SUMMARY - "PIG":
The Contrarian's View is published 11 times per year on a mostly-irregular schedule, and the views expressed are those of the author and editor, Nick Chase. Because nobody can predict the future, results of past suggestions or recommendations are no guarantee of future results. Material in this publication may be freely quoted provided proper attribution is given to its source. Subscription rate: Free on the Internet through the World-Wide Web service at Assumption College. Using your favorite Web-browsing program, Open URL http://nick.assumption.edu. Mailed paper subscriptions, one year for $39 to The Contrarian's View, 132 Moreland Street, Worcester, Massachusetts 01609. There is a limit of 50 paid subscribers at one time; please check for availability before sending any money. Sorry, Visa and Mastercard are not available. Overseas subscription rate, U.S. $54. Unsolicited material sent to us by UPS or by courier other than the postal service is refused and returned to sender! ISSN 1536-4429 Phone: (508) 757-2881
Currently here in Worcester, the financial backwater of America, the market is "hot". And it has been for several years.... there really wasn't a noticeable dip during the mild recession which just passed. In fact, prices kept climbing for all but the highest-priced homes.
What I especially look for in the magazines are the "fixer-uppers" and "handyman specials", and even the houses that supposedly only need "minor cosmetics" (translation: money pit). This is because I like older houses, especially post-and-beam homes of the 1700s and early 1800s, and I can see the restoration potential in the older homes that need somebody to care for them. (My wife and I have a standing joke: When we're travelling and I see an older house, overgrown with weeds, maybe covered with the asphalt-shingle siding that was popular eighty years ago, in need of paint, some broken-down machinery sprinkled about, I'll say, "What a nice old house!" And she'll say, "You've got to be kidding. They should tear it down". But you see, I can envision what the house would look like if it were restored. And the beautiful old lines of the home almost always shine through the damage that succeeding generations have done.)
Anyway, during the 1990s the prices of the small "fixer-uppers" generally were in the $65K-$95K range, with an occasional real bargain ($35K for an "as is" in Warren a few years ago, for example). Today, there are no fixer-uppers under $100K. (There may still be some on the market, but they don't appear in the booklets.) And people have no problem asking $150K or more for houses in need of help.
In February, in a neighborhood of smaller homes only a block away from us, a "handyman special" ranch went on the market for $165K. This house was typical late-1950s.... fake stone and green-shingle siding, peeling paint, one-car garage under, obviously in need of updated wiring and plumbing. (Probably was owned by the proverbial little old lady.) It didn't stay on the market for very long, so I assume it sold fairly close to the $165K asking price.
And, as it turns out, it was bought by somebody who did fix it up for resale. It now has new gray vinyl siding, new plastic windows, the junk in the garage was hauled away, and the interior has obviously been spruced up (as best can be deduced from what went into the dumpster). In just the past week, a new "For Sale" sign has sprouted on the front lawn. Since the listing is so new, I haven't seen it yet in the real estate magazines, but I'll bet the asking price is more than the assessed value of our house, which is twice the size, with a detached two-car garage, on a lot that's four times the size.
The heat of the market can also be seen in the cost of new homes. When the local real estate market last went bust in 1990, lots across the street sold at foreclosure auction for $21K - and not all of them sold at that price, which was the minimum the bank would accept. (Long-term subscribers will recall my writing about this in the "Westmont" articles.) Eventually the rest of the subdivision was bought by R.H. Gallo, who built $125K homes on them (which now are resold at $160K to $180K). But lots there now cost $48K or more, and any new houses being erected are in the quarter-million-dollar range.
A lot directly across from our house - which had been vacant for a decade - finally got a house.... or more accurately, the shell of a house.... two years ago (thereby finally blocking off my view of the Tatnuck hills). This is a builder's fallback house - a house that his employees will work on when there's slack time from other projects. And the strength of the local market is obvious from the really slow rate at which this house is being built. (Would you believe, eight months to put on a roof?) Now it's nearing completion, and I expect it will be on the market sometime this summer.
The "wealth effect" of rising home prices was, in my opinion, largely responsible for the mildness of the recession that just passed by, because it helped to compensate for the markdown of stock prices in the bear market. But rising home prices are largely the result of an aggressive easing of short-term interest rates by the Fed which carried over into the mortgage market, by increasingly lax lending standards, and by aggressive buying and subsequent derivativizing of mortgages by Fannie Mae.
