Fed Yellen is gutless and very transparent. She does the same nonsense over and over. She talks about the need to normalize rates and tells us that things are improving economically. We all know that she's not telling the truth and we all know by now that she's a phony. She never had any intention of raising rates, and found the usual excuses she knows will be there for her. Poor numbers as the year moves along on the economic front.
She smiled from ear-to-ear when manufacturing stunk. She smiled more when services nosedived, and celebrated when retail sales were a major disappointment. Three beautiful excuses not to raise rates in September. A dream come true. When grilled by Congress she spoke in a roundabout way, over and over. She found ways to get around the tough questions with a load of garbage. She gets away with it. Why not. Good for the 401K's. It's always about the dollar bill.
There was one change in the overall picture, in that three voting Governor's voted to raise, but of course she has the final say and would have nothing to do with a rate hike. It's my guess that as the year goes on, we won't see too much in terms of improvement in the global economy, and if that holds true, you can forget about a rate hike in December as well. And, if the bad news continues through the end of the year, you may not see another rate hike for longer than you can imagine.
I'll leave the rest up to your imagination. Bottom line is she will continue to find excuses not to raise, because in the end, she truly wants no part of doing so, for fear the economy here in the United States would go completely in the tank. If we go in the tank, so does the rest of the world. I expect no rate hikes until possibly well in to 2017.
So, what next? Hard to say. We can look back at the market for what it has been and guess about the future. Purely a guess, of course. Since the market has rallied on the premise of low rates, I would expect the market will try higher from here, but no guarantee folks.
We still have to respect the fact the global economy is weakening. It is in pretty bad shape, especially over the past month or two. You have to give the real world some attention, even though the market will have nothing to do with it. Never get complacent.
The bullied bull continues on. You have to look the other way when you play. If you play from truth, you'll likely lose. You have to bite your lip and hope the bubble doesn't pop. Everyone knows Yellen has blown up a massive bubble with her bully tactics, but no one really cares right now. They're happy to see this machine march on.
If you're long, you're loving it. If you're short, you're getting no love, and for all the wrong reasons, which makes it hurt that much more. 2194 is key resistance. 2120 down to 2092 is key support. Whichever goes first will likely cause a more directional move. We've gone nowhere for quite some time and I think everyone would love to get some real action.