Talk:Closing milestones of the Dow Jones Industrial Average

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[edit] 2000s commodity boom?

Could someone please source this? Either a citation or a link to Wikipedia somewhere...definitely not a link to the War in Iraq! I've never heard of this commodity boom, so either cite it or pull it out! Thanks :) --Lalala666 22:15, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] No more all-time highs

This section is basically speculation and isn't really encyclopedic. In my opinion, the history aspect of this article is great, but the future predictions should be eliminated. Carrp | Talk 05:30, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I very much agree and removed the main speculation and moved the rest of the text up to the intro, above the lists. Seems like the list could use coverage of the Great Depression-related bear market, since it was such a major shaper of the US in the 20th century. Niteowlneils 04:44, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Removed POV statement

"A new bull market cannot begin until market valuation (measured by way of PE ratio) is back to multi-decade lows." That is a POV statement predictive of the future that isn't even sourced. The offical defination of a secular bull market is however such that until the DOW makes an all time high, neither the end of the previous bear market nor the beginning of that bull market can be called. Jon 13:58, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Add more milestones please

Crossing 10,000, 9000, 8000 in the downward direction is just as interesting as crossing them in the upward direction. Jon 13:58, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

There should be another table added for the new record close or at least change the title of the table to include 2006 Moorematthews 21:11, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Intra day high

On January 14, 2000, the intra day high was 11750.28 this is according to both Forbes magazine and CNN. Moorematthews 13:12, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Concept of Theoretical vs. Actual Dow

The intraday high on January 14, 2000 was indeed 11750.28 "according to some but not substantiated by any intraday chart" (quote interjected by Anonymous); however, the "theoretical high", which is calculated as if the intraday highs of all 30 stocks were hit at once, was 11908.50 "and substantiated by intraday graphs [links at bottom]" (also interjected by Anonymous). This 150+ point spread between the "actual" and "theoretical" highs may be accounted for by the fact that January 14, 2000 was an extremely volatile trading day, meaning that the individual stock highs may have been highly spread in time.

The "theoretical" method was the only way to calculate highs or lows until early 1992, when technology allowed the index to be calculated every 10 seconds. Even on October 4, 2006, when the actual high eclipsed the intraday high of six years before by 100 points, the theoretical high of 11879 still failed to set a new record. This may have been caused by a number of factors, including the decrease in volatility between 2000 and 2006 and the dynamics of that particular trading day. The actual high of 11851 was set seconds before the close, meaning that in all likelihood the vast majority of the 30 stocks hit their highs simultaneously.

During the 2000-2002 bear market, the lows were (closing, actual, theoretical): (7286, 7197, 7181) on October 9-10, 2002. As many will recall, a market-wide rally ensued upon breaking 7200 on October 10, and virtually no new lows were hit in any of the individual stocks for the rest of the day. Thus, there was only a 16-point spread for actual and theoretical lows in spite of high general volatility.

65.27.233.132 12:50, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

The above referenced concept of a difference in "theoretical" and "actual" intraday highs is not supported by the graphs below, making it suspect as an indicator.

There is argument over the intraday high since the graphs (links below) substantiate a high on January 14, 2000 of 11,908.50 and none show any such high on October 5, 2006.

http://finance.yahoo.com/charts#chart2:symbol=^dji;range=5d;indicator=volume;charttype=candlestick;crosshair=on;logscale=off;source=

http://bigcharts.marketwatch.com/charts/big.chart?symb=DJIA&compidx=aaaaa%3A0&ma=0&maval=9&uf=0&lf=1&lf2=0&lf3=0&type=2&size=2&state=8&sid=1643&style=320&freq=1&startdate=1%2F10%2F2000&enddate=1%2F15%2F2000&comp=NO%5FSYMBOL%5FCHOSEN&nosettings=1&rand=692&mocktick=1

69.110.15.25 06:31, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

The theoretical high of 11,928 is substantiated by marketwatch.com and is shown on a chart from that site (links below). MarketWatch (including BigCharts, linked above) and Yahoo charts usually show the theoretical highs and lows if each bar represents a period of 1 day or longer. Charts from other financial sites (such as StockCharts) show the actual highs and lows reached during intraday trading regardless of the length of time each bar represents. Of course, for intraday charts (such as the Yahoo chart linked above), only actual data can be shown in a continuous manner, regardless of the source. Both "theoretical" sites show highs of 11,921 on October 6 and 11,924 on October 9 - so any way you slice it, the nominal high of 2000 has been passed. Furthermore, in response to the provocative statement above, the "theoretical" vs. "actual" concept is factual (I will find and post the link), although as with many types of market data, its usefulness as an indicator is a matter of opinion. A link to a Yahoo chart of the Dow since 1928 (in log scale for greater visibility) on the main entry page substantiates all the "theoretical" highs except 11,928, which is substantiated by the MarketWatch link.