This does not necessarily mean we're at the peak of the bubble yet. Hot though the local market is, things aren't as crazy yet as they were in 1988 and 1989. The Worcester area is still considered "fairly priced", not overvalued by 40% as the Boston area is, and I expect prices to rise another 30% to 50% before the bubble pops, probably toward the end of the decade.
About one-third of U.S. homeowners (like my wife and I) carry no mortgage at all; the remaining two-thirds, who have mortgages have, on average, about 35% equity in their homes. If prices rise 50%, and homeowners continue to draw equity out of their homes to maintain their spending (as they have for the past decade) and their equity remains at 35% (it has been declining for two decades), then a popping real-estate bubble of the magnitude of 1990, which took prices down by about one third, would (on average) almost completely wipe out the home equity of two-thirds of the homeowners in the country. Thanks to government subsidies, homes are a highly-leveraged "investment". That leverage is beautiful to behold on the upside, but the downside is real ugly.
The troublesome period is likely to arrive between 2008 and 2010. This is when the baby-boomers begin to retire in large numbers, and downsize their homes and begin to draw on their retirement funds, thereby putting downward pressure on the prices of both real estate and stocks. Those of you expecting a depression to result from all of this leveraged foolishness, this will be your best shot at it, since the evaporation of equity in homes as the real-estate bubble pops would cut consumer spending off at the knees.
The American public is heavily invested in homes (whose prices have
been rising almost uninterrupted for half a century) and in stocks (whose
prices rose for two decades). But they're not heavily invested in precious
metals, or commodities, or whatever the next rising class of assets will
be when home prices and stock prices simultaneously turn soft. Interesting times lie ahead.
In the last two years, stock portfolios have lost $3.9 trillion in value. But houses have gained about $2 trillion. Since more people have more of their wealth in houses than in stocks, the resulting "wealth effect" has been about even. - Bill Bonner
Wim Duisenberg, president of the ECB, let slip that central banks (in the plural) buy equities "all the time." This quip was a revelation, and it corresponded exactly with the explosive upside move of the stock market last Tuesday [April 23]. So there is nothing left to do. Macroeconomic theory is dead. The "invisible hand" of Adam Smith is dead. Throw your charts away, throw your Efficient Market Hypothesis away, throw away P/E's, earnings, dividends, interest rates, ROI, yields, marginal propensity to save and all the rest of that old stuff. It is all useless now. The central banks, which are endowed with the magical ability of producing literally infinite amounts of money out of thin air with which to buy things, are now using that bottomless fount of wealth to be buyers of stocks to keep the prices always moving higher and higher. And so there is nothing to do now but buy stocks, any stocks, any time, more and more, regardless of the price, and then just sit back and watch them go higher and higher forever. The Fed has expanded its mission again to insure that stocks always go up in price, that houses always go up in price, that everything always goes up in price, and that nobody will lose money on the long side of anything ever again. Oh, brave new world! - Richard Daughty
Wall Street cooked up the now-infamous pro-forma earnings, for example. Those are the "earnings" before subtracting all of those unfortunate items known as expenses. - Eric Fry
Bad terminology is the enemy of good thinking. When companies or investment professionals use terms such as 'EBITDA' and 'pro forma,' they want you to unthinkingly accept concepts that are dangerously flawed. (In golf, my score is frequently below par on a pro forma basis: I have firm plans to 'restructure' my putting stroke and therefore only count the swings I take before reaching the green.) - Warren Buffett
If Wall Street analysts' careers were traded like stocks, Merrill Lynch analyst Henry Blodget's career would have to be downgraded immediately to a "Sell." At best, it is a "Market Underperform." That's because the New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer has discovered incriminating internal e-mails from the superstar Internet analyst in which he trashed the very same stocks he was recommending in his "research" reports. In one email, written on October 10, 2000, Blodget described the Internet company 24/7 Media as "a piece of shit," even though he was publicly recommending the stock as a "short-term accumulate and long term accumulate." In effect, Blodget seemed to have established a dual rating system - one for the gullible public and one for his buddies. Back in the go-go days of October 2000, Blodget probably thought himself quite clever for encouraging investors to buy stock in a company that he privately knew to be a piece of you-know-what. But in the post- Enron days of April 2002, Blodget's behavior appears to some folks to have been more criminal than clever. - Eric Fry
