Market first – because it was remarkable.
As in remarkably bad.
Whether we will do a public post here on Urban will depend on whether we get “glowing reports” about the coming weekend. Because that’s when the world could really take a “smoke break.”
To keep things in perspective? It feels less like triumph than vertigo. We were not predicting “stocks might go down someday.” We identified compression, explained how flags and pennants store energy, and waited to see which side failed. At Wednesday’s close, the market answered: down.
The Dow lost 1,129 points, or 2.14%; the S&P 500 fell 1.50%; and the Nasdaq dropped 1.68%, leaving it roughly 9% beneath its June record. More telling than the percentages was the action: an attempted afternoon recovery failed, selling returned, and the indexes finished near their lows. That is exactly how a bearish continuation structure is supposed to resolve.
Yet we cannot stamp COLLAPSE CONFIRMED on it yet. This was a break – a hard one with a lot more down (says the theory side) immediately ahead.
However, because we counted this as a complex Wave 2 this means any coming (after we drop to the 200 DMA – or lower) should be a short violent rally.
Then we begin free-fall of Fall.
Collapse requires follow-through: another weak session, failure to reclaim the lower pattern boundary, worsening breadth, and selling spreading beyond the AI/chip leadership. OK, and China balling up in the power void and taking chips off the table…
A sharp recovery back inside the pattern would convert today into a bear trap. Rising oil and long-term interest rates make that recovery harder, because they simultaneously pressure inflation, growth and expensive equities.
Like I said in the Peoplenomics charts today: Wait and Watch mode.
Then Something Amazing Happened
That missing green IBM Selectric, which according to package records online at USPS is still in Denver had a “redelivery attempted” note in my mailbox Wednesday.
I know something is deeply wrong. Because Elaine and I were both home all day, up and down our county road talking toe the linemen putting in new power poles. To claim it was a RE delivery? Um, NO.
We are home every day and we love our carriers. Odds are better than even? This is a high-end butt covering because we live in a world where no one owns their mistakes anymore.
However, you can’t spend half a century in mahogany foxholes and newsrooms and not know how to chew someone’s butt.
So stand by for the floor show when I show up tomorrow to pick up the “Delivery Attempted” item.
I feel like Remo Williams. “The Adventure Continues.” Maybe when the nukes go off, we will have a moment to sit back as ask, “Say, what about that Fort Knox audit???”
Write when you leap a tall building, or something,
George@Ure.net