Like many Slopers, I pay attention to the charts posted by Joe8888. They are invariably interesting, and come with his inimitable punctuation style. Yesterday he posted a chart showing that February 17th was 155 days from the July turning point in the markets (roughly SPX 870), which in turn was 155 days from another key pivot in November 2008 (SPX low 700s). Both 155 day points loosely track "Big" Bradley turn dates (12/14/08, 7/14/09). The first big Bradley turn date of 2010 is March 1. After reading his post, I got to wondering the significance of 155 days.
I did a Google search, and did not discover any significance relative to markets, although there may be much written on the topic that does not show up in a fast internet search. What did pop up is that there is a fairly strong scientific basis for a 155 day cycle in solar flares. There does not appear to be a great explanation for why that period of time seems to shape the frequency of solar activity. One theory is that the period relates to the "timescale for the storage and/or the escape of the magnetic field."
Generally speaking, it also does not look like the current moment in time is a point of high solar flare activity. However, in February, the Northern Lights have apparently picked up a bit, in
“’This has been a very nice month for auroras,’ agrees Wioleta Zarzycka of
Is any of this tradeable? Credible? At least entertaining? Who knows, but given how low morale was on the Slope yesterday, maybe we can look forward to a decisive turn here at day 155.
Photo below is from
