Wall Street - Someone convince me that Wall Street is predictive

Because I see it as being historically a lagging indicator.

If it was predictive why would we have such large busts?

If it was predictive then why did it NOT predict the Banking/Housing bubble when everyone else saw it coming?

The talking whores keep claiming it is predictive, so is it bullshit or can someone provide facts to back up the statement?

If that's what you mean, then no I'd say anyone that who claims they can guarantee the market direction is deluding themselves.

There are however, ways of analyzing the fundamental and technical indicators of stocks and indices that can manage risk greatly. I think, in terms of probability, a good investor could guess with 75% accurracy which way a stock will move over a certain period of time.

That 75% number illustrates why anybody getting involved in the stock market has to have good money management techniques.

So the DJIA is predicting where the economy will be in 6 to 12 months.

I see it as reacting rather than predicting.

Case in point, we went into a recession in December 2007 based upon other indicators but the Dow continued to rise into 2008.

I love it when they say, "oh, the market has already discounted that news." Great seer that it is.

Here's what the market was telling you until last September: Falling wages, household incomes and home prices leveraged against historically high personal debt levels in an economy that is two-thirds dependent on consumers don't matter much.

They're hopeless, and no one should ever take the CW out of Wall Street seriously ever again.

The rest of us are suppose to look upon them as our great economic leaders. How did we get in this mess? Wall Street pretty much said we were in good shape, for sure that is what the economist told McCain when he was running for pres.. Then all hell broke lose last fall, or should I say the truth came out at election time? The Treasury Sec. and other major economic wizards told us we were in DIRE straights and we need a massive input of taxpayers dollars to fix?! What was that all about?

Why would we wonder what Wall Street was doing now? BSing us again. Anything to trash this New Government. Obama and his admin. has only received criticism, never acknowledging this country was in deep trouble for over a year!!! And, in that span of the last year we had hit a high of what, 1400? Something outrageously high. So are we to believe the market knows what is happening? It's the corps bottom line and they covered it nicely and we will all pay for the lies and deceit.

An unregulated Wall St. is one of the best predictive indicators of all: that it's time to run for your life.

Neither are predictive tools. We don't seem to have much consensus on what a predictive tool might be.