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[moonblue] 05/11/2002 23:07

downgrade by bet lynch..merryle's coosin ...and results 7th nnov

[moonblue] 05/11/2002 10:01

LONDON (AFX) - Shares in Signet Group PLC were expected to be active in
opening deals after Merrill Lynch downgraded its rating on the jewellery
retailer citing fears of a weak Christmas due to sliding US consumer spending,
dealers said.
Signet was moved to 'neutral' from 'buy' by Merrill.
The broker called Signet a "superb operator", but said it is becoming
increasingly nervous about prospects for US consumer spending.
While it thinks shares look inexpensive, Merrill sees increasing nervousness
ahead of Christmas which are likely to provide better buying opportunities ahead
for the shares.
The broker's move comes ahead of third quarter sales from Signet, due at
noon on Nov 7.
Merrill forecasts UK like-for-like sales growth of 6 pct, towards the top of
the forecast range, which it thinks is supported by positive noises from fashion
retailers.
It is less comfortable about the US market, which accounts for 70 pct of
group operating profits.
"With growing concerns about the US consumer's appetite for credit,
investors may decide that discretion is the better part of valour until
visibility in the US improves," Merrill told clients
The broker highlighted that recent updates from other US players have been
less than re-assuring, with Zale, Whitehall, and Findlay all weakening in their
like-for-like trends since the summer.
Merrill forecasts Signet to show 3 pct like-for-like growth in the third
quarter, at the bottom of the range, following the group's 6.7 pct growth in the
second quarter.
But it also highlighted that Signet's third quarter has proved a poor guide
to the fourth, when three-quarters of group annual profits are made.
Shares in Signet ended Friday's session at 86 pence.

[karlm] 05/11/2002 09:49

Joined you guys this morning with a 30k short at 86p

Karl

[brasseye114] 04/11/2002 18:59

Good start Mr Moonius. (:@)

[moonblue] 04/11/2002 18:32

i dont do whys' sorrie

[hilary] 04/11/2002 09:33

Joined you Moony. Would've liked another penny mind.

:-)

[moonblue] 30/10/2002 13:19

yep[ it is

[moonblue] 29/10/2002 11:03

AS GERALDO WOOD SAY

[fredbear] 18/10/2002 12:07

most have been selling this rally even through the steep up days.
there is certainly enough fear and pessimism to build quite a large rally on.

still long and staying long untill i see some good old complacent views come to the fore.

[vallely] 17/10/2002 23:40

errol6429 You have one 'believer' I agree that this could well be a Bear Rally ie bear trap and I thank you for your contribution. I will follow this rally VERY carefully. Admit to being 'long' the Dow at present.

[errol6429] 17/10/2002 22:49

As stocks rally, Dow 4,000 is imminent
Elliott Wave's Prechter, Hochberg see impending drop

SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) -- The U.S. stock market's dramatic October rally is about to dupe the majority of investors, say the folks who forecast the market decline in January 2000.

If Robert R. Prechter Jr.'s Elliott Wave International forecasts are correct, as I am confident they will be, the current rebound in stock indexes will go down in history as comic relief on a battered fiscal stage.

Steve Hochberg, chief market analyst at research firm Elliott Wave, says the stock market, as measured by the Standard & Poor's 500 Index (SPX: news, chart, profile), likely will rise another 5 percent before beginning a horrific drop.

"There is a possibility we could go up to 990 on the S&P 500," Hochberg told me Thursday morning from Elliott Wave's Georgia headquarters, just before the market opened. "But our preferred view is 890. In our view it is a bear market rally, and we take out the Oct. 10 low." On Thursday morning, the S&P 500, a broad measure of the stock market, rose 3 percent to 885.

The stock market's sharp swings this summer and autumn have discouraged investors. "High volatility is completely normal in a bear market," Prechter told me Thursday. (See the Elliott Wave charts below.)

The 30-stock Dow Jones Industrial Average will lose half its value in the next six months to about 4,000 on the blue-chip index, says Prechter. When it's all over several years from now, the Dow will trade below 1,000, Prechter says.

Hochberg, who worked as a strategist at Merrill Lynch in the early 1980s, joined Prechter's Elliott Wave after learning the storied market technician had won a trading championship in 1984. "I said, 'What does this guy Prechter know that I don't?'"

Prechter is president of Elliott Wave International. His 1978 book, "Elliott Wave Principle," was among the first to forecast a tremendous rise in stock prices. His 10th book, "Conquer the Crash," makes a compelling case for a vast and rapid deflation of monetary assets. (See: Prechter says deflation will depress most markets.)

Prechter gets credit for forecasting the bull market in stocks that began in the early 1980s. Prechter and Elliott Wave theories also correctly forecast the sharp decline in equities that began in January 2000 on the Dow and March 2000 on Nasdaq. In November 1999, Prechter gave his now-famous "case for a bear market" speech at the New Orleans Investment Conference.

Prechter and his Elliott Wave team also told subscribers, just after Sept. 11, 2001, that stock market indexes would get walloped, then rebound quickly.

