You, and your firm, do good work, as testified to, by: “”Ask one hundred investors whether this is a bull market or a bear market, and you are likely to find their opinions split evenly down the middle.” Identifying Bear Market Bottoms and New Bull Markets … A Study of 90% Days is here to clarify.
This paper was the winner of the prestigous 2002 Charles H. Dow Award
Each year the Market Technicians Association, in alliance with Dow Jones and Company, presents an award for excellence in the field of Technical Analysis. The recipient of that award is Paul Desmond, President of Lowry Research Corporation.
http://www.lowrysreports.com/research_studies.cfm
http://lowryresearch.com/custom_reports.cfm
You can listen to the Bloomberg podcast at the end of this post.

If you’re new to Lowry’s, many of the terms below may be confusing. For example, Pim refers to “Lowry stocks” which is a misnomer. What he means is OCO (operating company only) breadth, which is Lowry’s response to the pollution on the NYSE. This measure strips out ADRs, CEFs, REITs, bonds, ETFs, etc. and only shows market breadth for operating companies. For more background like that, as well as an explanation of Lowry’s proprietary indicators, take a look at my post late last year outlining Lowry Research’s position on the then market conditions.
http://www.tradersnarrative.com/index.php?tag=oco
sometimes it’s helpful leave a trail of breeadcrumbs..

“Conflict Resolution Day” occurs every third Thursday of October, and while there may have been some resolutions somewhere, as far as the equity markets were concerned, not much transpired in terms of resolving the near-term disparities that are beginning to appear. As noted in Thursday’s Morning Commentary, “there are elements of the recent rally that don’t quite jibe with a trouble free advance” at least for the near-term. While Thursday’s session saw some upside follow through after Wednesday’s new high in the major market indices, the gains were minor and accompanied by some weakening in market internals. Up Volume was about 46% of the total NYSE Composite Up/Down Volume and about 42% of the NASDAQ total Up/Down Volume. Breadth readings were also showing some deterioration, with Declines outpacing Advances on both the NYSE and NASDAQ. Weakening in momentum was also evident in the % of NASDAQ and NYSE Stocks above 10-Day Moving Averages that dropped from 85.6% to 80.9% and from 92.3 to 89.9% respectively.

The pattern of the advance from the October low being fueled more by a contraction in Supply than an expansion in Demand remains intact. Despite new highs registered by the major market indices in Thursday’s session, Buying Power dropped a point to 132 and Selling Pressure increased by 2 points to 811. To update recent commentary, the rally from the October 2nd low through Thursday now shows a 13 point increase in Buying Power and a 20 point decrease in Selling Pressure. The rise in Buying Power has simply not kept pace with the recent advance and remains below the level registered on the September 22nd market peak at 140. In essence, Demand as measured by Buying Power is not confirming the new market high. This is also evident in our Short Term Indexes on both the NASDAQ and NYSE that remain well below their September peaks. These non-confirmations or “divergences” suggest probabilities could be increasing for a short term correction or consolidation period. Examples of other non-confirmations include our NYSE 30 Day Up + Down Volume and the Percent of Lowry’s Operating Company Only (OCO) issues above 30 Day Moving Averages at levels below those seen at their September peaks. As discussed yesterday, Sentiment readings are also showing indications of possible misplaced confidence of further rally with both Wednesday’s and Thursday’s intraday CBOE Equity Put/Call ratio reaching the mid 40’s. This is the first time since July 2007 that back to back intraday readings this low have been recorded. Overbought readings on other short term indicators may also be increasing the probabilities that at least some near term profit taking could unfold.

On a longer term basis, confirmations are evident in many important indicators and measures that continue to support the primary uptrend. Some of those confirmations include new highs registered in various Advance-Decline Lines and the number of New Highs that reached levels not seen since 2006 in the case of the NASDAQ and 2007 in the case of the NYSE. Our Selling Pressure index has also seen a recent new low confirming the advance. Degradation over several months in these indicators along with a notable increase in Selling Pressure are usually apparent before the development of a major top. However, since these measures are confirming the recent price highs, they continue to support the prospects for additional gains in the primary uptrend.
In summary, there are signs that risks of a short-term correction or consolidation period could be increasing, albeit within the confines of the primary uptrend. The short-term risks, while on the rise, are still not likely to impact the primary term advance that in all probability has further to run.

That Said, mudgeon, I hope Tebow makes Saban very, very sad in Atlanta. My second prediction (in the same post as GM BK last year) was Gators undefeated championship season and Tebow wins his second Heisman. If that comes true, then I’ll still be happy. (although probably unemployed and broke as well).

That Said, Bruce, I hope Tebow makes Saban very, very sad in Atlanta. My second prediction (in the same post as GM BK last year) was Gators undefeated championship season and Tebow wins his second Heisman. If that comes true, then I’ll still be happy. (although probably unemployed and broke as well).

Yuck the Fankees. And I don’t even care about baseball. Down where I live, it’s all about college football. Even when my team (Alabama) sucks, like it often has until recently, they’d sell out that stadium every weekend. You can’t get season tickets without giving the school about $10,000 a year, and that’s more than I paid for tuition, and even at that, it wasn’t much worth it.