I'm
writing to you from my computer
room, on
the third floor of a Victorian
villa, overlooking
the broad sweep of the Hudson
River.
The Hudson is an estuary, which
means the
current flows in both
directions. It is tidal as far
north as Troy, 150 miles upriver
from Manhattan.
They say a log (or, I suppose, a
wooden horse)
launched in Troy takes a year to
reach Wall
Street. Twice each day it drifts
down 12 miles,
but then the current reverses,
and it gives back
all but a quarter mile of what
it had gained.
But in time it reaches the sea.
The ebbs and flows of the stock
market are quite
similar, though considerably
less predictable,
alas. Nevertheless the market's
flotsam (that's us)
does eventually get somewhere.
The thing to
remember is that historically
common stocks
produce a return of over a
million percent per
century, as my friend
Victor
Niederhoffer is so
fond of citing. That wouldn't
happen unless there
was a strong, reliable current
under the market.
It's true that the market has
been meandering in
recent years. Such periods are
inevitable. But it
seems to me that at last we may
have rounded
this bend in the river, and that
the market's
natural current may now once
again prevail. The
market's buoyant resiliency this
week suggests
that may be the case.
Water, water everywhere, but not
a drop to drink.
I say that because the tide
seems to have gone
out in my post-GTI celebratory
cocktail. As
Rumpole of the Bailey would
say, my blood
alcohol may be dangerously low.
I'd best float
down to the kitchen for a
refill.
The Week at a Glance
The London terrorist attacks had
NASDAQ
futures down 35 points Thursday
morning, but
by the closing bell the NASDAQ
had turned in a
7-point gain. A robust Friday
then followed. This
is a determined market.
Returns
for the Week:
Gilder
Technology Index (GTI):
+ 3.7%
Nasdaq Composite Index (NSD):
+
2.7%
S&P 500 Index (S&P):
+ 1.5% |
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