Indeed, who knows what inning it is?  Goldman hit this thing so hard so fast it knocked the ball out of the park.  Here are some statistics:  523 (elapsed) days, top to bottom, one long wave.  7729 Dow points lost, -55%.  You will remember the asymmetry of investment returns.  Lose 55% you have to make 119% to get even.  The rally is now 154 (elapsed — about 113 trading) days long, 2901 points, +44.8% .  We saw waves like this in the “90s, but this whole thing has been an eyebrow raiser.

We are not Fibonacci watchers, or calculators of exact percentage retracements.  We watch the market and assess the situation when the action starts, so a retracement of 44% means just that to us — it has no predictive value.  When the slide starts we’ll call attention to it.

In the S&P our stop signaling the end of the bear market has been tripped.  The Dow stop has not yet been hit.    Clearly you cannot be short.  And clearly you cannot be very comfortable being long, with the other shoe about to drop.  Stops are essential and great alertness.

Let us repeat that.  Stops are essential.  Don’t leave home without them.