Quite a successful day of manipulation for the Wall Street criminals...Textbook containment of a final hour sell-off prevented a big drop & close below 9,800, and a new low being set at the close.

How long before those moving the strings cede 9,800? Will they wait another 2 months worth of 401K contributions before they allow it to move lower?

Folks, I think this market is a fraud that will never, and I repeat NEVER, sees its equal...

Make sure you are positioned correctly. As I have said before I'm typically an optomist, but I fear things will likely get ugly this summer.

Lots of uncertainty out there for sure.

Over zealous job numbers, tensions in Israel, the Korean Peninsula, and Iran. War in Afghanistan now longer than Vietnam. What looks to be a never ending oil spill. Goldman giving the financial crisis commission the big middle finger. Businesses uncertain what their tax liabilities will look like in 2011. Eurozone countries facing tough fiscal decisions if not outright default.

It's hard to find any positives to point to for the coming summer season.

Don't forget economic impact of losing the entire Gulf of Mexico and it's entire coastline as a food supply.

Ryley;

My minor was money and banking and I have been an active investor for more than 40 years. From all that I know a few things and believe a few others.

What I know:

The market is driven by fear and greed. Recently fear had had the upper hand.

The market almost never just goes, up and up without a correction. The run up of the past six months was a big one. A significant correction was overdue.

Whenever everyone knows which way the market will go they are usually wrong.

What goes up must come down and vice versa.

What I believe:

There is no conspiracy. The market is simply too big and complex to allow it. There can be manipulation of individual stocks, but to manipulate the entire market would be a really difficult task.

If you are sure the market will continue down significantly you can make a ton of money by short selling. Money can be made in either direction the market moves. Big moves – big money.

Trying to time the market almost always bites you in the butt.

You always have a 50/50 shot when making market predictions.

We should probably ask Parker before drawing any conclusions, though.

one thing for sure, we will pay for the BP oil spill at the pump...no matter what demand and oil stocks are doing...

Doom and gloom..... Another crash is coming, that's what Parkers saying.......

Keith

Parker's right, all the propping up of the system is just prolonging the next big down turn.

Which will be followed by the next big upturn. That's the way it works. Those who didnt take advantage of the last big downturn missed a killer buying opportunity. You could have bought Ford at $1.45 per share. Now $11.00 per plus. I bought 1,000, now wish it had been 10,000.

Big market swings are opportunities to make big $$$.


"Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you're always afraid
You step out of line, the man come and take you away"

I think we are seeing a manipulation of gas prices right now. Usually it only takes the threat of something and prices soar. Every memorial day prices go up for the "summer driving period". Yet this year I am seeing prices drop. My theory is that big oil is holding prices down to keep the public from getting even more outraged at the spill. If they do manipulate it to keep it down, doesn't that mean they are probably doing the same to keep it up?

That's exactly how it works...+100

Parker's right?

Did you miss his big "Dow at 6000" prediction?

How'd that turn out?

Like I said...........make your prediction. You have a 50% chance to look like a genius and a 50% chance to look like a goat.

I don't know for sure if 6,000 will be the low point but I believe that we will head into a second dip.

Dave, I acknowledge and respect that you have many more years of experience in the market than I. With that experience I can’t understand how you would think that are within another normal market cycle, given the conditions of our domestic economy and how we are more and more tied to the worlds suffering economies. Debt is now at unmanageable levels at home and abroad. Spending by governments is totally out of control. The market indicators are negative across the board.

So I’ll play the Devils advocate, and you can play the Markets advocate.
Where are the indicators that we’ll have a summer rally, or that we’ll push through the ceiling of the current market cycles, instead of the floor?

I have some bad news, there isn’t any good news.

Employment, um..no.
Currencies, horrible.
The government has been propping up our economy by pumping money into the system with stimulus and other tricks that cant be sustained.
Commodities look good because everything else is in the toilet.
Manufacturing…yeah, look at what that 80 billion dollar bailout got us.

The consensus out there is that things are bad and only getting worse.

So start an agressive short selling program and you wil be filthy rich . . . . . . . .if you are right.

May is typically a down month for the market and summer is typically a lull. In my opinion many stocks are still way under valued and great buys if you are long. I think in the fall the market will take off if we don't have any huge 911 scale of events and next year will be even better. More and more companies are talking about going back to paying out their dividend and/or doing buy backs. International/European/the Euro right now is a great buy. Or there will be complete anarchy, all is worthless and the world ends.

Larry Fink, Chairman and CEO of BlackRock, managers of over a trillion dollars in assets disagrees with your take, Ryley.

He thinks the US economy is set for major growth. He has major concerns about Europe, but still thinks the US economy can shake off those concerns and post significant growth.

I tend to take his opinion more seriously than some others because he has a proven track record.

I'll not make any predictions myself because following the market is a hobby for me and there is much unseen to those not in the know.

Dan,

How many CEO's, who's job it is to increase investor contributions to their firms, paint the economy in a negative light?

'Insert Major Bank or investment CEO's name here'
"Hey, the market conditions look pretty dicey right now. This and that are going down, blah blah blah, don't invest your money right now"

You'll rarely ever hear any people in that position speak negatively, because that equates to driving away customers.

In CEO land, things are always Peachy ..unless your name is Tony and your'e the CEO of a major oil firm...

Point taken.

But remember that this guy doesn't get to play with a trillion dollars of other people's money because he has a great sense of humor, or a poor track record.

Still, Larry is going to get paid a handsome sum this year regardless of whether his predictions have any merit, so proceed with caution.