We are watching the rich become middle class just like everybody else.

[BCEagle91]

<p>Hard to believe that the option boys let this thing go. Put writers (including Buffett) must be getting toasted. One more day to recover.</p>

<p>Seems like every rally gets sold.</p>

[dstark]

<p>How much power do you think the option guys have?</p>

<p>This bear market is now worse than 1929 over the same time period. (Thanks to your chart. It’s right there).</p>

[rodney]

<p>anybody want to guess on a bottom? earlier in this thread, someone proposed 7500…blown through that…6500?
what do the technicals say?</p>

[dstark]

<p>We’re still above 7500.</p>

[mapesy]

<p>Lots of records being broken, from Ritholtz. </p>

<p>Gulp.</p>

<p>

• Over the past year, the S&P 500 index lost ~$1 trillion more than the entire 2000-2002 bear market, according to Standard & Poor’s. From the October 2007 highs of 1,565, to yesterday’s close of 806.58, the S&P 500 market capitalization lost $6.69 trillion. That’s almost $1 trillion more than entire 2000-03 bear market losses of $5.76 trillion. (Marketwatch)</p>

<p>• The S&P 500 hasn’t been this far below its 200-day moving average on a percentage basis since The Great Depression. (Doug Kass)</p>

<p>• CPI: U.S. consumer prices in October registered their largest single-month decline since before World War II. It is the largest monthly drop in the 61-year history of the data;</p>

<p>• PPI, down 2.8% for the month, was also record breaking drop.</p>

<p>• The dividend yield on the S&P 500 is now greater than the yield on the 10-year Treasury. That hasn’t happened since 1958. (Barron’s)</p>

<p>• First-time claims for U.S. unemployment insurance rose to the highest level since September 2001. The total number of people on unemployment benefit rolls jumped to the highest level since 1983.</p>

<p>• Housing starts fell to 791,000, off 38% from a year ago. That’s the slowest pace of starts since data began being compiled in 1959. Starts are now down 65% from the early 2006 peak — this has become the very worst housing downturn on record.</p>

<p>• Permits for new houses, at a 708,000 pace, were off 40% from a year ago, also the lowest total since it has been tracked starting in 1960. Put this into context of population — in 1960, the total U.S. population stood at 180 million — 60% of today’s 300 million.</p>

<p>• more Doug Kass: The 30-year return for BBB-rated corporate bonds is now greater than the 30-year return for stocks. So it has not paid to take equity risk for 30 years! (The Street.com)</p>

<p>• The TIPS Spread ( Treasury Inflation Protected Securities versus the 10-year Treasury) is at a record low 54 basis points (1997)</p>

<p>• The Russell 3,000 now has 1228 stocks a share price under $10. That’s 42% of the index. At the market’s 2002 lows, there were significantly less stocks trading below $10/share — just 884 (Bespoke Group).

</p>

<p>[Record-Breaking</a> Data Everywhere! | The Big Picture](<a href=“http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2008/11/record-breaking-data/]Record-Breaking”>Record-Breaking Data Everywhere! - The Big Picture)</p>

[J_adoube]

<p>

The danger is the formally middle class becoming the working poor.

</p>

<p>Toblin, I resemble that remark! My contention has always been that if you have to work, you are poor. There are only two kinds of people, the independently wealthy and the rest of us.:)</p>

[mapesy]

<p>The S&P 500 blew through the 2002 lows today. Bad news, indeed.</p>

[dstark]

<p>[How</a> the Mighty Have Fallen Buffett Other Legends Feel Bear Market Bite: Tech Ticker, Yahoo! Finance](<a href=“http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/article/132132/How-the-Mighty-Have-Fallen-Buffett-Other-Legends-Feel-Bear-Market-Bite?tickers=BRK-A,FMAGX,CGMFX,LMVTX,IEP,LM,GS]How”>http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/article/132132/How-the-Mighty-Have-Fallen-Buffett-Other-Legends-Feel-Bear-Market-Bite?tickers=BRK-A,FMAGX,CGMFX,LMVTX,IEP,LM,GS)</p>

[DocT]

<p>Yeah, I decided to go long on the s&p today - probably too early. I came within $.30 per sharing of being stopped out.</p>

[BunsenBurner]

<p>

The dividend yield on the S&P 500 is now greater than the yield on the 10-year Treasury. That hasn’t happened since 1958.

