Crazy. Dow down -1000 at opening

[marmar]

[HughBeaumont]

1. The tragic result of an economy so closely tied to the fate of it's slavestates.

[yeoman6987]

4. Oh it really is about time

We've known a 20 percent correction at least was coming and finally it is starting. The market needs this.

[B Calm]

2. Wall Street crooks stealing our retirement. . .

[Renew Deal]

3. Don't worry, it will be halfway back by lunch.

[Renew Deal]

17. I was correct... -479.20(2.91%)

10:14AM

[6chars]

29. who cares about the number - what's for lunch?

[Renew Deal]

32. lol, exactly

[edhopper]

5. The stock market is not the economy

classic panic- over selling, good time to buy.

[Puddy]

6. I'm getting ready to buy

[riversedge]

7. about 700 down now

[Quackers]

8. Rule 48 has been enacted.

[B Calm]

10. ? What's rule 47?

[no_hypocrisy]

12. RULE 48

http://blogs.wsj.com/marketbeat/2010/05/20/exactly-what-is-rule-48/

If you’re interested. Here’s the text of “Rule 48,” which the NYSE invoked to smooth the open today. Here’s the Cliffs Notes version:

(a) In the event that extremely high market volatility is likely to have a Floor-wide impact on the ability of [Designated Market Makers] to arrange for the fair and orderly opening, reopening following a market-wide halt of trading at the Exchange, or closing of trading at the Exchange and that absent relief, the operation of the Exchange is likely to be impaired, a qualified Exchange officer may declare an extreme market volatility condition with respect to trading on or through the facilities of the Exchange.

(b) In the event that an extreme market volatility condition is declared with respect to trading on or through the facilities of the Exchange, a qualified Exchange officer shall be empowered to temporarily suspend at the opening of trading or reopening of trading following a market-wide trading halt: (i) the need for prior Floor Official or prior NYSE Floor operations approval to open or reopen a security at the Exchange (Rules 123D(1) and 79A.30); and/or (ii) applicable requirements to make pre-opening indications in a security (Rules 15 and 123D(1)).

Dow Jones’ Kristina Peterson explained it pretty well in a story earlier this month. She writes that basically it means the designated market makers “will not have to disseminate price indications before the bell, making it easier and faster to open stocks. The rule was approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission on Dec. 6, 2007 and has been used rarely since then.”

[Quackers]

13. Don't break rule 46.

[underpants]

15. At least it wasn't Option 6

[Quackers]

19. What does the returning of the Jedi's have to do with it?

[Amishman]

21. Jedis' are Episode 6. Option 6 is pickles on your burger.

Not to be confused with Condition 6, which is what the dealership calls your car right before they rip you off on the trade-in

[Quackers]

22. So is this like level 6?

[underpants]

25. Option 6 - when faced with a hard life choice...

, such as which school to attend or firing someone/facing a firing, that you are deeply troubled about simply choose to unleash the zombie apocalypse to avoid having to make said choice.

[DesMoinesDem]

9. Because it was nothing more than a bubble created by the Fed.

[Octafish]

11. Wall Street wants MORE Quantitative Easing

Taxpayers! Do your Duty! American Austerity engage overdrive!

Banksters and Fed Friends! To the presses!

[Johnny2X2X]

38. Huh?

What does quantitative easing have to do with Austerity?

Quantitative easing might actually still be needed to fight the possibility of deflation.

[Sunlei]

14. all the crazy account fees stay the same.

[mmonk]

23. That's how they make their money.

[Sunlei]

28. I noticed, thats why I've never done the 401k 'thing'

[whatthehey]

33. Yeah, avg. 11% annual gains on pretax, often matched, contributions are made worthless by 0.5% fees

[A HERETIC I AM]

34. .....

[Sunlei]

35. what? I just didn't care to lose such a huge chunk in fees, adds up over a decade or two.

Though I only had one employer long ago, who made equal!! matching contributions and I quit that job one sunny day.

[whatthehey]

39. Which is fine if you have a better deal. They are very hard to find however.

First some numbers: In 2012 89 million workers were covered by defined contribution plans out of an average employed number of around 142 million, so certainly a great majority (remember some of the rest still get defined benefit pensions).

93.5% of plans offered some matching, with the two most popular being 50% of 6% of pay or 100% of 6% of pay. I've worked at 6 companies. All have offered matching programs. But my anecdote matters no more than yours.

http://www.americanbenefitscouncil.org/documents2013/401k_stats.pdf

http://data.bls.gov/pdq/SurveyOutputServlet

Now can you do better? Possibly but not plausibly.


