Stock trader who called three crashes sees 20% collapse
Insight: Veteran investor expects bear market within 12 months
By Michael Sincere
MarketWatch.com
July 28, 2014
MIAMI (MarketWatch) — Mark Cook, a veteran investor included in Jack Schwager’s best-selling book, “Stock Market Wizards,” and the winner of the 1992 U.S. Investing Championship with a 563% return, believes the U.S. market is in trouble.
The primary indicator that Cook uses is the “Cook Cumulative Tick,” a proprietary measure he created in 1986 that uses the NYSE Tick in conjunction with stock prices. His indicator alerted him to the 1987, 2000, and 2007 crashes. The indicator also helped to identify the beginning of a bull market in the first quarter of April 2009, when the CCT unexpectedly went up, turning Cook into a bull.
What does Cook see now?
“There have been only two instances when the NYSE Tick and stock prices diverged radically, and that was in the first quarter of 2000 and the third quarter of 2007. The third time was April of 2014,” Cook says.
In simple terms, as stock prices have gone higher, the NYSE Tick has moved lower. This divergence is an extremely negative signal, which is why Cook believes the market is losing energy.
In fact, the Tick is showing a bear market, which seems impossible considering how high the market is rising.
“The Tick readings I am seeing (-1100 and -1200) is like an accelerator on the floor that is pressed for an indefinite amount of time,” Cook says. “Eventually the motor will run out of gas. Now, anything that comes out of left field will create a strain on the market.” Since the CCT is a leading indicator, prices have to catch up with the negative Tick readings.
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