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 Eric Coffin
Secular – (adjective (s k y -l r)) Middle English,, meaning “Of an Age”
from old Latin, saeculum, meaning “ a generation, an age”
There’s been a lot of talk lately about the bull market in Commodities. Since 2001, most of the major commodity indices have risen by over 40%. That, in itself, is not unusual. Commodity prices are cyclical by nature, moving with the ebb and flow of the world’s economy as a whole. It’s wasn’t very long ago that commodities in general were relegated to the dustbin of history, old economy relics that would scarcely be needed by the “new paradigm” world that would, presumably, survive on nothing but air, water and an AOL account. For those who take the long view however—the real long view, not the Saturday supplement variety, this sort of talk was welcome news indeed. Bull markets are sired by Bear markets and those who pay attention to cycles knew that the distain shown for anything non “new age” was a sure sign that it’s time was at hand.
No one doubts any more that we’re in a bull market. HRA stated calling for one back in 2001 when we could see that the US Dollar was finally, (finally!) starting to show some signs of weakness. Now that we have the market that so may waited for, we have to climb the wall of worry every rising market faces. Being a cyclical sector, this wall is even taller for most investors. They know that commodity prices move both ways and no one wants to be the last one to leave the party. The question facing us all right now is: Just what kind of bull market are we in?
Charles Dow, the namesake for the famous index felt there were a number of different trends that could be classified based on duration and size. Primary Trends are broad movement lasting 4-6 years, where each successive rally reaches a higher (or lower) level and each decline ends at an higher (or lower) level, depending on weather it’s a Bull or a Bear trend.
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