Sick Stock Market and Sick Associated Press (Boycott Yahoo and AT&T): Getting Stock Market Moves Wrong (423 Points of Nothing).

Here is the AP/Yahoo/AT&T headine from this evening:


"Stocks soar 423 points on economic news"


Elizabeth Barrett Brwoning (first AP reporter): ; "How do I lie to thee; let me count the ways."


Hacker Bo (hacking into this despicable blog for the good of hunmanity, and still not commenting on allegatons I am associated wtih Rupert Murdoch): "Skip. You are despicable. A love poem cannot pssiblly have anything to do wtih your supposed--a conceit on your part--Sodom and Gomorrrah search for an honest, competent AP reporter. I am not even going to dignify your MISQUOTE with a comment."


Skip: "I admit that the love poem has not real connection to the awful Associated Press, and the boned deep stupid people who work there. I just lke this misquote, because I believe it accurately reflects the attitude of the Associated Press--which never gets ANY story right, and expecialy not any financial story. My futile Sodom and Gomorrah search for an honest, competent AP reporter continues, but we ALL kknow that no such creature exists outside of a fantasy novel.


Let me list for you the LIES of the AP in this HEADLINE alone:


1. The headline implies that the 423 point rise in the Dow was GOOD news. I was not. It simply was more proof that the stock market is SICK. Last four stock market sessions (Dow): down 600 plus, up 435 (or so), down 520, and now up 423 (after being up more than 500 about an hour before the close--a time when absolutely NO ONE, and no MACHINE, should have been buying any stocks at all because of tghe irrationality and the lesson of the past few irrational stock market rises). This kind of irrational stock mmarket movement is BAD news. It means that the market COULD fall 1000 points tomorrow. Sure, the market could also go up tomorrow, but this kind of comoputer gaming casino masquerading as a "stock market" should SCARE all rational people out of the stock market forever. If you win a FIXED horse race, does that give yu confidence in betting on horses when you don't have inside information on the race being fixed? Have I ever represented, by the way, that I am rationa? Nope. See below. What I am is HONEST and COMPETENT (substantively)--someting of which the AP is totally incapable. Oh, the AP does mention, in the body of the article, about the big moves, but that did not stop the disgraceful headline featured on Yahoo (the AT&T "welcome" page), and it did not prevent the many lies in the story..


2. Here I just want to cry. You would think that even the incompetents at the AP would hesitate to attribute a stock market move to "economic news" ater the market has gone DOWN 520, UP 435, and DOWN more than 6000 on the previous 3 sessioins (not to mention the 500 point DOWN move the previious week). It is simply absurd to attribute the 423 point move today to "economic news". EVERYBODY else with any knowledgee of the stock market attributes these wild gyrations to high frequency MACHINE TRADING (destroying the stock market as any kind of rational investing vehicle). For once, business "journalists" today pretty much recognized that you simply cannot--unless lyou work for the dsigraceful AP--look at these wild gyrations as having essentially anything to do with "economic news". At the very least, the magnitude of the moves is IRRATIONAL, and all rational lpeople know it. As I have stated, Jim Cramer is right on this. Now on up moves, even the financial "press" is in the takn for Obama, and so they may try to attirbute an UP move to real reasons, while talking otherwise about down moves. But, in this case, the absurdity of the major up AND down moves tells EVERYONE--exclusing, again, the bone deepstuid, partisan peole of the AP and mainstream media outside of the financial press--that these moves are not rational (unless you consider it rational to have a stock market run by MACHINE TRADINB, which is notihing but a computer gaming casiono)..


