Elections Today
- Pennsylvania
Recent Projections
| State | Candidate | Delegates |
|---|---|---|
 Donald Trump | ||
Pennsylvania |  Joe Biden |
When the economy gets tough, the tough get buying
— -- Quiz time! You see a baby bunny hopping among wildflowers in a meadow. You:
A. Run to get your camera.
B. Wonder at the renewal of life in springtime.
C. Envy a creature that doesn't have to worry about rising inflation, a stagnant economy and a stinking 401(k) account that has gone nowhere for a decade.
If you answered C, you're pretty much in the mainstream of investor sentiment these days. Oddly enough, that's a good thing: On Wall Street, gloom is good, and may even be a good "buy" signal.
The stock market may be deeply analytical in nature, but it's also highly emotional. The past few months, its mood swings have been unusually pronounced.
For example, the Dow Jones industrial average has posted losses of more than 100 points in 57 trading days the past 12 months. The average loss: 208 points.
It's not hard to see why Wall Street is so miserable:
•The credit crisis. The Federal Reserve has pushed the key overnight fed funds rate to 2% from 5.25% in September, but lenders are still terrified of actually making loans. As a result, it's hard for existing businesses to expand, and almost impossible to finance new ventures.
•The housing meltdown. The Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller 20-city home price index has fallen 12.7% the 12 months ended February. In that month alone, San Francisco-area home prices tumbled 5%.
•Inflation. Even though the consumer price index rose just 0.2% in April, huge jumps in the prices of food and energy remain a big worry, particularly among those who like to eat and drive.
•Earnings. First-quarter earnings for the S&P 500 fell 25.9% from the last three months of 2007, says Howard Silverblatt, S&P index analyst. Earnings for financial services firms dove off a cliff and rolled down a mine shaft, dragging down earnings estimates for the S&P 500 as a whole.
As you might expect, all this bad news has depressed investors. That may be a good thing.
Investor sentiment is a contrary indicator: Typically, the best time to buy is when the public is thoroughly disgusted with the stock market.
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