pay attention or pay the offer

“There is a tide in the affairs of men.
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.”

Shake-speare: Julius Caesar Act 4, Sc. 3.

There’s been some ‘buzz’ in the media and on the internet about the ‘lunar calendar,’ some of it more helpful, some of it less. There’s also quite a bit of new traffic coming to the site, (Hello, Poland!) so it’s a great time to specifically outline what is and is not occurring in the market right now.

One person’s blog linking to this site has an entry titled, “Another Crash Caller: Chris Carolan.”   Say what?  I am not calling for a crash. The crash is over. It’s in the rear view mirror.  Where We Are is at the point of maximum panic right now. In fact, that point most likely passed within the last few hours, if we take the average of the low points of the previous panics and crashes of 1929, 1987 and 1997 as our guide.  This is low tide in the affairs of men right now!

The VIX index is as pure a measure of human trader’s ‘fear’ level as any I know. The VIX reached a new high for this panic on October 24 of 89.58.  It’s possible early Monday sees a higher level, but after that VIX should fall indicating the point of maximum fear precisely fell on the dates calculated by my Autumn Panics research.

I am not telling people to get long the market here. My June 2008 report outlines the path I believe the bear market will follow in coming years, and there’s plenty  more trouble ahead. If you haven’t read that report, it is still very timely. Passing the point of maximum panic right now does not insure that the cascading nature of selling will end now.  Lower prices beget margin selling which beget lower prices etc.  It’s possible that there is still more of that forced selling that must occur regardless of the phase of the moon.

Nonetheless, I am saying that the level of fear, and widespread fear is the very definition of panic, will begin to abate next week. The highest VIX reading of the year should be right now. Friday morning’s 89.53 high is likely peak reading for the Panic of 2008.

click chart to enlarge

click chart to enlarge

I’m receiving a lot of questions in my mailbox about the Solunar Model. I’ve discussed how it’s made in old issues (now unavailable) of Calendar Research Reports, but I’m not going to detail it here. Primarily because I don’t want to highlight the Solunar Model as some type of ‘answer’ – it’s not.  The model is doing very well right now specifically because the markets are so emotional. The model shows the emotional track of the market. Because one of the component years for this year’s model is the Asian panic year of 1997, there is more than the usual amount of ‘replay’ to history right now.   Cycle students will note the 11-year span from the Asian Panic of 1997  to the panic of 2008 is what the Greeks called the hendekas.  The Spiral Calendar text book shows how the October mini crash of 1989 was an  11-year replay of the ‘October Massacre’ of 1978.

There’s also been questions about the November Spiral Calendar turn date mentioned in the June report. It’s really best to not attempt to figure out those dates before they arrive.  It’s preferable to rely on one’s best analysis of the market at any given moment and then when that time comes, measure the emotional state of the market to see if that date has a relevent effect.