On a side note to the above poster, it is not appropriate to interject your commentary within others' posts on the discussion page; simply post your responses below to show the chronological progression of the discussion.

This link, if accessed between midnight and 9 am on any given weekday or any time on the weekend, shows the Dow for the previous day, with the "actual" intraday chart at right and the "theoretical" high and low documented at left (the 52-week high and low are also shown to be "theoretical" if you check them against StockCharts.com): http://www.marketwatch.com/tools/quotes/quotes.asp?symb=INDU&sid=

Any chart of the Dow on Stockcharts.com will show candlesticks with the "actual" highs and lows, clearly distinct from those shown on MarketWatch and the non-intraday charts on Yahoo. This link shows a MarketWatch chart where the highs and lows are "theoretical", not "actual": http://www.marketwatch.com/tools/quotes/intchart.asp?symb=INDU&siteid=mktw&time=4&freq=1&comp=&compidx=aaaaa%7E0&compind=&uf=0&ma=&maval=&lf=1&lf2=&lf3=&type=2&size=1&txtstyle=&style=&submitted=true&intflavor=basic&origurl=%2Ftools%2Fquotes%2Fintchart.asp

65.27.233.132 11:28, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Pre-emptive - I will update the theoretical high after midnight tonight - please do not freak out about the vagueness of "11,920s range" - I put it that way since the exact high of 11,928 is disputed.

129.137.238.161 21:08, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 1000pt Dow High Increments

Interesting to note that the amount of time it took the Dow to go from its first close above 11,000, to its first close above 12,000 - which was about 7 1/2 years - was the longest time it took the Dow to make one of these 1000pt jumps since the Dow made the first 1000pt jump - from 1000 to 2000, which took from 1972-1987 (15 years). Every other jump was completed in a much quicker time-frame - most of them around 1 year. Should this be mentioned in relation to the dot-com bubble bear market? This very slow pace of increase? 155.143.221.252 17:46, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes this is due to the Dot Com Crash. The tech heavy NASDAQ sell from about 9000pt's down to 2000pt's. Although the Dow index is not tech heavy, there was still a sell off as well as limited growth for the next few years. Also the quickest jump was from 13000-14000pt's this took only months! April 25, 2007 to July 17, 2007, only 113 days.

The Nasdaq fell from 5000, not 9000. Still a fall of more than 60% that weighed on the marker. And please sign your posts. Bravosfan567 17:20, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Century of the Dow

The link is dead. If anyone knows what this link should point to, please feel free to fix it. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by CodeCarpenter (talk • contribs) 20:04, 5 January 2007 (UTC).

[edit] "2000 - undetermined" Bear market.

With the Dow now above 10% from the pre-Bear market high, I think we can safely say 2002 was the end of the Dow Bear Market and that also marks the beginning of the current Dow Bull market. (Note that we can not say the same thing for the S&P and especally not the Nasdaq) Jon 16:10, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

2003 or 2004, the bear market was still prevailant. By 2004 and 2005, the market was beginning to recover thanks to China and the housing market. However, since 2006, there's has been a bull market. The showing of the full recovery from that subprime mortgage meltdown in February and the unexpected earnings this quarter shows the economy has been tested through housing bubble brusting. Today's show has me wondering if we're back to this 90s bull market. Spongefan 21:01, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

But isn't the defination of the end of the bear market for a stock index, the lowest such price from the previous peak? Per this article that was in Oct 2002. Jon 23:16, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Answering my own question, I guess not; since otherwise the Great Depression era Bear Market would be recorded as ending in early 1932. Jon 23:20, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

