Today's mid-day market swoon

Equities were humming higher and then at around 11:30am they fell and the Dow stayed around 100 down for the rest of the day. Reasons for the decline voiced in the constant media flow were many---oil prices down means global economic weakness; concern about the extension of the new home buyer tax credit; Bove downgrades more banks and accuses the government of targeting BofA with abusive tactics; former S.G. Warburg investment head looks for 40% market decline; Faber sees absolute collapse of the dollar; and who knows what else.

All of these shoot from the hip media reasons for the decline may be partially correct but there are two trends that will steadily influence the market in the coming weeks. First, for funds and private investors there is the usual portfolio management before the year end tax books close. Losses are taken and gains are booked based on portfolio allocation decisions. No alert investor waits until December to deal with this and then risk being caught with limited options. Second, the fall into the abyss by stocks until early March and then the rise since then have distorted portfolios and investors are generally examining positions that need to be rebalanced.

Coming out of the weekend here, there were two names that were in focus. One had been a position built in the $40's and more than doubled in the low teens. The second had been established in the high teens and then tripled at an average price of $7. The former had rebounded to the $25 area and the latter to over $12. The result was that both had become positions that were outsized relative to the overall portfolio even though they were still in favor here. With the strong start to the morning 25% of both were sold. There is nothing, absolutely nothing, going on here that is unique.

There will be many reasons mentioned for the ups and downs of the market, markets which will have ups and downs that are normal. As Sonny Boy said, "whole lotta people talkin', mighty few people who know".