Sometime after the stock market collapse of last fall, I remember reading somewhere that the markets usually start taking flight about a month after a new U.S. president is sworn in.
Fortunately, instead of investing in the stock market based on that advice, I pissed away $2 on a Lotto 6/49 ticket last Saturday. As a result, I'm only down two bucks.
As for Monday, however, the North American markets tanked.
The Toronto stock market fell to levels not seen in more than five years on Monday as a fresh wave of pessimism trumped assurances from U.S. regulators on the financial system.
"There's just a lot of fear in the air and I don't think investors really know what to do," said Adrian Mastracci, portfolio manager at KCM Wealth Management in Vancouver.
"I think they would like to make a decision but I don't think anybody really knows what in the world is going on and how deep this problem is."
Toronto's S&P/TSX composite lost 302.32 points to 7,647.67, its lowest close since October 2003.
New York indexes revisited 1997 levels as investors succumbed to their growing worries about a recession that has no end in sight. The Dow Jones industrials fell 250.89 points to 7,114.78.
The index lost more than six per cent last week, partly on fears the U.S. government will move to nationalize parts of the financial sector, in particular troubled banks Citigroup and Bank of America.
I make no claims as to financial genius or even basic competence, but the "experts" say that stock markets are forward-looking instruments, so that even if the overall economy is tanking, stocks may be on the way up in anticipation of better days ahead.
So what are we to make of Monday?