Please note that until the Forecast for 2009 book is completed, there will be no "Longer-Term Thoughts" section in this column. We expect to resume this feature of the weekly column in the first week of December. Therefore this column will be presented in abbreviated format until then.
Review and Preview
Financial Astrology worked with precise accuracy last week in several financial markets around the world. Almost all stock indices continued their decline off highs that were realized November 4-5, when the first of the five Saturn-Uranus oppositions took place. Those declines found an important bottom on Thursday, November 13, day of the Full Moon. Many then commenced a very sharp rally later that day and into Friday, before starting to pull back again.
The geocosmic significance of Thursday, November 13, was discussed in last week's report as follows: "In addition to all the Uranus signatures in effect late October through November 10, we will have another interesting geocosmic period coming up in the next few sessions. These surround the Full Moon of November 13. On the day before, geocentric Venus will change signs from Sagittarius to Capricorn. On November 13, heliocentric Venus will change signs from Aquarius to Pisces. On November 14, heliocentric Mercury changes from Libra to Scorpio. And on Sunday, November 16, geocentric Mars moves from Scorpio to Sagittarius. So many planets changing signs in such a short period of time suggests a change in investor sentiment. The fact that a Full Moon happens November 13 means that a change trend (short-term) could happen within one day of this Thursday. If a financial or commodity market decline into a low then, an impressive rally may follow."
So what happened? In Europe, all four indices that we follow declined to form their weekly low on Thursday, November 13. In the Far East and Pacific Rim the same thing happened, except in India where the weekly low fell on Friday, November 14. Each of these indices held above their multi-year lows that were realized in late October. That same pattern was evident in South America with both Brazil's Bovespa and Argentina's Merval Index. But in the United States there was a little twist. The DJIA fell sharply to 7965 on Thursday, retesting its October 10 low of 7882. It held, and then the market soared 900 points form that low in the last couple hours of trading. But in the NASDAQ Composite prices fell to 1428, taking out the multi-year of 1493 that occurred on October 24, and then it also rallied sharply into the close. This pattern of a new low unaccompanied by a similar market with closes in the upper part of the day's (or week's) range is known as intermarket bullish divergence. It usually starts a significant rally, especially when it unfolds in a geocosmic critical reversal zone. Now we wait and see if the lows of Thursday will hold this coming week. If so, it is bullish for these markets. If not, it is bearish. It is really that simple.
Stock indices were not the only market affected by last week's Full Moon and numerous planetary ingresses. Crude Oil continued to sink to new yearly lows, falling to 54.67 on Friday. This is nearly a 100% correction of the entire move up from the four-year cycle trough of 49.90 in January 2007 (when Jupiter squared Uranus) to the high of July 11, 2008 when it topped out at 147.27. It is interesting to note that last week's low was under a Jupiter sextile to Uranus aspect. It is also interesting to note that the high of July 11 occurred under the Sun-Jupiter opposition. Jupiter is one of the co-rulers of Crude Oil (the other is Neptune). This is important because Mars will ingress into Sagittarius this weekend, and Sagittarius is the major ruling sign of Jupiter.
Gold and Silver also fell sharply into Thursday's Full Moon, re-testing their lows of October 24 and 28 respectively. But by Friday, both had risen substantially. In the case of Gold, the rally was over $50.00, and in Silver, it was nearly a whole dollar, or over 10%. Likewise the Euro currency re-tested its low of 1.2378 realized on October 28, when it fell back to 1.2387 on Thursday. It too rallied smartly into Friday.
Short-Term Geocosmics
Markets are likely to continue their wild price swings for the next few weeks as Mars transits through Sagittarius November 16-December 27. As mentioned above, Sagittarius is the ruling sign for Jupiter. Both Jupiter and Sagittarius have in common the principles of exaggeration and expansion. Mars is a planet that stimulates or excites. Thus Mars in Sagittarius can be a "wild time" in many aspects of human activity, such as financial markets. It would not be surprising to see very big moves resume. In fact, there are a number of other geocosmic signatures involving Jupiter and Sagittarian factors in effect through the rest of this month and even beyond. The Sun will be in Sagittarius November 21-December 21. Geocentric Mercury will follow November 23-December 12, and heliocentric Mercury starts its two-week trek through Sagittarius November 24. In addition, Jupiter will form its last of five trine aspects to Saturn on November 21, and Venus will form a conjunction to Jupiter on December 1. That is a lot of Jupiter and Sagittarius energy. That means there is likely to be a lot of exaggeration and excessive emotion in the world.
