As the Occupy Wall Street protests gather momentum around the world, we are poised for yet another round of bank bailouts as the Eurozone took additional steps to contain their crisis last week. This latest round of bank bailouts are likely to further increase resentment towards the financial elite as the average person has seen very little benefit from the many billions of taxpayer Dollars and Euros deployed to solve this problem. Despite the protests, the EU made all the right noises to convince investors that the problem was fixable as stocks extended their rebound for the second straight week. In New York, the Dow climbed 5% closing at 11,644 while the S&P500 finished the week near a key resistance level at 1224. It was much the same story in Mumbai as the Sensex jumped 800 points closing at 17,082 with the Nifty ending the week at 5132.
All this new-found optimism is more evidence that Jupiter is in control of sentiment at the moment as the recessionary gloom of Saturn in now in full retreat. I thought we might have seen more downside from Tuesday's Full Moon and Sun-Saturn conjunction on Thursday. While both of these days did buck the bullish trend with either flat or negative closes, the pullback was quite modest and was easily offset by the positive aspects in play. Monday's surge coincided nicely with Mercury's ingress into sidereal Libra. While the extent of these gains were a little unexpected, they were not that surprising either as I had noted that October was likely to have a bullish bias due to the Jupiter-Pluto aspect which is exact on October 28.
The re-emergence of Jupiter this month fits well with the promise of more bailouts to bankrupt countries and bankrupt banks. While Jupiter is traditionally seen as the planet of optimism and wisdom, its aspect with Pluto this month modifies this somewhat. Since Pluto represents power and large organizations, its association with Jupiter reflects this coordinated program to solve the current crisis through borrowing and inflating a stagnant economy. Just how effective this initiative will be is hard to say. Saturn is due to strengthen in the coming weeks and this is likely to shine a more unforgiving light onto the latest attempts to solve the debt crisis. Saturn's entry into sidereal Libra in November will likely tilt collective sentiment back towards recession, austerity and pessimism. This time around, however, Saturn's prominence will be paralleled with Jupiter as it forms tight aspects with Uranus and Neptune over the next three months. This could set up a make or break scenario where Saturn's presence in the larger planetary alignment could completely scuttle all rescue plans or it could deliver the necessary dose of realism which provides for a lasting solution.
This week begins with Monday's Mercury-Jupiter aspect. Jupiter has been a reliable source of optimism lately so there is little reason to expect this outcome to be any different. The Sun enters sidereal Libra on Tuesday. While the Sun is debilitated in Libra, this blemish may well be offset by the aspect it will receive from Jupiter. Between those two measurements, we could well see further gains early in the week. Once the Mercury-Jupiter aspect begins to separate, however, some sober second thoughts are likely to creep into the equation by midweek. Generally, the second half of the week may be somewhat shakier than the first half. Of course, the Jupiter-Pluto aspect is still gathering strength here so that may serve to mitigate the size of declines.