For one thing not taking advantage of a 401k/403b etc means you lose the pre-tax benefit. Most people pay higher tax rates in their earning years than in retirement, so avoiding taxes now and paying them later is a good deal. Can you overcome that by choosing better or lower cost funds? The choice of funds in 401ks is a mixed bag, but all I've seen offer either index funds or income funds, both of which are typically very low loads as all the fund manager needs to do is bung them into either SP500 or Russell2000 ready made allotments, or bonds and a few blue chip dividend stocks, no looking for hidden gems or breakout startups. Wise investors who don't want to start tracking cup and handle formations and arcane banding algorithms on their own would be well advised to go for this kind of fund anyway, so going away from 401ks means you lose pre-tax benefits and have to do more work yourself, and forgo the match most employers offer. If you are a trading genius can you make these gaps up? Well of course it's possible, but how likely is anyone that good at picking stocks to be working for a salary anyway?

[Recursion]

16. In principle this is good for me since I do constant-dollar purchases for my retirement fund

Still, it's always a little troubling.

[closeupready]

18. These swings are how some people get filthy rich VERY fast. In seconds,

literally. Kind of makes you wonder if some are taking advantage of China's downturn and manipulating our markets, selling short beforehand.

[Skidmore]

20. At the risk of sounding crazy, I just want to mention something.

I don't pretend to understand the machinations of the stock market at all, but things catch my eye which seem weird and out of place. A couple of months ago, I started seeing ads with Ron Paul pushing the idea that there would be a calamitous collapse in markets this summer and people would literally be fighting each other for food. He was encouraging people to prepare (I assume that meant to divest from the market). I came across an article about those ads once but didn't really pay much attention to it. He claimed to be in consultationw with some top economists though. I chalked it up to him needing an income.

However, in late July, I noticed a post on my FB page from something called "The Event Chronicle" which was predicting a similar sort of thing to occur near the end of August with all of the aforementioned calamity being visited on mankind. Out of curiosity I tried to find out who this page belonged to but was not successful other than it is linked to an ebook called "The Event Handbook." I went to the ebook site (it sells for $11.11), but I still could not figure out who is behind this. I thought perhaps it might be linked to Paul's ads, but I could find no connection. I'm not a big one for conspiracy theories, but I do find the specificity of these pronouncements weird.

As I said, it sounds nuts and I'm not attributing events to these scams? or whatever they are. It just is peculiar and I'm curious to see if anyone else has seen the ads or knows anything about this ebook/blog.

[mmonk]

24. Well not even many of the traders know the machinations anymore.

Remember all the predictions of a market rebound in 2008 or this or that stock or a financial institution would survive so they urged people to buy even the doomed ones?

[SheilaT]

26. I've been noticing little ads on various websites

all summer that likewise predict an economic calamity this summer.

I just keep in mind that for as long as I can remember, and I'm now 67, people are more or less constantly predicting terrible things, mostly having to do with economic collapse. And often the pronouncements are very specific. I believe there's an entire field of academic studies devoted to looking at followers of doomsday religious cults, and how the members adapt when the end of the world as predicted by their prophet, does not come about. The Seventh Day Adventists got started as a group who predicted the imminent return of Jesus Christ, and simply dropped that prediction when dates came and went without any sign of JC.

I have more than once had some true believer assure me that the end of the world as we know it is coming at some specific date.

On a secular level, dire predictions of global economic collapse seem to be very common. And we all still manage to muddle along.

[Johonny]

30. Ron Paul and people like him predict a stock market crash everyday of the year

when it goes down they say, "see I was right" when it doesn't they say, "just you wait, it will go down" Pretty much a stopped clock is right twice a day.

[corkhead]

36. even a blind nut will find a squirrel now and then. People who constantly predict calamities

will eventually claim to be correct when something even slightly resembling one occurs.

[cbdo2007]

27. Sounds like a great time to buy.

Hope I can free up some funds before it goes back up, lol.

[rdking647]

31. its only down 325 right now

looking at my trading screen it looks like a mini flash crash kind of panic.

there were stocks down 10-15-20% or more. and i dont just mean high flying tech stocks
jack in the box,johnson and johnson,visa,even some real estate trusts

[cbdo2007]

37. Damn, I missed it, lol.

Oh well, we're still due for a major correction so I'm sure we'll still see some big dips over the coming months.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

40. So we've gone from end of the world, stash your cash in a mattress to.....

.....a mildly disappointing day on Wall Street.

You've got to love the market. It's just a very weird thing in general.

[PasadenaTrudy]

41. I love not being in the Market

I don't have to give a shit about this stuff

[daredtowork]

42. Will this affect property speculation?

Especially regarding the San Francisco Bay Area where property is supposedly used as an international investment vehicle?

[JCMach1]

43. This is all about China, the Fed and Commodities... triple whammy

Having said that, I made thousands when I bought blue chips during the 2007-2008 recession crash...

We are nowhere near a correction bottom yet. Keep your powder dry.