Weekly column: The ompact of Mars-Uranus-Algol conjunction on markets and politics

Review

The Commerce Department said Friday its personal consumption expenditures inflation gauge rose 2.5% in June compared to a year earlier, slowing from its 2.6% pace in May….On the CME‘s FedWatch tool, which uses fed funds data to estimate the pricing of rate moves, odds of rates remaining unchanged next week are 93%, while odds of a 25-basis point cut in September are 90%. Meanwhile, some pundits have called for a cut already next week, in order to avoid an undesired overcooling of the economy.

—Paulo Trevisani, “U.S. Inflation Data Keeps Door Open for September Interest Rate Cut,” Wall Street Journal, July 26, 2024.

 Greetings from Amsterdam, where I arrived last night for the first stage of my two-month European tour that will culminate with the MMA Investment Retreat, September 19-22 in beautiful Lake Bled, Slovenia (see link to this event and pictures in Announcements).

It was a stunning week in politics and financial markets as we navigate between the Mars-Uranus-Algol conjunction of July 12-15 and the dual T-squares surrounding August 19, when Mars/Jupiter will be squared by Venus in opposition to Saturn. During the same week, the Full Moon will square Uranus.

The August 19 geocosmic period indicates a very chaotic time, and it just happens to coincide with the Democratic convention. The chaos of the convention may have been reduced considerably this week with the anointment of Kamala Harris as the likely candidate following President Joe Biden’s decision to finally step down. This possibility was discussed in this column three weeks ago. Still, I will elaborate more on it in this week’s Short-Term Geocosmics section, since her probable nomination has created a major buzz (sense of excitement) throughout the world. The election forecast is much closer now with Democrats re-energized. Republicans are also re-energized following the near assassination of their leader, Donald Trump. The only ones not tremendously re-energized are the independents. They are still the majority. They will break this election one way or another. They still do not have what they perceive as a moderate candidate representing a moderate platform.

But back to the markets. Following their highs or secondary highs of the week surrounding the Mars-Uranus-Algol conjunction of July 12-15 +/- 1 week, many global stock indices continued their hard decline into mid-week before starting powerful rallies to end the week. In Japan, for instance, the Nikkei index had plunged 11.35% from its all-time high of 41,426 on July 12 to a low of 37,611 on Friday. The tech-heavy NASDAQ had declined 10% between its all-time high of July 11 and the low of July 26. Our target has been a 15–26% decline from a 4-year cycle crest now due to a 4-year cycle trough due from August to November. So, we captured a good chunk of that on this first dive. And now begins the secondary rally as we approach Mercury turning retrograde a week from Monday on August 5. Will there be a second leg down, and if so, how much from this rally?

Gold, and especially Silver, took a deep dive last week. Gold peaked at 2488.40 on July 17, close enough to our July 12-15 CRD (geocosmic critical reversal date). By Thursday, July 26, it had touched 2351.90. Silver’s break was more painful, falling from a secondary high of 32.01 on July 11 to a low of 27.55 on July 26, a loss of nearly 14% in one week. However, Bitcoin continued to support our bullish call given recently, as it tested our 59,000-62,000 support zone on its pullback to 63,395 on Thursday, then rallied as high as 68,166 the next day. Crude Oil continued to struggle, falling to the 76.00 area on Thursday, July 26. It is still in a time band for a major cycle low, but far off the 85.00 mark it needs to exceed in order to change its pattern to bullish.

 Short-term geocosmics

 I had long thought Kamala Harris couldn’t beat Donald Trump. That’s wrong. She can. But beyond that, something’s happening. Ms. Harris has not, in five years on the national stage, shown competence. She is showing it now, and that is big news. Her rollout this week demonstrated talent and hinted she may be a real political athlete. She was striking and strong in this week’s speeches in Milwaukee and Houston. She knows how to act a speech. When she is “scripted” she is good.

—Peggy Noonan, “The Kamala Harris Surprise,” Wall Street Journal, July 25, 2024.

