November 25th Edition

Good Morning All,

World markets have taken kindly to the Fed's latest bailout news and to the announcements surrounding the incoming administration's economic team. More news on this and other Barack moves will be forthcoming over the next ten days or so, including the Hillary adoption.

Thanksgiving Day in the U.S. will dramatically shorten this important trading week, but maybe that's a good thing. A better thing may be a "no letter from Bill" Thursday and barring a compelling reason on Friday, as it too may draw a blank from this quarter.

It is interesting to note that the S&P 500 closed back up at its former support level of 850. According to David Nichols of the Fractal Report we should be looking for a monthly close over 944 if this latest move is to prove lasting. I have been calling for a recovery of as much as 50% of the index losses by Inauguration Day on January 20th for some time now and continue to maintain this positive outlook. History shows us how recoveries from major bear markets are their most swift during the early stages. The harder the fall the bigger the bounce so punters ought to take a good look the "tech notes" I sent yesterday. The same theory applies to groups of beaten down stocks in Canada, with the stated caveat that spreading the risk makes more sense than being right on the market or even the sector but wrong about your individual choice; ergo the ETF's so often discussed here. To wit, the Russell 400 Mid Cap, symbol MVV in the U.S. has risen from its new low of 15 made Friday morning to a 20.12 close last night. The 52 week high was over 90 so you can see that this game is not over.

The word I have most often used to describe the Obama team is adult, to this we might add the term professional as the structure of operations being created here appears so relatively sane that aside from being reassuring it is almost shocking to think of what the world has survived these last 8 years. So much so that the ever sexy George Bush now appears to have the most popular ass in America as nearly everyone wants to see the last of it as he boards his last helicopter ride from the WhiteHouse lawn.