Market Crashes! Doom! Market Back! We’re Saved!

I got a CNN breaking news alert a few minutes ago informing me that the Dow had dropped more than 500 points in the opening minutes of trading.  It has already recovered:

Stocks staged a huge turnaround Friday morning, with the Dow erasing most of a 700-point slide as fears of a global recession were countered by a willingness of some traders to step in at five-year lows.

The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) was down 40 points in the early going after having fallen nearly 700 points. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (SPX) index was down modestly and the Nasdaq composite (COMP) rose.

Developing….

I’d advise holding off jumping from tall buildings for the nonce.

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James Joyner
About James Joyner
James Joyner is Professor and Department Head of Security Studies at Marine Corps University's Command and Staff College. He's a former Army officer and Desert Storm veteran. Views expressed here are his own. Follow James on Twitter @DrJJoyner.

Comments

  1. Moonage says:

    May as well jump. The recovery lasted fifteen minutes. I’m not EVEN going to predict what happens by the end of the day. Well, actually, I already did? )

    Doubt I’ll be doing that again any time soon.

  2. Steve Plunk says:

    Can’t anybody get a grip and calm down?

  3. Michael says:

    I’m just shocked to have seen the DOW below 8,000. I mean, we were over 13,000 at the beginning of the year. That’s a nearly 40% drop.

  4. markm says:

    Just heard a trader on the floor being interviewed…he said “I hope the massive downward trend continues to weed out the fidgety investors” thus bringing some calm to the markets next week.

  5. It’s almost like markets have never went down before! And, of course, the DJIA is the economy, right?

  6. Bithead says:

    Well, this all comes back, folks, to the idea of mortgages and trying to get peple into home that really couldn’t afford them or flat out didn’t belong there… all because we wanted to ‘fair’ to’disadvantaged’ people.

    Are you aware that something like 5 million fruadulant loans are currently held by illegal aliens, accoring to a HUD report out this monring?

  7. Brett says:

    It’s back down 436 points as of about noon Eastern Time. The chart of its value for the day so far is crazy – it’s been on a bloody rollercoaster ride all morning.

  8. Brett says:

    To add, though, at least we haven’t lost as badly as the Japanese Nikkei. The Nikkei has lost nearly 20% of its value in two days.

  9. Michael says:

    Are you aware that something like 5 million fruadulant loans are currently held by illegal aliens, accoring to a HUD report out this monring?

    Just out of curiosity, how many of those 5 million have gone bad?

  10. Bithead says:

    Note the use of the word “fraudulant”.

  11. Bithead says:

    To add, though, at least we haven’t lost as badly as the Japanese Nikkei. The Nikkei has lost nearly 20% of its value in two days.

    Well, that’s the interesting part of all of this; Relative to the rest, the dollar has been getting stronger the whole time.

  12. Tad says:

    5 million mortgages to illegals? I thought the count of illegal aliens was approximated at 12 mil. The HUD report claims that half of them have home mortgages…that doesn’t sound right, one of those two numbers must be incorrect.

  13. Michael says:

    5 million mortgages to illegals? I thought the count of illegal aliens was approximated at 12 mil. The HUD report claims that half of them have home mortgages…that doesn’t sound right, one of those two numbers must be incorrect.

    You’re quibbling over whether it is 5 or 6 million?

  14. Joe Buzz says:

    Its confusing to the govt. bean counters because they had a LOT of co-signers.

  15. Tad says:

    You’re quibbling over whether it is 5 or 6 million?

    No, that’s not where I was going. I find the idea that roughly 1 in 2 of all illegal immigrants own a home. The idea that 50% of the poorest and most mobile people in the country own houses seems ridiculous and rings as untrue. Am I the only one finding that insanely hard to believe?

  16. Billy says:

    The idea that 50% of the poorest and most mobile people in the country own houses seems ridiculous and rings as untrue. Am I the only one finding that insanely hard to believe?

    Insanely hard to believe is an understatement. That’s a mortgage for every other illegal immigrant, meaning each individual has a house somewhere. Not family, indvidual.

    The fallacy here was listening to Bithead. Stick around a little longer – you’ll not make that mistake more than a couple times (unless you fancy bashing your head into a wall, which is a marginally smarter and more productive activity).

  17. Tad says:

    Billy, thanks for the back up. I started out trying to point out how ridiculous the idea was…I guess I’m happy I at least encouraged someone to point out about what was claimed to be ‘fact.’

    It really is sad how few conservatives(hell people in general) think about ‘facts’ told to them.

  18. Bithead says:

    And have you actually looked at the report?
    Had the idea that individuals buying up multiple homes, crossed your mind?

    Well…here’s such a report, from KFYI:
    http://kfyi.com/pages/local_news.html?feed=118695&article=4364653

    One illegal alien was arrested this year in Tucson after allegedly using a stolen social security number to buy two homes and rack up over $780,000 in bad debt.

    Some five million fraudulent home mortgages are in the hands of illegal aliens, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

    It’s not known how many of those have contributed to the subprime housing mortgage meltdown, but it has affected every state, including Arizona.

    The problem began years ago when banks were forced to give mortgages without confirming social security numbers or borrower identification. As a result, illegal immigrants were able to obtain home mortgages which they could not afford.

    What would such added homes be used for? Any number of things. Added collateral, for one things. Fr another, well, let me ask you; Have you ever heard of a “Coyote home’?

    The obvious implication here is we’re just scratching the surface of the illegals problem, and it’s impact.

  19. mannning says:

    Just jump halfway–the market is only down 50%.

  20. JSBolton says:

    The Obama panic is on. When Obama’s in the lead markets everywhere crash. 74% of CEO’s say Obama would be disastrous, while the markets have money talking with numbers that say the same as the CEO’s. It’s easy to stop the panic though, if those contacted by pollsters would say that they’re not voting for Obama. Markets look ahead, they project what might be expected.

  21. Michael says:

    When Obama’s in the lead markets everywhere crash. 74% of CEO’s say Obama would be disastrous

    [citation needed]