Bull!
A History of the Boom and Bust, 1982-2004
Chapter OneThe Market's Cycles
January 1975. When Richard Russell squinted, he saw the silhouette of a
bull emerging against a bleak horizon. The author of Richard Russell's Dow
Theory Letter, Russell had been writing his financial newsletter since 1958,
and by now he had a wide following -- at least among those still willing to
read about stocks. Over the past two years, the Dow Jones Industrial Average
had lost nearly half of its value.
The Dow had last seen blue skies in 1966 when it grazed 1000. Two
years later, it flirted with 1000 again, but in fact, the bull market that began
in the fifties was peaking -- much as the bull market that began in the eighties
peaked at the end of the nineties.
After reaching its apex in the late sixties, the Dow rallied and plunged,
rallied and plunged without getting anywhere -- until finally, in January of
1973, the benchmark index smashed 1000, setting a new high at 1051.69.
It seemed that a new bull market had begun. In fact, the bear was just baiting
investors, luring them in so that they could be impaled on the spike of a
final bear market rally. What followed was the crash of 1973–74.
When ... read full excerpt from Bull! ebook
