Don't Be Fooled by Faux Bulls

[newporttony]

Watch Out for "Sucker Rallies" - WSJ.com

Wall Street needs a new road sign.
"Caution: Sucker Rallies Ahead."
Plenty of very smart people are wondering right now if we are due a very big rally. And maybe they are right. It is certainly true that there are an incredible number of bargains around.
But that won't necessarily mean the bear market is over.
A look through the archives shows that big bear markets, like this one, last far longer than many people expect. And they feature any number of giant temporary rallies.
Japan's big bear market began in early 1990 and still hasn't clearly ended.
Yet during that time Japan has seen 13 separate rallies of 15% or more. Some were huge, and fooled many into thinking the bear market was over and the new bull market had begun.

 

[Grep]

Great, all I have to know is which rallies are sucker's rallies and which one is the "real" one, and I'll be in fine fettle. This should be so easy!

 

[harley]

Just buy at the bottom and wait, no worries!

 

[DblDoc]

I'll just keep buying every two weeks and ignore the noise.

DD

 

[haha]

This board is typical. We are all in the grip of bear psychology. A thought experiment: when all these gurus say that the market will go down another 25% or more it is patently absurd. If so many people know that the market will drop 25%, they would rush to sell or sell short, and the market would almost immediately drop 25%.

Just watch- if the market should turn around and head abruptly up, two types of gurus will be quoted, and the same two types of posts made here.

Some will say that it is a bear rally and that it won't last; others will say that they saw it coming, that it had to happen.

Ha

 

[MichaelB]

Some will say that it is a bear rally and that it won't last; others will say that they saw it coming, that it had to happen.Ha

And there are others that will say just the opposite ...

 

[HFWR]

I thought this was a thread about faux "balls". Nevermind...

I think this market will stay irrational longer than I can stay solvent...

 

[wallygator69]

I thought this was a thread about faux "balls". Nevermind...

I think this market will stay irrational longer than I can stay solvent...

Man Wins Award for Creating Fake Dog Testicles
Thursday, October 06, 2005
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BOSTON — Gregg Miller mortgaged his home and maxed out his credit cards to mass produce his invention — prosthetic testicles for neutered dogs.

What started 10 years ago with an experiment on an unwitting Rottweiler named Max has turned into a thriving mail-order business. And on Thursday night Miller's efforts earned him a dubious yet strangely coveted honor: the Ig Nobel Prize (search) for medicine.

"Considering my parents thought I was an idiot when I was a kid, this is a great honor," he said. "I wish they were alive to see it."

The Ig Nobels, given at Harvard University (search) by Annals of Improbable Research magazine, celebrate the humorous, creative and odd side of science.

Miller has sold more than 150,000 of his Neuticles, more than doubling his $500,000 investment. The silicone implants come in different sizes, shapes, weights and degrees of firmness.

Although the Ig Nobels are not exactly prestigious, many recipients are, like Miller, happy to win.


"Most scientists — no matter what they're doing, good or bad — never get any attention at all," said Marc Abrahams, editor of the Annals of Improbable Re (search)search.

Some, like Benjamin Smith of the University of Adelaide in Australia, who won the biology prize, actually nominated their own work. "I've been a fan of the Ig Nobels for a while," he said.

Smith's team studied and catalogued different scents emitted by more than 100 species of frogs under stress. Some smelled like cashews, while others smelled like licorice, mint or rotting fish.

He recalled getting strange looks when he'd show up at zoos asking to smell the frogs. "I've been turned away at the gate," he said.

This year's other Ig Nobel winners include:

— PHYSICS: Since 1927, researchers at the University of Queensland in Australia have been tracking a glob of congealed black tar as it drips through a funnel — at a rate of one drop every nine years.

— PEACE: Two researchers at Newcastle University in England monitored the brain activity of locusts as they watched clips from the movie "Star Wars."

— CHEMISTRY: An experiment at the University of Minnesota was designed to prove whether people can swim faster or slower in syrup than in water.

The Ig Nobel for literature went to the Nigerians who introduced millions of e-mail users to a "cast of rich characters ... each of whom requires just a small amount of expense money so as to obtain access to the great wealth to which they are entitled."

 

[HFWR]

I have now, officially, seen it all...