In Japan, charity begins at the banks. - Akio Mikuni
Asians are now the world's main savers. Japan invests 26% of GDP, South Korea 27%, Singapore 33%, China 35%. Compared with that, the U.S. invests 18%, Germany 22%, the United Kingdom 18%, and France 19%. The top end of the European or North American scale of saving and investment is below the bottom end of the Asian. This is reflected in the financing of the U.S. deficit and by the actual movement of funds. - William Rees-Mogg
Perhaps the continued and unending friction [in the Middle East] is caused not by political differences, but by a clash of cultures and civilizations. Westerners find suicide, even for the worthiest of causes, absolutely repulsive. Apparently, large segments of the Islamic world embrace this method of action. Westerners find the use of women and children as combatants repugnant. The Arab world apparently sees no problem putting women and children at the front lines of the armed struggle in the West Bank. Western society has long cultivated the idea of a "just war" and certain rules of engagement. Among these is the idea that civilians as military targets should be avoided, especially if one side in a conflict agrees to the principle. But the Arab world sees no compulsion to keep such rules. Palestinians revel in attacks on ordinary civilians in their terror campaign.... Westerners also believe that violent means should be the absolute last resort in a conflict between two parties. Even during the "peace process," the Palestinians have used violence as a primary method.... it should not surprise anyone that Arafat and the Palestinians continue their terror war. After all, their experience has been that it works. - Christopher Ruddy
Arafat condemns the suicide bombings in English - and praises them in
Arabic. Arafat swears he's doing his best to curb them - and issues
textbooks to Palestinian children with math problems such as: "If you kill
one Jew on Monday, three Jews on Wednesday and five Jews on Friday,
how many Jews have you killed for the week?" Arafat thanks Israeli
military intelligence for handing over roll calls of the actual suicide
bombers-in-waiting, and then does nothing to apprehend them before
they act. Israel decided, probably after the Passover Massacre on
Wednesday, March 27, that too much is enough. Israel is now going in
and doing the job Arafat has consistently promised and equally consistently refused to do. - Barry Farber
On the other hand, the reader has a point. I have called, and continue to call, this market the "invisible bull market" (on the NYSE, not the NASDAQ) because advancing issues consistently outnumber declining (as "Timer's Trend" illustrates), and more new highs than new lows are attained almost every day. The problem is, this isn't reflected in the averages, because the averages are (as the reader has pointed out) heavily weighted with the has-been overpriced big tech and other big-cap stocks, and these are so extensively owned by index and most other mutual funds that there are few buyers left (at current prices) as they fall out of favor.
Last fall I thought the impetus of the Fed's money-printing might be great enough to push the averages into record territory during the first half of 2002. Obviously, that ain't gonna happen. The rush of cash into small-cap stocks and, particularly, real estate, though I correctly anticipated this, has been a bigger shift than I anticipated, and it's left big-cap stocks gasping for air. Well, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised for, as we know, when an investment becomes too popular, it usually provides subpar returns until sanity returns. So now, for 2002, I expect the market averages (and index funds, etc.) to move "choppily higher" by the end of the year. I would be surprised if, by the end of the year, any average weighted with big-cap stocks returned a double-digit gain. On the other hand (oops, that's three hands.... oh, well) I'm not expecting a loss. And eventually (2003? 2004? 2005?) the bull will spread to the big-caps, just as prior bull markets have typically started with some hot area, then the enthusiasm eventually spread to the entire market.
This leaves me with a real dilemma in my retirement funds, because all of the TIAA-CREF stock fund choices are variations on the big-cap theme. In the past six months the CREF equity index, bond and money market funds have gained a fraction of a percent, while the other stock funds show losses and the inflation-indexed bond fund is flat. The TIAA Real Estate fund has about a 2% gain, but all pale in comparison to the guaranteed return of TIAA (in the supplemental retirement annuity) of 6.5% annualized. But I can't get that guaranteed return in my retirement annuity because switching into TIAA locks up the money, so I have to pick one of the non-guaranteed-return alternatives.
