A Positive Session — Finally

January 23, 2008

All three indices put an end to the five successive downturns, and finished the day scoring substantial gains. The DJIA and the S&P500 moved up over two percent, while the NASDAQ increased by 1.05 percent.

The chances of another down day –to make it the sixth-in-a-row decline- were small. There have been only two of these for the S&P500, 9 for the DJIA and 13 for the NASDAQ since January 2000.

On the other hand, a situation like today –that is, a positive close after five straight declines- occurred 14 times for the S&P500 and11 times for the DJIA, while the NASDAQ scored 18 advances.

Looking at the results of the next day, that is did the market continue higher or did it decline, the data show that there were just about as many advances as declines since January 2000. About nine days with price increases and the same number of declines. Yet the losses on the down side were more substantial than the up day gains.

The NASDAQ median loss comes to – 2.29 percent, while its median gain was just .66 percent. The S&P500 median loss of -1.26 percent is more than twice as large as its .50 median gain. On the other hand, the DJIA experienced about equal increases and decreases: -.98 percent is the median loss while .81 percent is the median gain.

DJIA 2.50 percent
NASDAQ 1.05 percent
S&P500 2.14 percent

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