World Affairs
From the beginning of 2016, a worldwide stock market selloff has wiped out about $15 trillion in wealth.
Have you been part of this wealth destruction?
This bull market is long in the tooth having began in 2008 and showing signs of unraveling last August when the U. S. stock market plunged 11% in just a week. Anybody examining the stock charts will see that August 24th marked the day of collapse.
In fact one man predicted a stock market crash on one of the days I and another group of street preachers were in Santa Monica. That particular video has received several thousand views although the man was off on his timing.
The markets rebounded but never took out their highs set earlier in the year. Judged by most analysts this would be considered a bad sign and probably signals lower prices ahead. Unless we get some type of QE-4 we will most likely see much lower levels this year. This will signal that a severe recession if not a depression is jolting our economy. We are experiencing higher unemployment, lack of growth and more government debt than ever before.
Over half of the world is now in a bear market.
London's FTSE 100 has taken a 21% hit since reaching an all time high in April.
Canada entered a bear market 14 days ago with the Toronto Stock Exchange Composite
Index falling 26% since April.
Last Friday Europe entered a bear market. The STOXX Europe 600, which tracks 600 of Europe's biggest stocks, is down 24% since April.
China reached a bear market in June 2015 with the Shanghai Composite Index falling 44% since June.
Technically the U. S. stock markets haven't yet hit bear market status. That occurs when the markets fall 20% from their tops. We are now at 15,882 which is about 13.45% drop from the all time high set in May 2015 of 18,351.35.
Can the markets go lower? Sure they can. In fact some financial pundits like Harry Dent are predicting a drop to the 6,500 level which would cut the market by more than half from current levels.
Already the S&P 500 has dropped 9% this year.
Other indexes are doing even worse.
The Dow Jones Industrial is down 10% from the start of this year and the NASDAQ is down 11%. The only market to have reached an official bear market is the Russell 2000 which tracks 2000 small U. S. stocks. It reached a bear market last week and has fallen over since July 2013.
Thus far we can surmise that the U. S. stock market has been taking a beating with few bounces in between. While the major indexes such as the DJIA, NASDAQ, S&P 500 and Russell 2000 are all over sold nevertheless these markets continue their downward spiral. Apparently there has been no major panic yet which is why the market will continue dropping. When these markets break some further support levels and people begin feeling the pain of their financial losses then people will belatedly sell their positions. At that point we'll likely get a healthy bounce. Upside movements generally don't manifest themselves until a large degree of fear grips bulls.
At this point, almost all of the major European indexes have entered bear market territory.
News writer and commentator Michael Snyder says:
"Just check out how far stocks have fallen in some of the largest European nations since their 52-week peak…
United Kingdom: down 20 percent
Netherlands: down 22 percent
France: down 22 percent
Germany: down 24 percent
Turkey: down 24 percent
Italy: down 25 percent
Sweden: down 25 percent
Poland: down 26 percent
Portugal: down 28 percent
Spain: down 30 percent
Greece: down 44 percent
Overall, global stocks have now officially entered a bear market, and panic is spreading fast.
In the U.S., our markets are still in better shape than most of the rest of the world, so we don’t necessarily understand the severity of the situation quite yet. But let me assure you that what we are facing is incredibly serious. Even at the best of times, most of the major banks in Europe and Asia were on shaky ground, and all it was going to take was a major financial downturn for them to start toppling like dominoes.
Those that believed that the European crisis was “finished” were sadly mistaken.
The European crisis is not over.
The truth is that the European crisis is just beginning.
Italy will probably be first, but economic and financial problems are going to spread like wildfire.
And by the time it is all said and done, European society is going to be fundamentally altered, trillions of euros will be lost, and the face of the continent will change."
I recall watching Chaplan Lindsey Graham a few years ago tell how his insider connections communicated to him that first the Euro currency would collapse and then the U. S. Dollar. I don't believe he ever gave a time frame but I suspect this will all play out within the next 5-10 yeas and maybe sooner.
2018 comes up on my radar as a significant date. Israel became a nation in1948 and 70 plus 1948 brings us to the year 2018. The number 70 is a significant number in Bible numerology.
Could the whole house of cards come tumbling down within a few years? Only time will tell but the Lord has all things under His control.
My best advice is to humble yourself for your many sins. Ask the Lord to grant you repentance and a new heart. Trust the Lord and seek His wisdom in how to prepare for the future.
It is times like these when people suffer tremendous financial loss and displacement that people are often open to the Lord's reproof. Judgment can come in many forms and the Lord can chastise even his children for their foolish ways.
Carlton Pruitt ministers the gospel to the Los Angeles area. Formerly a Hollywood actor (SAG member) and junk removal expert he now spends most of his time studying the scriptures, writing articles, hymns and poems and doing street preaching. See all his videos on https://www.YouTube.com/user/LAStreetPreacher CONTACT at [email protected]
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