My feeling is, I'll stick it out in the equity index fund (the closest I can get to the Russell 2000) for the next few months as long as "Timer's Trend" remains positive and, if I'm not going to make money, I might as well not make it in stocks as well as not make it in bonds or the money market fund. Then at least, I'll be positioned for the time the big-caps return to favor in some degree.
Those of you who feel that we're headed for a double-dip recession are
going to be disappointed. Though one might argue with the way the
Federal
Reserve bought itself a post-bubble mild recession and recovery, nevertheless, the economic signs point to several years of (debt-financed) solid
economic growth ahead. It remains to be seen just where the bubble will
inflate next.... my bet is on real estate.... but at least some of it will bleed
into stocks when earnings and profits recover.
Original cost (adjusted): $ 4,998.21
Present value: $ 4,235.35
Increase: $ -752.86 [-15.26%]
The performance of this portfolio and its predecessors ("Hedger's Delight", "Present and Future Income", "Crapshooter's Folly") from January 1987 to the present is -3.91%, for a compound annual rate of return of -0.26%. COMMENT on "Phoenix": There is no change from the last issue (cash balance is not up to date).
B. "Professors' Investment Group (PIG)" - investment club portfolio.
SUMMARY - "PIG":
Original cost: $ 9,899.00
Present value: $15,312.68
Increase: $ 5,413.68 [+54.69%]
COMMENT on "PIG": There is no change from the last issue.
C. Roth rollover IRA - real portfolio, includes commissions:
SUMMARY - IRA:
Original (1983-86) cost: $ 8,326.19
Present value: $10,512.06
Increase: $ 2,185.87 [+26.25%]
The performance of this portfolio (including its predecessors) from January
1, 1987 to the present is -4.15%, for a compound annual rate of return of
-0.27%.
D. CREF Pension plan; I switch between indexed stock/bond/money funds:
Date Sold Bought
13Mar1992 stock @ 56.65 MM @ 13.41
29Apr1992 MM @ 13.48 bond @ 31.19
19Jun1992 bond @ 32.14 MM @ 13.55
29Jun1992 MM @ 13.57 stock @ 56.74
24Jul1992 stock @ 56.76 MM @ 13.61
29Oct1992 MM @ 13.72 stock @ 58.61
23Dec1992 stock @ 61.48 MM @ 13.78
16Jan1995 MM @ 14.83 equity-index @ 26.44
20Jan1995 eq-index @ 26.19 MM @ 14.84
30Oct1997 MM@ 17.24 bond@47.56 (27.17%)
30Oct1997 MM@ 17.24 i-i bond@26.12 (27.17%)
11Feb1998 bond@ 48.84 MM@17.52 (27.17%)
11Feb1998 I-I bond@ 26.23 MM@17.52(27.17%)
16Jun1998 MM@ 17.84 TIAA Traditional (45.87%)
23Sep1999 MM@18.99 I-I bond@27.56 (53.32%)
17-18May2000 rate adjustment to 7.25% in SRA
12-13Jul2000 rate adjustment to 7.5% in SRA
8Jan2001 TIAA Traditional bond@58.62 [22.77%]
8Jan2001 TIAA Traditional eq-idx@75.79 [4.56%]
1Feb2001 i-i bond@31.78 eq-idx@80.84 [26.76%]
20Sep2001 bond@61.99 eq-idx@58.42 [2.44%]
21Nov2001 i-i bond@33.80 eq-idx@67.52 [4.35%]
11Dec2001 i-ibond@33.28 eq-idx@67.95 [6.19%]
17Dec2001 i-i bond@33.13 RlEst@168.75 [9.94%]
17Dec2001 bond@61,54 RlEst@168.75 [9.26%]
31Dec2001 i-i bond@33.50 eq-idx@68.74 [8.21%]
25Mar2002 bond@62.43 TIAA Traditional [9.13%]
26Mar2002 bond@62.63 eq-idx@68.76 [3.39%]
Values, 30Apr2002: stock, 156.41; equity-index, 65.67; MM, 21.42; bond, 63.70;
inflation-indexed bond, 34.88; real estate, 169.79; TIAA current yield in SRA,
about 7% (new money at 6.5% through February 28, 2003)
Gain, 1988: 18.91%; 1989: 14.48%; 1990: 8.28%; 1991: 27.93%; 1992: 10.20%; 1993: 3.08%; 1994: 4.07%; 1995: 4.80%; 1996: 5.28%; 1997: 5.38%; 1998: 5.72%; 1999: 5.12%; 2000: 9.99%; 2001: 1.11%
Gain, January 1 throughMarch 31, 2002: 0.97% (3.86% annual rate of return)
Total gain since January 1, 1988 (14.25 years): 223.43%
Compound annual rate of return: 8.59% (My long-term target: in excess of 10%)
Gain shown excludes the impact of additional monthly cash contributions.
