Let's think back nearly seven months ago -- to late March of 2009. Gloom and doom about the economy was pretty extreme. In fact, the only thing people were more gloomy about was the stock market. That's because earlier in that month, the Dow Industrials hit its lowest price level in 12 years. All the major U.S. indexes had lost more than half their value.
But that was then. Today the Dow Industrials closed above the 10,000 level. So, a simple question: in the words of a headline I saw scroll across the television screen a moment ago:
"Dow 10,000 -- Who knew?"
Indeed. Good question. Who did know? I'm sure that in the case of that scrolling headline, the question was rhetorical -- as in it meant to suggest, "Nobody knew..."
And I'll be the first to acknowledge that no one can "know" the future with certainty. Nothing is certain before it happens. Yet when the topic is financial markets, the "who knew" question really is about forecasts. As in, "Who actually forecast a rally to Dow 10,000?"
And if THAT is the question, well, the answer is Yes. Someone did. And it was back in late March.
"The big news is the power of today’s advance, which confirms that a Primary-degree countertrend rally is underway. Today’s rally carried ten NYSE stocks up for every declining share; such one-sidedly positive breadth signals that the low of March 9 (on a closing basis) is the start of a multi-week rally that will ultimately re-ignite the old bull market euphoria.... [and] suggests that a longer-term push back toward 10,000 is now unfolding."
-- Short Term Update, March 23, 2009
I could fill these pages with days of quotes from experts during that month: what they'd all have in common are forecasts which said the opposite of what you read above. (Two days later on March 25, the Dow 10,000 analysis went out to all monthly Elliott Wave Financial Forecast subscribers.)
"Dow 10,000 -- Who Knew?" At that time, nobody did. Except the Short Term Update. And in the very next issue of his Elliott Wave Theorist, Bob Prechter added that the trend "could carry the Dow as high as 10,000" (April 18, 2009).
Enough about the past and present: what matters now is, "What's next?" You can get that answer right now, from the three publications of EWI's Financial Forecast Service, which helped subscribers stay ahead of the decline
and the climb back to Dow 10,000.
Click here to learn more.