What We're Reading

A Ribbon Study consists of 8 or more Simple Moving Average plots having different lengths thus forming a "ribbon". The lengths of those averages are in an arithmetic progression relation: the increment of the progression is defined by the initial and the final Moving Average lengths.

The way I view a moving average, especially a large one, is that is the average price of stockholders who have held since "that" point in time.  So if you're looking at a 50d, it's the average price of shareholders who purchased in the last 50 days.  If it's a MONTHLY moving average............NOW you're talking funds who have skin in the game and HAVE had skin in the game for months or years.  I want to be one of them if I'm a long/hold investor.  I want to "buy" when they buy.

I've always felt, that from a long/holding investing point of view, this study can also be an interesting way to view a coming expansion, after a long market consolidation.  View these historical charts and give me your view.  Ex

As I read this morning's offering, I thought not of next week's trade or the possibility for growth next year but much further down the road.  I pondered the future for my children and my children's children.  All I have to say is I pray they stay in school. -kos

IBM's Ai project Watson “now applying for jobs at call centers, and getting them. In finance, and in law, and getting them.” - MIT’s Erik Brynjolfsson

When Growth Hits Zero

A Carter-era text called The Zero Sum ­Society, suggests a grim dystopia that emerges once economic growth hits zero point zero, at which moment to gain anything........................requires that you take it from somebody else. “Once you start to think about growth,” the Nobel laureate Robert Lucas has said, “it is hard to think about anything else.”

What if

The global economic slump that we have endured since 2008 might not merely be the consequence of the burst housing bubble, or financial entanglement and overreach, or the coming

Is it possible we are in the early stages of an enormous secular stockmarket bull run?  We talk about this continually in Chat on StockBuz.

Since 1900, there have been four large stock market basing patterns which exceeded 12 years in length:

• 1906 to 1924—18 years
• 1929 to 1955—26 years
• 1966 to 1982—16 years
• 2000 to 2013—13 years

What prior breakouts had in common is investor behavior reflected an underlying distrust or disinterest and characterized by underinvestment in equities.  This results in a rebound that is relentless (emphasis mine), providing little opportunity to buy on pullbacks.  To put it bluntly, the distrust creates so many bears, that the inflow of bulls plows them over and with minimal pullback, they've forced to cover higher and higher...............fueling the market (my words - not in the article)

How and what caused those breakouts to sustain is a point of discussion in this Raymond James presentation  (courtesy of MarketFolly)

Also reviewed is