Buying CREF stock on January 1, 1988 and holding it gained 422.38%, for a compound annual rate of
return of 11.46%.
COMMENT on NYSE "Timer's Trend":
The BUY on November 1 remains in effect. Note that "Timer's Trend" has remained bullish through the corrections of the first third of the year, indicating that we're still in a bull maket for those stocks most directly influenced by Fed actions.
____________________________ NYSE TIMER'S TREND _______________________________ Wed 2 Jan 02 . | .# |10073.40 | . + * Thu 3 Jan 02 . | . # |10172.14 | . + * Fri 4 Jan 02 . | . # |10259.74 | . + * Mon 7 Jan 02 . | # |10197.05 | . + * Tue 8 Jan 02 . | #. |10150.55 | . + * Wed 9 Jan 02 . | # |10094.09 | .+ * Thu 10 Jan 02 . | # |10067.86 | .+ * Fri 11 Jan 02 . |# . | 9987.53 | + * Mon 14 Jan 02 . # . | 9891.42 |+. * Tue 15 Jan 02 . | #. | 9924.15 |+. * Wed 16 Jan 02 . #| . | 9712.27 |+. * Thu 17 Jan 02 . | # | 9850.04 |+. * Fri 18 Jan 02 . |# . | 9771.85 |+. * Tue 22 Jan 02 . # . | 9713.80 |+. * Wed 23 Jan 02 . | .# | 9730.96 |+. * Thu 24 Jan 02 . | . # | 9796.07 | + * Fri 25 Jan 02 . | .# | 9840.08 | + * Mon 28 Jan 02 . | # | 9865.75 | .+ * Tue 29 Jan 02 .# I . | 9618.24 | + * Wed 30 Jan 02 . | #. | 9762.86 | + * Thu 31 Jan 02 . | . # | 9920.00 | + * Fri 1 Feb 02 . | #. | 9907.26 | + * Mon 4 Feb 02 .# I . | 9684.09 |+. * Tue 5 Feb 02 .# I . | 9685.43 |+. * Wed 6 Feb 02 .# I . | 9653.39 + . * Thu 7 Feb 02 . & . | 9625.44 |-. * Fri 8 Feb 02 . I .# | 9744.24 |-. * Mon 11 Feb 02 . | . # | 9884.78 |+. * Tue 12 Feb 02 . |# . | 9863.74 |+. * Wed 13 Feb 02 . | .# | 9989.67 | .+ * Thu 14 Feb 02 . | #. |10001.99 | .+ * Fri 15 Feb 02 . |# . | 9903.04 | + * Tue 19 Feb 02 # I . | 9745.14 |+. * Wed 20 Feb 02 . | #. | 9941.17 |+. * Thu 21 Feb 02 . & . | 9834.68 + . * Fri 22 Feb 02 . | #. | 9968.15 + . * Mon 25 Feb 02 . | . # |10145.71 |+. * Tue 26 Feb 02 . | .# |10115.26 | + * Wed 27 Feb 02 . | . # |10127.58 | .+ * Thu 28 Feb 02 . | # |10106.13 | . + * Fri 1 Mar 02 . | . # |10368.86 |~.~~+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~* Mon 4 Mar 02 . | . # |10586.82 | . + * Tue 5 Mar 02 . | .# |10433.41 | . + * Wed 6 Mar 02 . | . # |10574.29 @| . + * Thu 7 Mar 02 . | .# |10525.37 @| . + * Fri 8 Mar 02 . | . # |10572.49 @| . + * Mon 11 Mar 02 . | . # |10611.24 | . + * Tue 12 Mar 02 . | . # |10632.35 @| . + * Wed 13 Mar 02 . | #. |10501.85 | . + * Thu 14 Mar 02 . | # |10517.14 | . + * Fri 15 Mar 02 . | . # |10607.23 | . + * Mon 18 Mar 02 . | .# |10577.75 | . + * Tue 19 Mar 02 . | . # |10635.25 | . + * Wed 20 Mar 02 . # . |10501.57 | .