USMarketView

May 13, 2009

The NASDAQ loss of  -3.01 percent, its worst performance in the last 17 trading days, is also its third straight decline.  The last time this index fell three days in a row was on February 27. 

The S&P500, down  -2.69 percent, and the DJIA, off -2.18 percent, also posted their deepest loss since April 20.  Indeed, only 49 declines steeper than today’s occurred since January 2000; moreover, only 20 such closes exist before 2000.

Only the DJIA continued its up-and-down gyration, now in its seventh day, while the other two indices experienced their third decline in as many days.  This is the 21^st repeat of this pattern since 1975; yet it has not been seen since October 2005.

In the past, the day following posted declines more often than gains.  The NASDAQ fell 14 times and moved higher on six days.  The DJIA has an 11 negative and 9 positive history, while the S&P500 scored 8 advances against 12 declines.

This heavily downward bias is similar to yesterday’s state of affairs, in which the frequency of losses in the past outnumbered gains on the next day.  In that sense, history provided a useful guide to today’s outcome.

 

DJIA                  -2.18 percent

NASDAQ          -3.01 percent

S&P500             -2.69 percent

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 13th, 2009 at 12 042009000000Wed, 13 May 2009 16:12:47 +0000 and is filed under Market Report. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.