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Has the bear finally returned?
This is the question on the mind of everyone who finds the need to equate market movement with beasts as a way to better grasp the situation and the consequences. Regardless of today's outcome, financial journalists will have plenty to write about as we teeter close to the line where the bull market might finally come to an end.
The reason for the decline?
Much is being said that battles in Washington are to blame ... but fingers are being pointed in all directions. The White House, the FED, the Treasury Secretary, tariff moves ... as usual in times like this there is plenty of blame to go around ... but it might be that after 3,482 days of a bull market (where, according to Bespoke, the average is 1,662) ... an end was, eventually, to be expected.
But how long and how severe might this decline be? Regardless of expert claims ... no one knows!
I obnoxiously repeat ... no one knows!
I included two articles today, both on ratings-seeking CNBC where ... in one ... many analysts call for a rebound ... while - for some reason - they also put on Ron Paul who tells us we are heading for a 50% decline and "depression-like" conditions.
Now, I don't mean to pick on Ron Paul ... but it was fun to "Google" his predictions of the last few years and see that in February 2016 he told us the "... recession is here and it's getting worse" ... while in June 2015 he warned the "... stock market day of reckoning is near" ... and in April 2014 announced we had "stocks in a bubble and will crash."
For heaven's sake CNBC! When today is in the rear view mirror, will you put him on in 2019 or 2020 to, once again, warn the end is near?
I took great solace in a comment I read on Twitter where Moran Housel is quoted as saying, "every past decline looks like an opportunity, every future decline looks like a risk."
Yes, the bear might be at our doorstep.
... but don't be in such a rush to feed him, no matter how loudly he growls.