Taken to their logical end points, the ideas that I encountered first at the POC conference, and then Columbia University, paved the way to a political and social hellscape where skin color, a meaningless trait, is given supreme importance. They have infected all of our key institutions: government education, and media.

—Coleman Hughes, “The End of Race Politics: Arguments for a Colorblind America,” Penguin Random House, 2024.

 President Biden finally did the nation and his party a favor by withdrawing his candidacy for the 2024 presidential election race. As mentioned over the past several weeks following the disastrous debate of June 27, it was only going to get harder and harder for his party, family, and the nation to stay on after it became evident he was no longer physically or even cognitively capable of carrying his party to victory in November. The tragedy is how hard the party and mainstream media tried to cover for him when it was his decline was so apparent to everyone who had watched him over the past several months. But now the Democrats have a younger, more vibrant, and articulate candidate in Vice President Kamala Harris to offer voters, and the race immediately becomes more competitive.

Although this is a more financially-based column, it is important to pay attention to politics, especially this year, as the two parties have starkly different economic agendas that will affect financial markets in separate ways. For instance, history shows that a Republican president is likely to oversee both a record high in the U.S. stock market and a stock market crash exceeding 38%. A Democrat in the White House can also oversee record stock market levels, though not as consistently as a Republican White House does. However, Democrats do not tend to be in office when the stock market declines more than 26%. Correlations are also present in the U.S. Dollar, which tends to rise when Democrats are in control and fall when a Republican holds the highest office. It is also a running joke introduced in this column long ago (and now often used by MSM) that Democrats want to control our boardrooms and Republicans our bedrooms.

However, one thing presidents of both parties have struggled with through the years is racial tensions. Although much progress has been made in race relations, there is still the unsettling belief that racism, and now neo-racism, underlies great division in the nation. So, one wonders: what effect will a female Black (and Asian) candidate have on this issue in the U.S.? Will racial tensions increase? Or will they recede, even be eliminated, as the nation slowly continues its progress towards a colorblind America, and even a world where character and humanity matter, and not the meaningless color of one’s skin, as Martin Luther King once dreamed and inspired a whole generation to dream?

Kamala Harris is no stranger to astrologers and astrology. Her birth time has long been known, which suggests that she or her family may have consulted an astrologer long ago. She has a remarkable planetary pattern in her natal chart as described in the Forecast 2020-2021 books, which pointed out that she could one day run for – or even become – president of the U.S. Born October 20, 1964, 9:28 PM in Oakland California, she has her natal Sun in Libra, opposite Moon in Aries (full Moon), and both in harmonious aspect to her Gemini rising, with the Moon’s North Node also rising. In fact, her Ascendant/Node conjunction is very close to Donald Trump’s natal Sun/Uranus conjunction, which is also opposite his natal Moon. Both Trump and Harris were born under Full Moons, and both his Sun/Moon and her Ascendant/Lunar North Node will be highlighted by transiting Jupiter (good fortune) near Election Day. It’s likely to be very close, and perhaps both will receive a record number of votes.

I will address these candidates more in this column as we go forward. But for now, I would suggest that astrologers focus on the debate of September 10. It is my opinion that this debate may tilt the election in favor of one of the candidates. There will be a mutable T-square then between the Sun, Moon, and Jupiter, activating Trump’s natal Sun/Uranus opposite Moon, and Harris’ Ascendant/North Node degrees. Transiting Uranus is also conjunct Harris’ Jupiter and squares her Mars/Uranus opposition, while at the same time conjunct Trump’s Midheaven. Both will be lit. There are going to be more unexpected surprises (this is the promise of a prominent Uranus). Someone (or both) is likely to go “over the top” with exaggeration. It could be just as consequential as the June 27 debate, which ended President Biden’s bid for a second term. At the same time, it led to the opening for Kamala Harris and the real start to the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election.

The good thing is that the nation is alive and interested again. Let the good times roll!