Usually Jupiter and Sagittarius corresponds to optimism and hope, even to the point of "irrational exuberance," as Alan Greenspan used to say when describing the never-ending bull market in stocks between 2003-2007. But it can also correspond with hysteria and panic if prices start to fall hard too. What will it be this time? Certainly there is a sense of great optimism and hope about the changes a new leadership in the United States will bring to the world. But at the same time everyone recognizes the danger of the current economic times, and the threat of falling steeply into a severe recession if the trend of the world economy is not altered quickly.
It is also interesting to note how the great bailout plan to rescue the American economy changed gears last week. You may remember how Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson rang the panic button in September with Mercury retrograde, demanding that Congress act quickly (immediately, or else risk economic catastrophe) to approve his bailout plan. Our comment at the time was that this idea was not well-thought out and changes would have to be made, based solely on forcing the issue under Mercury retrograde. Not enough information or understanding was yet available for Congress to make an educated and considered vote. This week, in another dreadfully awful televised press conference, Paulson outlined how the program now has to be changed in order to get the monies from the government directly to the consumer. The stock markets immediately collapsed -- again -- on his words. Paulson is quickly rising to the status of a very reliable technical sell indicator. Let's hope that during Mars in Sagittarius -- a time when either hope or panic will dictate the direction of equity prices -- that Paulson refrains from the need to address us again with his shifting ideas and near-impossible-to-understand explanations. It's bad enough that our Congressional leaders and President have granted him $700B of taxpayer's money to lead the rescue mission with very questionable oversight and accountability. To have him publically speak out and demonstrate once again that he doesn't have a real solid, well-thought out plan for a successful rescue mission doesn't give investors a great sense of confidence in what he is doing. The election of Obama and a new leadership in the White House may be creating a sense of great hope that could carry the stock markets higher into the end of the year. But the sudden switching of plans on how to execute the economic rescue mission is exactly the kind of stuff that could lead to panic and hysteria in the markets.
Disclaimer and statement of purpose: The purpose of this column is not to predict the future movement of various financial markets. However, that is the purpose of the MMA (Merriman Market Analyst) subscription services. This column is not a subscription service. It is a free service, except in those cases where a fee may be assessed to cover the cost of translating this column from English into a non-English language. This weekly report is written with the intent to educate the reader on the relationship between astrological factors and collective human activities as they are happening. In this regard, this report will oftentimes report what happened in various stock and financial markets throughout the world in the past week, and discuss that movement in light of the geocosmic signatures that were in effect. It will then identify the geocosmic factors that will be in effect in the next week, or even month, or even years, and the authorís understanding of how these signatures will likely affect human activity in the times to come. The author (Merriman) will do this from a perspective of a cycleís analyst looking at the military, political, economic, and even financial markets of the world. It is possible that some forecasts will be made based on these factors. However, the primary goal is to both educate and alert the reader as to the psychological climate we are in, from an astrological perspective. The hope is that it will help the reader understand these psychological dynamics that underlie (or coincide with) the news events and hence financial markets of the day.
No guarantee as to the accuracy of this report is being made here. Any decisions in financial markets are solely the responsibility of the reader, and neither the author nor the publishers assume any responsibility at all for those individual decisions. Reader should understand that futures and options trading are considered high risk.
About the Author
Raymond Merriman is a professional astrologer and President of The Merriman Market Analyst, Inc., an investment advisory firm specializing in market timing products and services. He is the editor of The MMA Cycles Report, an advisory newsletter used by banks, financial institutions, investors and traders. He is the author of numerous astrology books, and developed two financial astrological software systems: The FAR (Financial Astrological Research) program, and the SOS (Stock Optimizing Selector) Program, which enable traders to identify potential turning points in various stocks and/or financial futures markets. He can be reached by email, or visit his website.
