What is the market waiting for?

With the prospect of more rate cuts on the horizon (realistically only 4 left before 0%), the market continued to seesaw, finally going red in the final hour of trading. However, the drop wasn't very significant. Such daily volatility resulting in so little real movement causes me to believe that we have a ways to go before we're out of this recession.

What I'm looking for is a good 700-800 point one-day drop, where from start to finish, the market was consistently in the red. This will be such a huge signal to everyone, that rich, nearly all cash position investors, will be forced to quickly and greedily invest.

Last week

Economic fundamentals last week were being watched on the stock market for the first time in a long time. It has been a while since people considered earnings in watching the stock market, and I really think it's the beginning of the end of outright market pessimism.

Come on stock market, I'd like to see my 401(k) not end the year down 40%...

Ugly Week for the Dow

What an ugly week for the Dow! -1875 pts representing -18.15%...

Spent the week at work analyzing companies, not dictated by my boss, but rather through minute to minute updates on MarketWatch and CNBC. Things were just happening so fast. There were some moments that on my 30 second walk to my boss' office, the news I was going to tell him had been changed and he about to come to tell me.

Just crazy.

But what now? With the bailout passed, money flooding the markets out of the coffers of many governments' central banks, and oil futures falling, global stock markets continue their death march. Every day they open is another 5% decrease in value. How sustainable is this?

Well, there is one number that they could end up at: 0.

Hopefully, this weekend's emergency meetings between finance ministers will result in a positive AND cohesive message. This was attempted this Friday and ended in a dismal message: "We know we need to do something, but we can't agree on what."

The way I see it now, the markets are falling due to mass chaos and fear. Perhaps the best way to calm these fears would be to shut down stock markets for a few days and allow companies to start worrying about running their business, rather than having their CEOs mesmerized at their desks, tapping at the ticker symbol as it scrolls by.