Picking the bottom is impossible.If you stripped the banking...

Picking the bottom is impossible.

If you stripped the banking sector out of the US reporting season, their have been a number of positive earnings. At worst the reporting season minus banks and builders thus far has been GOOD. But when a market is correcting, none of that matters.

The Government rescue package received no positive response because it carried no details. People want to know how much and when. Until then it gives the market an excuse to have a breather.

So over the next 6 months in the US you can expect
* Personal spending incentives
* Business spending incentives
* Interest rate cuts
* A surge in spending by those classed as bankrupt (No mortgae to pay so spend away)
* Banks will start to receive income from bankrupts as they pay a portion of their income back to creditors.

But until it all starts to flow through it will give the market an excuse to rest or slide.

I see the real problem in the US as being one more round of chaotic consumer confidence with low interest rates and another false economic boom.

You must remember that for the same argument that people have been putting forward for a devaluation in stocks will be an opposite argument when earnings turn around.

Trying to pick targets like 11,500 and 5,000 for the US and Aus respectively is like fishing in the dark. The markets will continue to slide until or stagnate until people can read positively into the future. For most of us on here that means we can see the market going up and consolidating along the way.