One month ago we wondered: Would the stock market suffer a September swoon? If you answered yes to that question and acted on it, then you missed out on a nearly 4% gain in the S&P 500, a whopping 6% on the Nasdaq, and 2% in the Dow, which had its best quarter since 1998. [...]

The price of gold rushed past $1000 per ounce today, sending it within glittering distance of last year’s record high before profit-taking ate into gains. But the breach of the psychological $1000 barrier has put a sparkle into the eyes of those who have been accumulating the precious metal, and has them looking for more [...]

If you happen to be in Cambridge, Massachussetts on October 8th, drop in on a lecture by Marc Hauser, Director of the Cognitive Evolution Lab at Harvard: How Apes and Monkeys May Help Us Understand the Economic Crisis. Hauser will argue that “many of the problems in our own economic decision-making can be traced back millions of years when our primate ancestors were small-brained quadrupeds lacking any concept of money or the stock market.” Hmm. Sounds like some financial advisors we know.

September is the cruelest month – for the stock market. According to the data, if the leaves have started to fall, so have the major indices. In September, the Dow and S&P 500 have dropped on an average of 22 out of 30 days, the Nasdaq 17 of 30. The bulls having enjoyed a Pamplona-like [...]