The start of the bull market is controversial and more discussion is needed before its causes can be identified in an encyclopedic fashion. I would say the Dow was very bullish from March 2003 all the way to February 2004, and then pretty bearish for most of 2004. Then, some would argue we were still in a bear because the Dow was down for the 2005 calendar year, yet it seems superficial to call the start of the bull market 2006 just because the old high was passed then. The other bull market start dates in this article (1949, 1982, etc.) seem to be based on when the P/E ratio of the Dow hit its low for the time period. If anyone knows when this happened in the past five years, they should edit the article accordingly. Until then, it should probably be reverted. 129.137.228.196 22:09, 26 April 2007 (UTC)DAP

[edit] About the graph

Linear

Logarithmic

The graph is a nice addition to the page, but I think if someone can find a good one, we should add a logrythmic graph. Most financial data of this kind is shown on logrythmic graphs, and it will give a lot more detail on the period before 1980. Prnd3825 20:53, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Ask and you shall receive. Here's a logarithmic version, you can replace the graph if you want. Up to you. I like the linear one better, but I'm an aesthete, not an economist :P

Lalala666 03:30, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

Just curious about the new graph. Why in the world would it start in 1901 when the DJIA started in 1896? Why the arbitrary dismissal of the first 5 years? I imagine it would be easy to add those first 5 years at the beginning of the graph? (JosephASpadaro 02:56, 8 May 2007 (UTC))

If you can find me data for those years, that would be great. The source I had only had daily (and even monthly) closes from 1901. See the image page for more detail. Lalala666 21:49, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Isn't that type of data readily available somewhere? I just stumbled across this page and am not an expert on the DJIA ... but it would seem to me that that would be data that is very readily available somewhere or another ... am I wrong? (JosephASpadaro 21:47, 15 May 2007 (UTC))

I don't know if it's readily available either, since I haven't really done an exhaustive search. But if you can find the data raw (ie, text), then I'll put in the graph. Thanks! Lalala666 12:16, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Would you be able to update this graph? Current closings are off the chart. (ArqMage 20:09, 30 May 2007 (UTC))

I tried that, but since the graph covers 100 years, a few months' worth of data are negligible. You can't really tell the difference unless you zoom in really far. So I don't think it's worth updating the graph every month when the data is invisible!

Lalala666 17:25, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Milestones

Any reason why the milestone values are NOT formatted with a comma (e.g., 13000) but the actual closing values ARE formatted with a comma (e.g., 13,000)? Is this intentional or oversight? Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 03:01, 8 May 2007 (UTC))

It's intentional - based on the formatting of the source that was used to begin this page. 65.27.236.224 20:06, 10 June 2007 (UTC)DAP

[edit] Italics in chart

Why are some of the numbers and dates in italics? Do these have some special significance? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by ArqMage (talk • contribs) 17:40, 15 May 2007 (UTC).

They seem to be the "milestones" within the milestones: 100 - then 1,000 - then 5,000 - then 10,000 - etc. I suspect the next will be 15,000. Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 21:50, 15 May 2007 (UTC))

[edit] Daily Closing Values

Does any one know: where can I find daily closing values (and change from the preceding close) of the DJIA going back to 1896? In particular, I am interested to know IF -- and WHEN -- the DJIA ever had a daily change of 0.00 points from the preceding day. In other words, were there days in which there was no change at all (0.00 points) between one day and the next? Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 21:55, 15 May 2007 (UTC))

Here are a list of days when the DJIA closed the same the next day, to within a TENTH of a point (my data isn't for a hundredth)...beyond me why you'd want to know this. Obviously this list depends heavily on the margin of error. If I did the math right in Excel, of course. Lalala666 01:48, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

