti-competitive practices, such as bundling or mergers that create excessive concentration in an industry (you don’t need to collude to fix prices if you simply buy out all your competition).

Starting with the Reagan Revolution, but continuing even under the Clinton Administration, antitrust enforcement by the Department of Justice has become very tolerant of size and concentration. At times it has focused instead on whether mergers will benefit or harm consumers. During the last eight years it has been almost non-existent since almost by definition an anti trust action is interfering with the markets. Under the last administration in particular, but generally since 1980, there was a strong presumption that the market was always right and could not make a mistake (or if one were made it would be self correcting). The feeling was that economies of scale would lead to greater efficiencies and thus benefit consumers, as much or more than concentration would hurt consumers by limiting competition allowing firms to jack up prices. It seems clear that there are limits to economies of scale, and at some point firms, particularly financial firms, simply become to large and complicated to manage effectively.

Lost in this was the idea that excessive concentrations of wealth will lead to excessive concentrations of power, particularly political power. With the defeat of the mortgage cram-down legislation last week, can anyone doubt the political clout that the banks have, even after they have been bailed out by the taxpayers to the tune of hundreds of billions? One of the highest return on capital investments out there is spending money to get the rules changed in your favor. While we have thousands of banks, we really have only a handful that are really significant. The top 19 banks that are going through the “stress tests” are the ones that really count, and not even all of them are really all that important.

Still, the level of concentration among the banks is not big enough to trigger the rules under the Clayton Act. Financial institutions should be treated as a special case, but there is probably a need for new anti-trust legislation to do so. We can not afford to let any of the big banks fail, particularly any of the big six. If they can not be allowed to fail, they are very difficult to control. They can take on excessive risks knowing that if the bet pays off, they win, but if the bet goes bad, the taxpayer will pay. Financial institutions that are too big to fail need to be broken up into smaller firms, each large enough to benefit from economies of scale, but none large enough to threaten the entire world economy if they were to fail. If we don’t do something then we will face the same problems again, perhaps not tomorrow or next year, but in a decade or so. Never again can we let banks grow to the point that they are too big to fail. We need to make banking boring again. Separate out the casino from the public utility type functions of a bank. Make each of the banks much smaller. The world will be much safer if once again, bankers can get in a full 18 holes before dinner.

pavel.chichikov,

We know.. it has not killed as many as the "experts" predicted..

Now if it mutates into something else- then it is not the same organism.

"bringing the death toll to 26, with 727 total cases reported "

Fatality rate over 3.5% is huge. I assume there are a lot of cases that have not been reported.

geeceemmm,

How many people with influenza end up in the hospital? and are they not the sickest anyway?

ManhattanWest Photos

I don't know if it is worth extricating the the logic from within the bond market, but it does overall signal there is no expectation of inflation or economic recovery this year.

As for what to do with that information. You could pursue top quality bonds, which will benefit once credit quality is re-evaluated during the next crunch for money. You could look at basic materials, but there has already been stockpile build. Agriculture should do well, but it may not be fast in coming. Precious metals, sure just be careful about central bank and JPM/HSBC activity.

I haven't been following options, beyond premiums are still between normal and October plummeting. Would be surprised if out of the money Puts for this fall did not pay off big. I'm not comfortable with shorts or short ETFs beyond the next sunset

I guess there is also the parallel question of which country/market leads off the next fall. I don't believe there can be a capital flight from the US this calendar year, which would be necessary to show dramatic inflation.

Lucifer, I don't know, but I believe the 1918 pandemic had a fatality rate of 2% which is considered extremely high. I think the normal flu is around 0.1%

oops.

Thanks.

That is an interesting question..

//Isn't perjury still illegal?//

Market = The Matrix. It's that scene where the guy agrees to betray his buddies in order to taste steak again. He knows it's fake, but he doesn't care. People are buying into the market even though, by any objective measure, it should still be down. I would dearly like to know how many players realize the fake nature of the rally and are playing anyway, to try to win back some of the losses they had last year. Versus the number of sheeple who think they are 'dollar cost averaging.' It also shows how much money is out there, worldwide, which has to flow into some sort of instrument-- there is still so much cash in the world it's difficult to stop bubbles happening somewhere.