Stocks in freefall; Dow below 9000

In the face of a torrent a bad economic news including global bank nationalizations, investors lost hope late this afternoon as markets sold off over 7% in New York. The Dow closed below 9000 for the first time since 2003 and finished the day at a bracing 8579 while the S&P ended trading at 909.

While not quite 'crashworthy', this was more or less in keeping with my standing prediction for a large percentage decline (5-10%) for today, October 9th.

I believe there is more downside tomorrow, although my sense is much of the negative planetary energy has already been expressed. It's possible we will see a further decline to the much-talked about support level of 7500-8000, but I think there will be a lot of buyers at 8000 so we should expect a lot of intraday volatility. Of course, it's conceivable that the Dow goes below these levels, but it's not probable and even if they do, they won't stay there very long.

I think Friday will be the much-sought after capitulation and near term bottom after which we will rise into next week. We are now facing a two month bottoming process where there will be some retesting of the lows we likely make tomorrow. Early November is the first probable retest, and then again in the first two weeks of December.

The VP Debate

With the much-anticipated Vice-Presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin tomorrow, here are a few thoughts on the probable outcome as it relates to the general trend in the campaign. As predicted in mid-September, the Obama campaign has pulled into the lead and is now ahead of McCain by an average 5-6 points in recent polls. This trend is likely to continue as the Obama campaign chart is very strong in the coming days while the McCain campaign chart is troubled.

With Moon and Venus transiting the 7th house of the Obama campaign chart today (Oct 1), we can see that his campaign is riding high. A new poll was released today that put him ahead by 9 points, the most in the campaign thus far. His vote tonight in the Senate on the bailout bill will also improve his profile and popularity. The difficulty in the McCain campaign chart is that transiting Mercury is exactly aspected by malefic natal Saturn, so he is likely to look weak and out of favour in the next couple of days. While Mercury is usually a fast moving planet, it is retrograde now and moving quite slowly. This extends the negative influence on McCain.

The debate tomorrow doesn't look like a game changer for either campaign. It is very unlikely to help McCain much since Mercury will still be afflicted by Saturn, especially since transiting Mars conjoins the natal IC. With Venus transiting the 4th house cusp Thursday and Friday, it's possible that McCain may get a small bounce but it will not be significant. Another possible interpretation may simply be the feminine influence (Venus in Libra) that Palin will exert on the campaign at this time. At the time of the debate, the Moon will be in a difficult square aspect to the Sun-Mars-Saturn conjunction in her chart, so this will certainly be a high stress moment for her. It also suggests that things may not go as well as she would have liked. By contrast, the Moon will conjoin Biden's natal Mercury and come under the helpful aspect of his natal Jupiter at the time of the debate. This may suggest that Biden is relieved and happy with his performance. At the same time, transiting Venus is close to his natal Mars which is often a problem and transiting Mars opposes his natal Moon over the next few days which is rarely a good thing. There may be some negative post-debate fallout with Biden that could cause some short lived problems for the Obama campaign.

The next significant time to watch out for is October 9-10, when transiting Mars opposes the natal Sun in the McCain campaign chart while transiting Sun comes under the influence of the natal Saturn. This looks like a major setback for the McCain-Palin ticket and will likely increase Obama's lead.

After that, however, Obama still stumble from Oct 13-16. With the involvement of Mars, Sun and Mercury with malefic points in the horoscope, there will likely be some element of conflict with the event. Fortunately for Obama, he will likely be enjoying a lead of more than 5 points at that time, so it's more likely he will be able to withstand this problem and go on to win. The problem will occur right around the time of the last debate on Oct 15 so it may be doubly embarrassing for him if it becomes the focus in the debate. Alternatively, it may simply be a poor debate performance.

This promises to be an interesting finish to the campaign.