Review and Preview

Stock markets around the world put in another mixed performance last week, despite the new yearly highs made in the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The DJIA defied conventional wisdom and soared last week, following the passage of the Health Care Reform bill. Contrary to popular belief, this bill is not any sort of restriction to profits for health care insurance companies. In fact, they may be laughing all the way to the bank, for the bill mandates that about 30 million new (and currently uninsured) people will now have to purchase health care insurance from these companies. And if they don’t, THEY will be punished. Thus, there is a justification for the U.S. stock markets surging to new yearly highs last week. But this was not the case everywhere.

In the Far East and Pacific Rim, the Hang Seng of Hong Kong actually declined over 300 points last week, down to a low of 20,639 on Thursday. This is well off the yearly high of 23,099 as of November 18, nearby to the first Saturn-Pluto waning square. The NIFTY index of India rose all week, hitting 5293 on Friday. But this was still slightly below the yearly high of 5310 recorded on January 6. The All Ordinaries of Australia rallied to a high of 4921 on Wednesday, still well off its yearly high of 4984 on January 11. Only the Japanese Nikkei soared to a new yearly high, reaching the 11,000 mark on Friday and thereby eclipsing the old high of 10,982 back on January 15, when Saturn was turning retrograde. Are you taking note that this bull market makes highs – not lows – under important Saturn transits?

In Europe, The AEX of Netherlands, DAX of Germany, and FTSE of London all made new yearly highs last week. But the Swiss SMI did not, which had been the leader. The Russian MICEX index also failed to make a new yearly high, and much like the Hang Seng, it was down most of the week. Once again, we have a case of bearish intermarket divergence in a particular region of the world.

In the Americas, both the DJIA and NADAQ Composite soared to new yearly highs late last week. But given the nature of the new health care legislation in the USA, that is now understandable. New highs were also noted in Argentina’s Merval index. However, the Bovespa of Brazil was still far from its yearly highs, attaining only 69,677 last Wednesday, still well below its yearly high of 71,068 on January 11, and in a downtrend since a secondary high on March 12.

Perhaps the strangest market behavior however, was in the precious metals, which fell most of the past week, despite the concern about increasing the budget deficit due to the new legislation (I know, the claim is that it is actually a budget deficit reduction, but….). Perhaps the increasing debt potential of this bill pales in comparison to the debt threats of the Euro union members. Or perhaps investors see the need for the Fed to raise interest rates in order to sell more U.S. Treasuries to cover the U.S. government’s imminent need for more monies. The U.S. Dollar did rise sharply against many currencies. The Euro currency, for example, fell to its lowest level since May 2009. Crude also fell early in the week, down to 78.57. But mostly it continued trading close to the 80.00/barrel level.

All in all, last week was a very bizarre week for financial markets, with a host of divergent signals still being issued across the globe. It is about what one would expect under strong Uranus signatures. Then only thing is, under such Uranus-Saturn-Pluto signatures, one never knows exactly what to expect, except the unexpected. There is more of that coming up ahead.

Short-Term Geocosmics

If last week was a preview of what to expect between late May and September, it is going to a very bizarre period, filled with highly charged emotions and wildly speculative markets. The past ten days have witnessed the translation of the Sun to the forthcoming Saturn-Uranus-Pluto T-square. In late May, early June through next September, all three planets will be in early cardinal signs, along with Jupiter, forming a very rare “Cardinal Climax.” The past ten days have witnessed an historic passage of a very partisan Health Care Reform bill, followed by threats of violence against both supporters and opponents of the bill and a surge in the U.S. stock market to new yearly highs. And instead of rising in concert with stocks and the belief that this new legislation would lead to continued run-away spending and debt, the precious metals fell rather hard.

In typical fashion when Uranus is involved in anything, the markets did not do what most thought they would. They did the opposite. And instead of reversing recent the trends, they “broke out” in the USA and accelerated the trend that was in force as the translation period began. A few weeks ago, I speculated that it would be hard to see how equity prices could rally in March, given that the “soft aspects” of February were coming to an end, and hard aspects were about to begin. Yet if one looks back, the stocks markets of the world were indeed up until the end of February, but continued virtually straight up through the hard transiting aspects of March. But what did reverse during this period was the probability of passage of the Health Care Reform bill, which only a few weeks ago was considered dead. It is now law. Financial and Mundane astrology worked fine. It just that it didn’t work quite the way I expected in terms of the U.S. stock market. This is a case where the collective psychology and nature of events was very consistent with the nature of these aspects, but it did not translate as a reversal in U.S. stock markets, though it did in other financial, markets.

For this coming week, we find a full moon on Monday (and hence the Easter holiday follows on the next Sunday), Venus entering its ruling sign of Taurus on Wednesday, Mercury entering Taurus on Good Friday, the same day that the Sagittarius factor also unfolds. It is a pre-holiday week, and thus we anticipate it will be a period of unreliable technical signals. Normally one would expect stocks to be bullish with Venus moving into Taurus March 31-April 25. But technical studies are way overbought, and a cyclical correction is long overdue. Thus we are in a period where cycle, geocosmic, and technical studies are saying different things at the moment.

Longer-Term Thoughts

There is much talk these days about the end of Capitalism, with the accompanying commentary that it is a failed system because it is a “predatory” system. The nature of the Cardinal Climax suggests that any system of dominance in today’s political and economic world is ripe for overhaul and transformation, and maybe even termination. But I wouldn’t make the assumption that it is due to its “predatory” nature, or that a non-predatory system will replace any of these. In my humble opinion, any system is vulnerable to “predatory” influences, and thus becomes corrupt. To state this in another way, most systems are fine in their purest form. The system is not the problem. It is the people who run the system, and the changes they make to it in order to benefit their own special interests that end up corrupting the system that causes it to fail.

As Pluto continues its long sojourn through Capricorn (2008-2024), many systems of the past 2-3 centuries will be vulnerable to change. Some will end, and some will be radically transformed. It will not likely be painless. But the cause of these changes usually has to do with corruption of some sort, and the misuse of power, rather than the failure of the system itself. With Pluto, everything is revealed that was hidden, and especially those things that had to do with taking advantage of others for one’s own personal gain. In Capricorn, the domain that will be exorcised is likely to be government, banks, and large businesses (Capricorn institutions) that made huge profits through unscrupulous and socially damaging means. The result is oftentimes debt or abuse (or loss) of human rights, especially when Saturn is in its waning phase to Pluto, a condition which has been in effect since 2001 and will remain through 2020. Thus we see the overlap of these two long-term cycles in effect 2008 through 2020.

Yet at the same time we are still in the Uranus-Neptune mutual reception time frame, following the 171-year Uranus-Neptune conjunction of 1993. This is a period of unprecedented technological and scientific advancement, a time when human ingenuity soars. So as one (or more) system comes to an end, there is a possibility of a brilliant new system(s) being born. But with Pluto in Capricorn, it is mandatory that this birth be led by those who are not corrupt, who truly have a vision and not just a case of self-delusion. Otherwise it will be just transferring one failed system for another, because of the failure in leadership and character of those leading the social, political, and/or economic revolution. These first two decades of the 21st century may not be easy times to live through, but they are important. They will set the course for many decades, even centuries to come. And the outcome – the nature and severity of this revolution — is still to be determined, because many important choices remain to be made this year and next. It’s not too late to fix it, and it’s not too late to say it has been irreparably broken. But so far, about the only entity not falling in line with the failed themes of previous waning Saturn-Pluto cycles is the Federal Reserve Board. And the Fed is about to come into another very difficult geocosmic period now through September.