My trading mantra of Don't Ask Why the market does what it does got bolstering on two fronts this week. We now know that the worldwide market melt down this past Monday was, at least in part, triggered by a trader gone amok at Societe Generale, a French banking concern. To be sure, the markets were primed for a sell-off and anything could have triggered it, but the why it happened that day in the way that it did, was only revealed well after the fact, and was not due to the sub-prime mortgage mess or other commonly cited reasons.
Ben Stein wrote a column in today's New York Times, arguing that it is the big traders that move the market in whatever direction they want. While I agree that the bigs boys hold sway over the market, I am not sure they are always of a collective mind. I think there is this constant war going among the Greek Gods of Investing which us mere mortals cannot understand. Our only hope is to try to figure out who is winning at any point in time and sneak a little bit of the spoils for ourself with out getting stomped on by the wrestling gods. That is what I try to do in this blog. I don't care what the fight is about, I just want to know what the short term trend is and where I can grab a profit. Its not easy and I have gotten stomped on quite a few times, but in the long run, I think I will come out ahead.
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