What Really happened In the Stock Market Last Week? So was it a Fat Finger?
Posted in Business on 10. May, 2010
Hi there!
We have officially launched!!
It’s exciting that we officially launched the Lives Of A Woman site last week, and I hope that all you wonderful mothers had as lovely a Mother’s Day as I did. I got to take a much needed lazy day and be treated like a queen. The whole family turning up, text messages from friends, presents, gorgeous flowers in my favourite colours, home cooked baked lunch and organic apple and wild berry pie. Yum!! Thank you my wonderful family, especially my former husband, and the best father in the world, Michael, who put it all together the way he does, with such ease and grace.
What a crazy week though and I so wish I had more time for article writing, but I’ve been working really long hours with my IT team, getting ready for the launch next week of our other business MarketingMasterClub.com. We’ll be promoting to around 50,000 people via emails, and being featured in the brand new online magazine by Dale Beaumont, Business Blueprint.
Marketing Master Club is the answer we felt was badly needed by the thousands of SME business owners we meet who have great little businesses, but know they are leaving so much money on the table by not communicating regularly enough with their clients, and have little idea how to use the internet to its full effect. So we hired a team and trained them, and formed a ‘club’ which allows our members to share the costs of a professional team for creating newsletters and websites AND get the best quality, and access to experts who know what works. Leverage and economies of scale are great strategies whether you’re a big corporation, or especially when you are just starting out.
Our site isn’t glamorous, but it’s based on some of the most successful content sites in the industry, and before we’d even launched we’d already signed up clients, and have quite a few others in the pipeline. This is the ideal situation when launching a business, and we knew from our own experiences getting websites created how much this service was needed. Plus when you see our charter member prices, you’ll see why people are jumping on the offer!
So what happened last week?
Meanwhile over on the stock market last week , we had one of the most exciting falls in the overall market in history. It was quite spectacular. Have a look at this chart of the S&P 500 which is an index made up of 500 different stocks. The S&P 500 is the benchmark of the overall market, and frequently used as the standard of comparison in terms of investment performance.
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=%5EGSPC&t=6m&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=
At first the rumour was that one trader had what they call ‘fat finger’ or that he had accidentally sold billions of shares instead of millions of shares, and it made a great story. But now they are saying that it was probably a massive sell down by all the computerized systems.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Computers-Not-Human-Error-cnbc-1614949039.html?x=0
http://www.moneyshow.com/investing/blog.asp?aid=Blog-19677&scode=016208
It’s very interesting reading and gives some insight into the volatility we’re seeing in the stock and foreign exchange markets today.
Personally, I’m thrilled because months ago, I started buying gold and silver Exchange Traded Funds (ETF) options, just before gold and silver got slapped down again by the powers that be, and I am almost back to break even!
It sure is hard to get back into traditional business after years of prosperity in our land from a wonderfully buoyant stock market, but what’s going to happen from here will be quite a spectator sport. I wouldn’t dream of trying to give any advice, but I do like the way some of my friends are trading, which is taking short term positions, and not staying in the market too long, or options on overall indexes, which spreads the risk. I’d be interested in your perceptions of what is going to happen in the next few months. But with interest rates starting to come up it now seems like as good time as ever to be careful with your cash reserves, look for supplementary sources of income and reduce your debts.
To your great success,
Cydney x