3. What "economic news"? Another LIE. The main item cited by the despicable AP is Thursday's report on the number of new unemplyment calims last week. The LYING headline is that the 395, 000 number was the "best" in 4 months. I keep reporting this LIE week after week, and the mainstream media keeps telling the same lie. The number of new unemployment claims STAYED THE SAME this week, for the third week in a row. Here are the numbers ffor the past three weeksks, starting with the number reoported today: 395,000, 402,000 and 401,000. Even the mainstream media, including FOX, should realize that the 395,000 number was UNCHANGED (no "improvement" at all, except a modest improovementin the four weeek average because the number has stayed thee same for awhile). No, and this is the LIE. 395,000 is NOT different than 402,000. The difference is well withink the marging of error. In fact, the 395,0000 number will be REVISAED next week. See that 401,000 number in the past three weeks? That number was rEPORTED origninally as 398,000, with the SAME LYING HEADLINES that it was the first time in more than 4 months that the number had fallen below 400,000. The number was REVISED up to 401,000. So much for the mainstream media LIES. Amazingly enough, the number for last week was NOT revised much, if at all. There has been a consistent revision UPWARD of 3,000 or 4,0000, except on very rare occasions. When the number has NOT been revised much the previiuos week, there has been atendency for a BIG revision the next week. Will the 395,000 STAY "under" 4000,000? Stay tuned. ASIF it makes any idifference. The "seasonal adjustment" alone creates a margin of error of 100,000, or ev even 20,0000--combined with all kinds of special factors. It is a FACT taht the 395,000 number was UNCHANGED, in any kind of real statistical analysis. Sure, if the numbrer is not revised upward, and continues substantially down next week, you might look back and say a trend was develooping. But today's number meant NOTHING (other than we are not getting worse, obviously). And "investors" know it. There is NO invetor out there who really believes that the small "down tick" in the number of new unemployment claims had anything tto do with the 423 point stock market move today.


Okay. The AP is composed on incompetent liars, and Yahoo and AT&T are just as despicable for featuring the AP as virtually the sole source of featured stroies. But yhou already knew that. You want to know: "What abot you, Skip. You say that the stock market is a compter gaming casino, being manipulated by irratinal people and machines. That means you are inveting in gold, or something, right? "


Actaully, no. As stated, I do not claim to be a rational person. When I came back from vacation on August 2, I was about 40% invested int he stock market. I am now about 80% invested in the stock market. You can see that--contrary to what you may have been thinking--I WANT the stock market to have a BIG BOUNCE here. As I have told you, IF you are going to actually invest in this market as an individual, and don't take the more rational mutual fund route--with renvesting smoothing out the wild gyrations--you need to BUY into major declines, and SELL into major advances. For examle, I SOLD some of the recent Cisco I purchased in today's up move. But I need a BIGGER up move to get out of the extra risk I have assumed during this sell off. I may not, by the way, have sold enough of the Cisco Systemms stock I have. Nor am I at all confident that the stock market is going up tomorrow. But there is usually a MAJOR BOUNCE after this kind of quck sell off (as there was in 2008, before the market dECLINED to a low in March of 2009). Yep. You can say I am SPECuALTING on a quck profit, even though I believe that our economy is IN TROUBLE. You can't make any money is CDs, with the Fed artificially depressing interest rates (and scared people getting out of the stock market and depressig bond prices).


No, I don't think you can "invest" "long term" in this computer gaming casino. You have to play short term games, although I can't bring myself to play the "high frequency" trading computer game. I trade online, but NOT aas a "day trader", or minute by minute computer program trader. Note that you CAN still invest long term, n mutual funds, PROVIDED you "dollar average" with CONSTANT PURCHASES at the same level. Yu can actually make money in a BAD stock market--so long as you are not about to cash out--by investing a constant amount each month, since yo will be investing when the market is LOW, as well as when it is high. It is NOT TURE that investors in a constant mutual fund purcase program lose, say, 50% of their money when the market declines 50% over five years (or whatever). Sure, you may lose money, but it all depends on WHEN--and at what price--most of your money is invested.


So. I would LIKE an IRRATIONAL BOUNCE in the stock market right now. That does not change the fact that it would be IRRATIONAL.


The risks out there are extreme. You are almost surely better off not specualting. I am just not built that way. But neither do I cry and ask for a government bailout if my investments go wrong. And no, I do NOT have millions of dollars. I do not even have a million dollars. I am not one of the "rich", although I am hardly one of the "poor" (depedning on what the market does). I only have ME to support, as my daughters are both big time lawyers (although hardly "rich" either). Thus, I cn indulge in the "thrill" of a casino stock market, wihut owrrling overmuch. After all, my daughters can support me, right? (LOL). In the meantie, I will tell you the TRUTH, while the despicable AP, and mainstreammedia, lie to you.


P.S. No proofreading or spell checking (bad eyesight).