12/21/2005
9/15/2005
12/24/2001
11/3/1998
12/2/1996
8/8/1995
7/21/1995
1/18/1994
3/12/1992
9/5/1991
7/19/1991
12/19/1990
7/17/1990
3/14/1989
6/17/1987
10/7/1986
4/22/1985
6/13/1984
5/5/1982
3/6/1981
7/27/1979
6/19/1979
5/2/1979
2/21/1979
9/11/1978
12/28/1977
8/9/1977
6/17/1977
3/19/1976
12/31/1975
7/10/1975
11/13/1974
1/18/1973
10/30/1972
10/2/1972
6/1/1972
3/29/1971
10/1/1970
4/8/1970
3/25/1969
10/21/1968
7/27/1967
1/24/1967
9/16/1966
11/24/1965
3/31/1965
4/9/1963
10/12/1962
9/19/1962
4/13/1960
11/9/1959
5/4/1959
8/25/1958
7/1/1957
5/24/1957
3/20/1957
1/13/1956
12/30/1954
5/24/1954
11/10/1952
7/16/1952
3/11/1952
3/3/1952
11/8/1951
9/26/1951
8/15/1950
8/3/1950
11/18/1948
8/13/1948
6/4/1945
10/24/1944
5/9/1944
1/25/1944
9/17/1942
5/25/1942
1/15/1942
1/8/1941
8/29/1940
7/3/1940
1/2/1936
12/4/1933
3/2/1933
10/27/1930
9/2/1930
3/3/1930
1/30/1929
12/20/1927
10/24/1927
10/6/1927
11/15/1926
7/17/1924
2/5/1924
9/27/1923
2/8/1923
5/5/1922
4/7/1922
2/11/1921
12/7/1920
7/5/1920
4/11/1919
10/24/1918
6/17/1918
2/5/1918
3/7/1917
8/18/1916
7/12/1916
6/15/1916
3/8/1916
8/6/1915
7/20/1914
5/5/1914
4/7/1914
4/2/1914
3/18/1914
12/18/1913
8/26/1913
6/16/1913
5/23/1913
4/16/1913
12/30/1912
12/10/1912
6/13/1912
1/30/1912
8/3/1911
6/21/1911
4/4/1911
1/31/1911
6/28/1910
4/1/1910
1/31/1910
11/12/1909
11/11/1909
10/25/1909
8/10/1909
4/2/1909
2/9/1909
1/22/1909
11/20/1908
6/26/1908
9/30/1907
5/23/1906
2/19/1906
7/18/1905
6/27/1905
5/9/1904
12/9/1903
6/24/1903
2/17/1903
10/20/1902
8/29/1902
6/13/1902
4/8/1902
10/23/1901

Hi. Thanks for the information. May I ask, where do you get the raw data for the daily opening and closing values? I had assumed that an unchanged DJIA value (i.e., a change of 0.00 points from one day to the next) was a rare occurrence. But you have shown dozens of incidences of this -- although, only four in the last 10 years. (JosephASpadaro 20:34, 28 May 2007 (UTC))

Source: [1] This is only a change of 0.0, and it's rarer recently because a tenth of a point was a bigger deal in the past than it is now -- like if the DJIA is 50, 50.1 is a 2% difference, but if it's 5000, it's a .02% difference, which is harder to nail.

Lalala666 17:43, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the info. I looked at the source data that you provided, and it raised another question for me that perhaps you can answer. I had always assumed that the DJIA opening value for any day was exactly the same number as the DJIA closing value for the day before. Is that assumption wrong? In other words, if the market closes on the afternoon of June 4 at exactly 13,000.00 -- does not the market open on the morning of June 5 at exactly 13,000.00? If not, why not? (What happens to the number in the interim between one day's close and the next day's opening?) If so, how come your source data has different opening and closing values for consecutive days? Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 18:45, 3 June 2007 (UTC))

Also, as a correction to your prior posting: one-tenth of a point when the DJIA is 50 equates to 0.2% and one-tenth of a point when the DJIA is 5,000 equates to 0.002%. But I see your point ... the bigger the DJIA, the smaller the percentage value of any one-tenth of a point ... and the smaller the DJIA, the bigger the percentage value of any one-tenth of a point. (JosephASpadaro 18:51, 3 June 2007 (UTC))

Yeah, good call on the percentage. Gives you a lot of faith that I did the math right on those graphs, huh? Anyway I don't know why opening and closing prices are different, but my guess is that the DJIA only follows the exchanges which close in the afternoon, but Late trading alters the pricing at night. Just a guess. --Lalala666 22:09, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Might check me on this, but I believe the change on 7/17/1990 actually was 0.00 - I read somewhere the market closed at 2,999.75 for two consecutive days before plunging into the Gulf crisis. 65.27.236.224 20:05, 10 June 2007 (UTC)DAP