Take profits from market dementia?

There is crazy like a fox and there is plain crazy. When it comes to the stock market in the aggregate, it is hard to remember the first kind. Examples of the second kind are presented daily.

A story in MarketWatch tells us:

U.S. stocks surged Friday, lifting benchmark indexes into the positive column for the week, after the July jobs report proved far better than estimated.

“We got a much more optimistic labor report, and ISM was expected to be down and it was up,” said Phil Orlando, equity market strategist at Federated Investors in New York. “The 163 print is the best number in about five months,” added Orlando of the 163,000 increase in payrolls. 

However, the unemployment rate, which is calculated from a different survey, climbed to 8.3%. 

So it would seem that more people are being hired but more people are unemployed. Take your choice of survey results -- it doesn't matter because both are almost surely wrong. 

Oh, here's some more good news:

Speculation that Spain might soon make a formal rescue request also bolstered sentiment, with Spanish borrowing costs falling to levels viewed as more sustainable on Friday. 

Jolly good, that! Spain is going to ask for a rescue remedy, a loan or bank bail-out most likely. Really steadies the old nerves, what?

So, on the strength of dubious statistics and one more desperate throw of euros, the market is blowing out the doors as we write this, Dow putting on 225 points, Naz up 63, S&P showing an equivalent weight gain. Brokerage account going green in no mean way.

What a fantastic time for some prudent selling. But then, we wind up with more fiat currency. What to do with it? Wait for the next big drop to buy more shares of worthy securities? What if the glue sniffing high carries on through Monday and we feel the pain of seller's remorse? 

Ghost Money says, this is no laughing matter. But all you can do sometimes is laugh.

Keywords: [Employment] [Unemployment] [Spain] [Pain]

Ghost Money's author does not claim to know what he's talking about. He is not an investment advisor. This site is for entertainment, if it can even manage that.