By day’s end the bears had won, reversing the tide at lunchtime today.


Reports Reuters in Credit worries, GM strike weigh on Wall Street:

Stocks fell on Monday as financial shares weakened on news that Germany’s largest bank may take a big hit from subprime mortgage investments, while a landmark strike at General Motors raised concern about the economic outlook.

Citigroup and other banks fell after sources familiar with the situation said that exposure to risky U.S. home loans could reduce Deutsche Bank’s profit by $2.4 billion.

Now that is interesting, because around lunchtime the headlines spun the story completely the other way. For example, AP reported:

Wall Street traded higher Monday with investors still upbeat about last week’s Federal Reserve rate cut while they await further hints about the economy’s direction.

Wait a minute — today is Monday! Wall Street traded higher Monday until lunchtime with investors upbeat, but within an hour or so they all had “concern about the economic outlook.” Are these the same investors or are we all passing through the Twilight Zone?

Stocks can only go up, down, or sideways, so investors are either “upbeat,” “concerned,” or “neutral,” but the latter does not make a compelling headline. “INVESTORS FLAT” probably will not sell copy. So I suppose we are down to the binary combination.

The most logical explanation would be morning euphoria over rate cuts, followed by afternoon angst over more downcast economic realities. In other words, a deep, multi-layered psychology permeates the market: a mask of optimism perhaps covering deeper pessimism, or perhaps a rakish pessism beguiling with more fundamental hope beyond it. Or, using Occam’s Razor, the simpler explanation is that mass moods rise and fall, willy-nilly, tracking a range of variables some of which come to the foreground at any given time. It is the media’s job to provide the spin. But the reality is much more subtle, complex, and ever-changing, creating the kaleidoscope we know and play as the Market.

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The Law Offices of Michael H. Cohen offers corporate legal services, litigation consultation, and expertise in health law with a unique focus on holistic, alternative, complementary, and integrative medical therapies. The law firm represents medical doctors, allied health professionals (from psychologists to nurses and dentists) and other clinicians (from chiropractors to naturopathic physicians, massage therapists, and acupuncturists), entrepreneurs, hospitals, and educational organizations, health care institutions, and individuals and corporations.

Michael H. Cohen is Principal in Law Offices of Michael H. Cohen and also President of a nonprofit organization exploring legal, regulatory, ethical, and health policy issues in the judicious integration of complementary and alternative medical therapies (such as acupuncture and traditional oriental medicine, chiropractic, naturopathic medicine, homeopathy, massage therapy, energy healing, and herbal medicine) and conventional clinical care. Michael H. Cohen is author of books on health care law, regulation, ethics and policy dealing with complementary, alternative and integrative medicine, including Healing at the Borderland of Medicine and Religion, Complementary and Alternative Medicine: Legal Boundaries and Regulatory Perspectives (1998), Beyond Complementary Medicine: Legal and Ethical Perspectives on Health Care and Human Evolution (2000), and Future Medicine: Ethical Dilemmas, Regulatory Challenges, and Therapeutic Pathways to Health Care and Healing in Human Transformation (2003).

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Health care and corporate lawyer Michael H. Cohen has been admitted to the Bar of California, Massachusetts, New York, and Washington D.C. In addition to qualifying as a U.S. attorney, he has been admitted and to the Bar of England and Wales as a Solicitor (non-practicing). For more information regarding the law practice of attorney Michael H. Cohen, see the FAQs for the Law Offices of Michael H. Cohen. Thank you for visiting the Complementary and Alternative Medicine Law Blog.

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