Prices fell again, for the fourth day in a row – right on the heels of four successive gains. Yet such contrary strings are far from unusual, occurring about five percent of the time, whether prices are trending up or drifting down.
Today’s diagram shows how frequently these strings occur. They come almost back to back, happening almost once, on average, every three weeks.
Yet, despite these most recent ups and downs, prices have climbed more than three percent in the 16 trading days since the beginning of the month. In fact, the September trading profile is one of successive changes in the same direction. So far, we have seen one string of seven advances in a row, followed by a chain of four gains and now by four successive losses.
DJIA -.43 percent
NASDAQ -.08 percent
S&P500 -.26 percent