+ * Thu 21 Mar 02 . | #. |10479.84 | .+ * Fri 22 Mar 02 . | #. |10427.67 | + * Mon 25 Mar 02 .# I . |10281.67 |+. * Tue 26 Mar 02 . | #. |10353.36 + . * Wed 27 Mar 02 . | . # |10426.91 |+. * Thu 28 Mar 02 . | . # |10403.94 | + * Mon 1 Apr 02 . | #. |10362.70 |+ * Tue 2 Apr 02 . |# . |10313.71 |.+ * Wed 3 Apr 02 . # . |10198.29 |+ * Thu 4 Apr 02 . | #. |10235.17 |+ * Fri 5 Feb 02 . | # |10271.64 |+. * Mon 8 Apr 02 . | .# |10249.08 |+ * Tue 9 Apr 02 . | .# |10208.67 |+ * Wed 10 Apr 02 . | . # |10381.73 |.+ * Thu 11 Apr 02 . # . |10176.08 |.+ * Fri 12 Apr 02 . | . # |10190.82 |.+ * Mon 15 Apr 02 . | # |10093.67 |.+ * Tue 16 Apr 02 . | . # |10301.32 |. + * Wed 17 Apr 02 . | . # |10220.78 |. + * Thu 18 Apr 02 . | .# |10205.28 |. + * Fri 19 Apr 02 . | .# |10257.11 |. + * Mon 22 Apr 02 . |# . |10136.43 |. + * Tue 23 Apr 02 . | # |10089.24 |.+ * Wed 24 Apr 02 . | # |10030.43 |.+ * Thu 25 Apr 02 . | # |10035.06 |+ * Fri 26 Apr 02 . # . | 9910.72 |~+~*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Mon 29 Apr 02 . #| . | 9819.87 |+. * Tue 30 Apr 02 . | . # | 9946.22 |+ * ========================================================================
COMMENT on NASDAQ "Timer's Trend": At the end of April, this
NASDAQ indicator was still whipsawing. Dragged down by all the
burned-out techs, the NASDAQ index clearly is not going to see new
highs for many years. Only when the crashed dot.coms and telecoms
disappear or are bought out, and are therefore removed from the index,
will it be able to recover. (Survivor bias.... the index recovers, but your
portfolio of has-beens doesn't.)
____________________________ NASDAQ TIMER'S TREND ____________________________
Wed 2 Jan 02 . | . # | 1979.25 | . + *
Thu 3 Jan 02 . | . # | 2044.27 | . + *
Fri 4 Jan 02 . | . # | 2059.38 | . + *
Mon 7 Jan 02 . | # | 2037.10 | . + *
Tue 8 Jan 02 . | . # | 2055.74 | . + *
Wed 9 Jan 02 . | .# | 2044.89 | . + *
Thu 10 Jan 02 . | .# | 2047.24 | . + *
Fri 11 Jan 02 . |# . | 2022.46 | .+ *
Mon 14 Jan 02 . & . | 1990.74 | + *
Tue 15 Jan 02 . I # | 2000.91 | + *
Wed 16 Jan 02 .# I . | 1944.44 |+. *
Thu 17 Jan 02 . I . # | 1985.82 |+. *
Fri 18 Jan 02 . #I . {| 1930.34 |+. *
Tue 22 Jan 02 .# I . | 1882.53 + . *
Wed 23 Jan 02 . I .# | 1922.38 + . *
Thu 24 Jan 02 . I . # ]| 1942.58 | + *
Fri 25 Jan 02 . I #. [| 1937.70 |+. *
Mon 28 Jan 02 . I # ]| 1943.91 | + *
Tue 29 Jan 02 .# I . [| 1892.99 | + *
Wed 30 Jan 02 . I# . | 1913.44 |+. *
Thu 31 Jan 02 . I . # | 1934.03 | + *
Fri 1 Feb 02 . I# . | 1911.24 |+. *
Mon 4 Feb 02 # I . | 1855.53 + . *
Tue 5 Feb 02 #. I . | 1838.52 |-. *
