State of the Market - 9/17/09

Another quite crazy day, as AIG's bailout did nothing to rally the bulls early on. Futures fell throughout the pre-market session, and when the market did open, it did forcefully to the downside. They tried to bounce a bit but couldn't get much past the open, and from there they sold off hard into the lunch hour, with all major indices down at least 3% once again. Stocks did find a temporary bottom at 12:00 and tried to rally for about an hour, but couldn't hold onto those gains and sold back off, testing and in some cases slightly breaking the lunchtime lows. Support held there, however, and the bears were squeezed a bit back into the close. That is until 3:30 came, when stocks sold back off rather hard and finished at the lows for the day with very large losses once again (over 4%). Another really bad day for this market.

I once again did nothing today, as a huge gap down didn't allow any low-risk positions to be put on anyway. Trading remains difficult here unless you are a day-trader, and I can't be that right now, so I just have to remain patient. It is way too late to short here - I thought we would bounce a bit today - but I would be very careful trying to buy dips. You may be able to play some intraday bounces on the short side, but if you do, I have not done my scans yet, but I would guess we are getting closer and closer to extreme measurements in a lot of areas. The VIX spiked again and is closing in quite quickly on the 40 level that is pretty important in past bottoms.

If you are not already short (and to be honest, I probably would have covered my shorts anyway by now - I don't know that I would have the patience or guts to sit through all of these swings without taking most of my profits), there is nothing to do here other than sit tight and watch history unfold before your eyes. And I do get the feeling that we are witnessing history. It is going to be a very interesting next few days, especially heading into the weekend.

The only good news out there right now is that this type of action will bring us closer to a very nice, tradeable bounce and perhaps even a more serious move higher. I have no way of knowing when that will happen - I will keep an eye on the same measures I normally do - but history shows that when capitulation occurs (and that does look to be where we are headed), markets are usually higher several months afterwards. And if we don't bounce soon after this carnage of this week and possible further carnage ahead of us, well, then, we probably all are screwed anyway. Let's hope that doesn't happen. No charts to put up tonight - no sense in trading right now, at least for my style and from my perspective. If I have any interesting observations or thoughts, I'll post later. Good luck Thursday.

Tags: VIX, Market Crash