</p>

<p>Question is: will the earnings support these dividend levels? If everyone tightens their belt and battens down the hatches, I do not think so.</p>

[dstark]

<p>Options trading is decreasing…
[Bloomberg.com:</a> Invest](<a href=“Bloomberg Politics - Bloomberg”>Bloomberg Politics - Bloomberg)</p>

[dstark]

<p>[Citi</a> shutters more hedge funds - Daily Briefing](<a href=“http://dailybriefing.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2008/11/20/citi-shutters-more-hedge-funds/]Citi”>http://dailybriefing.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2008/11/20/citi-shutters-more-hedge-funds/)</p>

<p>This just gives me so much confidence in Pandit and Citigroup.</p>

<p>"Amid massive layoffs and losses, Citigroup (C) is also getting hammered by hedge fund declines, according to the Financial Times.</p>

<p>The FT says that Citi is liquidating its Corporate Special Opportunities fund, which invested mainly in debt that backed European private equity deals.</p>

<p>The fund was reportedly down 53% in October and has a net asset value of about $58 million and debt of about $880 million. At its peak, CSO managed about $4.2 billion. Citi tried to save the fund by supplying $450 million in credit lines and equity infusions of about $320 million. According to the newspaper, Citi told investors last month that CSO’s performance was “impacted by the fund’s leverage” after a deterioration in market conditions that “has been unprecedented and overwhelming.”</p>

<p>Earlier in the week, the FT reported that Citi is also unwinding a fixed-income hedge fund called Falcon. The fund had $10 billion under management at its peak, and the newspaper says that investors are likely to receive no more than 45 cents on the dollar.</p>

<p>People familiar with the matter told the FT that had Citi not injected a $250 million subsidy into the fund, investors might have received only half of that amount. Citi has not yet returned calls to Fortune seeking comment.</p>

<p>This is not the first-high profile setback for Citi’s hedge fund division. The FT reports that client assets in CAI, which houses the hedge fund division, fell 19 percent this year, from $48.7 billion at the end of 2007 to $39.4 billion at the end of September. CAI also manages $9.9 billion of Citi’s own capital.</p>

<p>In June, Citi shuttered Old Lane, the hedge fund founded by Citi’s chief executive Vikram Pandit. Old Lane blew up just about a year after Citi bought the fund for $800 million in a move to bring Pandit into the fold."</p>

[mapesy]

<p>^^Any idea why Citi is lobbying lawmakers to reinstate the ban on short selling of financial stocks and the uptick rule?</p>

<p>There seemed to be so much fear in the markets today that I have to wonder if we’re nearing capitulation.</p>

<p>[FT.com</a> / Markets - Fear stalks the world?s economies](<a href=“Fear stalks the world’s economies”>Fear stalks the world’s economies)</p>

[dstark]

<p>Well, we dropped over 6500 Dow Jones Industrual Average points so far.</p>

<p>We’re not going to drop another 6500 points. :)</p>

[dstark]

<p>“^^Any idea why Citi is lobbying lawmakers to reinstate the ban on short selling of financial stocks and the uptick rule?”</p>

<p>I think this is one of the nonsense things that comes out when there are problems.</p>

<p>Let them reinstall the uptick rule.</p>

<p>There isn’t an uptick rule for futures, options or ETFs and stocks trade a penny wide now. But if it makes people feel better…</p>

<p>Or maybe the Citigroup executives want to sell their stock and don’t like the competition from short sellers. :)</p>

[sueinphilly]

<p>[S&P&lt;/a&gt; dives to lowest level since 1997 - Yahoo! News](<a href=“http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081120/bs_nm/us_markets_stocks_75]S&P”>http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081120/bs_nm/us_markets_stocks_75)</p>

<p>S&P below 1997 level. Let’s call it back to the future, in reverse
off 3300+ from its highest point in the year 2000</p>

[mapesy]

<p>^^Very good, dstark!</p>

<p>Just found this:</p>

<p>

Citigroup wouldn’t be the first to blame short-sellers for the decline in its stock. Bear Stearns did it when it was alive, so did Lehman Brothers Holding. It is practically page one of the PR playbook for financial companies with falling stock prices.

</p>

<p>But, ironically…</p>

<p>

Citigroup once earned a lot of money by helping hedge funds sell shares short. Now the banking giant wants the government to impose some limits on the practice.

</p>

<p>[Deal</a> Journal - WSJ.com : Citigroup: If You Can’t Save the Stock, Blame the Shorts](<a href=“http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2008/11/20/citigroup-if-you-cant-save-the-stock-blame-the-shorts/]Deal”>http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2008/11/20/citigroup-if-you-cant-save-the-stock-blame-the-shorts/)</p>

[dstark]

<p>Nice link about short selling.</p>

<p>Goldman and Morgan Stanley were/are large short sellers also.</p>

<p>The comments about short selling by financial firms are Orwellian.</p>

[Columbia_Student]

<p>[Citi</a> Weighs Its Options, Including Firm’s Sale - WSJ.com](<a href=“http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122722907151946371.html?mod=mktw]Citi”>http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122722907151946371.html?mod=mktw)</p>

[mapesy]

<p>Louise Yamada, aka “The Queen of Technical Analysis”, says her next targets on the S&P are and 600 and 400. Both levels have substantial support. It’s very significant that the S&P dropped below 2002 lows yesterday.</p>

<p>Watch the financial stocks. They’re the canary in the coalmine. (Citi is struggling today.)</p>