BEAR POLAR DISORDER IN OIL:

I'm not sure if drilling is the answer - it seems that refining has been the big problem, but with Conventional Wisdom saying oil should go down and Composite Operator Goldman Sachs reiterating a $150/bbl price, I'd bet on the latter!
In these dog days of lower Volume and benign neglect, regression to the mean rules, with only a few notable exceptions: the VIX, at 18.8 is in the lower zone where previous bottoms called the exact tops in Oct. '07 (9th and 31st), Dec.21, Feb.26 and May 15 -almost to the day. Although a coincident indicator, the area that it is in is the operable statistic.
Both surveys that I follow - AAII and Inv.Intell. have righted themselves to the Bullish "ON" the market (not FOR); insider trading has risen to 18:1 sales to buys.
Seasonally, it is a coin flip whether the Labor Day week, normally a positive (first few days + holiday), will be held back by the Democratic convention news.
Here are the numbers:

MktSentiment. 8/22/2008 Prev. Week.....5Yr.HI......LOW

DJIA ………. 11628……….11659………..14093............7286
Nasdaq………. 2414………….2452…………2810.............1114
S&P500…….. 1292………….1298………….1561………..776
CBOE Eq. put/call …70…………….70……………..92-1/08….....46-1/03

VIX ………. 18.8………….19.6…….…….44… 9/02 bu..10.0-7/05 br

McClellan Osc……….17………….35……………91-5/04 br...(-81)-5/04bu
McClelSum……….…-405………-409…………..1568-6/03.......-1187
Newsletter Surveys:
Inv.Intel -Bull:…..…40.7…………31.8……….…63 (12/04br)......35-6/06bu
Bear:………… 38.4…………45.5…..………… 38.2-3/03.......16-6/03

AAII-Bull/Bear ……38.1/37.3……42.9/39.0……..n/a n/a
IBD: Short Interest- na…………….14…………15.0………. 4.0
Public/NYSE Spec.-…15.6………..15.9…….….21.9bl…………..1.0br
Bullish%- …………50…………50…….…88 -2/04br.....19bu
*Insider corporate sellers.18:1…….16:1………..97………….4
Mutual Fund Inflows: (.5B)……..(.3B)
ETF InflowsL(.7B)……………… 4.2B
Money Market Inflows: 2B………10B

With record numbers of dollars coming out of Money Market Funds, mostly into the crowded trade of short term bonds, anyone who has a minimal knowledge of covered call options and/or an interest in hedging stock market exposure might want to check out: brentleonard.com for an alternative strategy that is low-risk as well as highly rewarding. For those of you wanting more details and actual trading results, a new book is available for $14.95 at Amazon.com: Zero (IN)Tolerance

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BEAR POLAR DISORDER IN OIL: