Dow 11,000

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), or The Dow, is now within 73 points of breaking through 11,000. What does this mean? It actually doesn't mean anything other than it's a nice round number and it's a psychological barrier for many. Of course it's not as exciting climbing back through 10,000 and now hopefully 11,000 because we've been there before. At least once again, we are moving in the right direction. I had a client call me the other day asking if we were due for a correction. Well, nobody knows. There is no formula that says if the Dow goes up this much, in this amount of time, then it must go down. No, the stock market does what the stock market wants to do. No one is in control of it. The market will confound, perplex, frustrate, excite, and fool you every time. But the market is efficient and an effective barometer on what is happening with the stocks of companies that are represented by the index. So go ahead, watch The Dow, map it, chart it, look at the trends, do whatever you want to do, but know this, you can not accurately predict what the market will do, anymore than you can tame a wild mustang horse and make it your pet.