Wed 6 Feb 02 # I . | 1812.71 |-. *
Thu 7 Feb 02 #. I . | 1782.11 | .- *
Fri 8 Feb 02 . I # | 1818.88 | .- *
Mon 11 Feb 02 . I # | 1846.66 |-. *
Tue 12 Feb 02 . I# . | 1834.21 + . *
Wed 13 Feb 02 . I .# | 1859.16 |+. *
Thu 14 Feb 02 . & . | 1843.37 | + *
Fri 15 Feb 02 # I . | 1805.20 |+. *
Tue 19 Feb 02 # . I . | 1750.61 |-. *
Wed 20 Feb 02 . I# . | 1775.57 |-. *
Thu 21 Feb 02 # I . | 1716.24 | .- *
Fri 22 Feb 02 . I .# | 1724.54 | - *
Mon 25 Feb 02 . I # | 1769.88 |-. *
Tue 26 Feb 02 . I #. | 1766.86 |+. *
Wed 27 Feb 02 . I# . | 1751.88 |+. *
Thu 28 Feb 02 . #I . | 1731.49 |+. *
Fri 1 Mar 02 . I . # | 1802.74 | + *
Mon 4 Mar 02 . | . # | 1859.32 | + *
Tue 5 Mar 02 . | . # | 1866.29 | .+ *
Wed 6 Mar 02 . | . # }| 1890.40 | . + *
Thu 7 Mar 02 . | . # | 1881.63 | . + *
Fri 8 Mar 02 . | . # | 1929.67 | . + *
Mon 11 Mar 02 . | . # | 1929.49 | . + *
Tue 12 Mar 02 . # . | 1897.12 | . + *
Wed 13 Mar 02 . # . | 1862.03 | .+ *
Thu 14 Mar 02 . | #. | 1854.14 | + *
Fri 15 Mar 02 . | # | 1868.30 | + *
Mon 18 Mar 02 . | .# | 1877.06 |+. *
Tue 19 Mar 02 . | .# | 1880.87 | + *
Wed 20 Mar 02 . # . | 1832.87 | + *
Thu 21 Mar 02 . | . # | 1868.83 | .+ *
Fri 22 Mar 02 . | # | 1851.39 | .+ *
Mon 25 Mar 02 . & . {| 1812.49 | + *
Tue 26 Mar 02 . | # }| 1824.17 | + *
Wed 27 Mar 02 . | .# | 1826.75 | .+ *
Thu 28 Mar 02 . | . # | 1845.35 | .+ *
Mon 1 Apr 02 . | .# | 1862.62 |.+ *
Tue 2 Apr 02 .# I . | 1804.40 |+ *
Wed 3 Apr 02 . #I . {| 1784.35 |+ *
Thu 4 Apr 02 . I #. | 1789.75 |+. *
Fri 5 Feb 02 . & . | 1770.03 +. *
Mon 8 Apr 02 . I # | 1785.87 +. *
Tue 9 Apr 02 . & . | 1742.57 +. *
Wed 10 Apr 02 . I # | 1767.07 |+. *
Thu 11 Apr 02 . #I . | 1725.24 |+. *
Fri 12 Apr 02 . | . # | 1756.19 |+ *
Mon 15 Apr 02 . I .# | 1753.78 |+ *
Tue 16 Apr 02 . | . # }| 1816.79 |. + *
Wed 17 Apr 02 . | . # | 1810.67 |. + *
Thu 18 Apr 02 . | # | 1802.43 |. + *
Fri 19 Apr 02 . | # | 1793.83 |. + *
Mon 22 Apr 02 . #I . {| 1758.68 |.+ *
Tue 23 Apr 02 . #I . | 1730.29 |+. *
Wed 24 Apr 02 . I# . | 1713.34 |+. *
Thu 25 Apr 02 . I# . | 1713.70 +. *
Fri 26 Apr 02 # I . | 1663.89 |-.~*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Mon 29 Apr 02 .# I . | 1656.93 | -. *
Tue 30 Apr 02 . I .# | 1688.23 +. *
========================================================================
"Timer's Trend" is based on 4% and 10% exponential moving averages of the New York Stock Exchange or NASDAQ advance/decline lines (that is, the ratio of advancing to declining stocks). There are many symbols shown above, but the ones that count are the braces: NEXT ISSUE - will appear in late May. /Nick Chase