Accountant Ralph Nelson Elliott developed Elliott Wave theory in the 1930s. The premise is fractal: that all events -- psychological, physical and technical -- repeat themselves. In financial markets, market trends occur in five waves. Reversals, or pauses, develop in a three-wave pattern. According to Prechter's analysis, the Dow has completed five waves since the 1974 recession.



Prechter, in an earlier interview, said the decline that began in January 2000 will play out for several years. "What's going to happen when the stock market finally bottoms? You'll be able to go in there and buy stocks that used to trade at $85 a share for maybe half a dollar or a quarter of a dollar." View: Robert Prechter and the coming crash.

'Critical juncture'

Hochberg at Elliott Wave is one of a small group of technicians at the firm. Their task is to keep subscribers posted of developments on a daily, sometimes hourly, basis. "We try to be as clear and as concise as possible," he says. "Within a set pattern there is infinite variability."

The most recent Elliott Wave patterns are at a "critical juncture," says Hochberg. "A lot of people are calling for a market low, but we are emphatic that it is not."

"From the Aug. 22 high of 965 (on the S&P 500) there is a five-wave decline that ended in the Oct. 10 low. Once a five-wave decline is over, you get a three-wave, what we call an a-b-c wave," the strategist says. "Now it is possible we have also completed a five-wave decline from the March 19 high, which is how we derive that higher level of the S&P, 990, before the turning point."

Hochberg acknowledges nimble investors can profit by trading market indexes if the current rally proceeds another 10-12 percent from Thursday morning's level. For example, 990 on the S&P 500 would be equivalent to about 9,200 on the Dow Jones Industrial Average (INDU: news, chart, profile). The Dow Thursday morning was at 8,240.

"The important point is that this is a bear-market rally and that the advance will be completely retraced," he says. "The next wave down, when the a-b-c rally rolls over, will lead to a third-wave decline, the broadest and strongest move. That is the point of broadest recognition by investors that something is terribly wrong.



Hochberg and the Elliott Wave team see this next, long-lasting decline starting in the next several weeks. Hochberg's boss, Prechter, explains in his recently published "Conquer the Crash" book that such wave patterns occur over and over again for centuries.

From the 1974 Dow low, for example, to the January 2000 high qualifies as a completed five-wave move, and an even larger move from the 1932 move, which completed yet another five wave pattern, from the late 1700s.

When I asked Hochberg why three-quarters of all stock-market technicians see the October rally as a starting point for a lasting rally, not a decline, he pointed to several indicators that are misleading the professionals.

"The indicators that worked in the bull market - like the number of 52-week highs and lows, MACD, advance/decline lines, the ARMS Index and so on -- don't work in the bear market. The parameters change as the market rallies, then takes out the lows," he said.

Hochberg examined bear market rallies in the Dow between April 1930 and July 1932 (see chart 1 above). "Specifically, we looked at the breadth of the rallies: New York Stock Exchange advances vs. declines. Note on the chart the huge breadth days in the advances," he says. "Normally, one would look at these ratios and proclaim a new bull market under way. Yet despite these huge breadth days, each rally was completely retraced as the bear progressed to its ultimate low."

The Elliott Wave strategist drew a parallel with stock-market volatility, as measured by the CBOE Market Volatility Index. That index Thursday stood at 40. "Normally a 50 on the VIX (VIX: news, chart, profile) would signal a bottom," he says. "But it is a hook in a bear market. By the time this bear is nearly complete, the VIX will be at (high) levels that we can't even imagine."

Steve Hochberg will address the ZfU-International Business School's 18th International Investors Conference in January Switzerland. He also will speak in November at the New Orleans Investment Conference, one of the longest-running counter-trend investment conferences in the United States

[qwento] 17/10/2002 22:47

errol - that's what you said two weeks ago - is it always two weeks to armageddon ?

[whitehawk99] 17/10/2002 22:20

errol you can now pop out and come back in a few weeks then :-)

Sorry not having a pop just like the way you tell it.

My screen had S+P futures heading right for 900 _ should have bought multiple contracts before the 9-15 close _ opened way to fast to trade into.

Looking at an overnight high of 909 pay some bill sthen who cares any day is here.

The Fib/Wave cafe is brimming with talk hope you guys have 100% faith in this unproven myth's.

[errol6429] 17/10/2002 22:10

DOW will start a MASSIVE decline within a few weeks.

[bonsai] 17/10/2002 21:57

oh dear
tomorrow could be buy one get one free.

[bonsai] 17/10/2002 15:10

Is today another reversal ?
anyone for 3200 puts?

about £3.50 a dozen at the mo.

[harry kaplan] 15/10/2002 17:47

bonsai- noticed that DOW also up gainst May trendline & also 50% retracement from Aug high.

[bonsai] 15/10/2002 10:49

post 93
we are now hard up against the May trendline so I guess its decision time.
post 91
anybody else got jan calls at 4200 ?

[energyi] 13/10/2002 09:43

Looks like the turn may be in place:


...this could be bad news for the Dollar and good for gold