Edited by author 08-07-2008 06:30 PM
Here is a link for jobless claims:

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080807/economy.html

We haven't come close to 1350 on the SP Index and things don't look too good.Oil is coming back up some.

Here's a look at the Goldman Sachs commodity index:

http://stockcharts.com/h-sc/ui?c=$gnx

After peaking at almost 900 in early July, it finished today @ 738. That's a drop of almost 20%. Commodity prices taking that steep a drop will probably keep inflation from getting out of hand, which in turn should help out the Fed. Indeed, I heard a report today that someone at the Fed was saying that inflationary pressures would moderate. That would be good news for the market, so keep an eye on those commodity prices.

ruralflunky, the way the market has been jumping up & down several hundred points almost every day, you have to try to factor in the good night's sleep you get not having to worry about how much your TSP is losing. I've heard several people at work say that they haven't checked their TSP balance in months - afraid to find out how bad it is.

I think you may have another chance to get back in the stock funds IF the market retests. I'd hate like heck for Cramer to be right about it hitting the bottom - the guy is an idiot.

Today's MONSTER rally brings the market right up to a crucial area - 11,600 (Dow finished @ 11,615). If it can hold here, my guess is that 12,000 is doable. One interesting thing about today's market performance was that the large cap indexes outperformed the small caps by close to 2 to 1. Oftentimes, a big market move will start out in the large cap stocks, then spread out through the rest of the market (one exception today was oil stocks - LOL!)

The news from the Fed today was pretty much expected, but I guess everyone breathed a sigh of relief that they didn't lean toward tightening. The ISM number came in better than expected, and there were a few good earnings reports. The dollar was up, which always helps

Well. It looks like I will regret not moving it after today.

ruralflunky, I heard something to the effect that the stock market has basically gone nowhere for nearly 9 YEARS now. I think what they meant was that the market is right around where it was 9 years ago, however, it's been all over the place (mostly higher) in the intervening years.

Back in July of last year, pabak caused quite a stir on the rural boards by pulling out of the stock funds & going into the G fund. It was a GREAT call on his part. That's what started this board. I think it's beyond most of us to try to "time" the market, but I believe that pulling out or scaling back before a market drop and jumping in or bumping up your stock funds before a market rise isn't impossible, though it's not easy.

We should post those "performance" figures on a regular basis. It might give us a better "feel" for how things are going.

btw, I figured out my own TSP performance as of the end of June. It was just under 2%. Since then, though, I've been going backwards - LOL!

I knew that my post didn't sound right. I meant the other funds have been down. :)

How has the G fund been down?I have never seen it lose anything.At least so far it hasn't gone down.

http://postalmag.com/tsp.htm

I thought this was interesting.
  
I left my money in the G fund, and I had to keep suppressing the urge to move it. I kept thinking I should move it, but then I would stop myself. It's been down more than anything else. I got excited when it went up those few times, but I think I made the right decision. It can't be moved quick enough to outguess the market. They used to move it that day if you put in the request by noon, now they don't.

Here's an article from Reuters on the upcoming week:

http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews...rtualBrandChannel=0

I think we need to at least break 1350 on the SP Index before we are close to coming out of the bear market.

When I got up this morning, the Dow futures were up almost 50 points, and now they're down 12. What happened?? Well, for one thing, General Motors came out with a mind-numbing loss. Seems like making all those SUVs wasn't such a good idea after all.

We'll be getting a jobs report this morning, and that will probably move us up or down depending on how it turns out.

I forgot to mention that Jim Cramer said that we had seen the market bottom. Gutsy call, and a LOT of people follow him, so maybe he can change the market sentiment, but who knows. Still looks to me like we may go down spme more...

Happy August!

Thanks for the compliment but I think manoman is the guru here.If I were retired maybe I could really put a lot of time in on the market and do some decent commentary.

barebull, /m1293 nice link!! Several of the sources I read have been speculating that the current market uptrend won't last. Today's big jump on the heels of yesterday's big move up will probably make some investors think we're out of the woods, but the market often gives us a "head fake", sucking people in before running down.

In the short term, we have come back nicely from the lows, but we still haven't gotten to levels that would imply we're going to break the longer term downtrend we've been in.

I just read the commentary at the Downs site, and he thinks he is seeing a triangle forming with the possibility of an 1100-point Dow move (up or down??) Our TSPtalk guy seems to think that we'll retest the recent lows (the Dow touched 10,700 intraday on July 15), and the analysis in your Barron's article seems to support that. One of the "reasons" cited for the Dow's recent rise has been the drop in oil prices, and oil prices were up today on inventory news, so we'll see if that puts the kibosh on this rally tomorrow. Conversely, if the market can continue to perform well in the face of bad news, perhaps we WILL see the start of a turnaround. My gut feeling is that it's too soon, but I've been wrong about the market too many times to count.

btw, maybe YOU should consider doing the commentary here!

Pabak? Tigers trade catcher Ivan Rodriguez to Yankees!

We are still under 1400 on the SP500 index.Look at the graph in the earlier post on here.Oil needs to come down a lot more before we can go up.