Wow - what a Month so far...DOW=8,579.19

So it's been quite an eventful month so far:

October 1st - The DOW went down -19.59 points or - 0.18%. The Senate votes 74 to 25 for the 2nd try at the infamous 700 billion dollar "bailout".

October 2nd - The DOW went down -348.22 points or -3.22%. The Bailout is sweetened to $850 Billion in order to get more members of the House to vote for the bill.

October 3rd - The DOW went down -157.47 points or -1.50%. The House Approves the now, $850 Billion dollar, bailout.

October 6th - (Monday) The DOW went down -369.88 points or -3.58%. World markets around the world begin to fall before the US markets open. Japan's NIKKEI falls 4.25% , The London FTSE market falls 6%, Austria's Vienna stock exchange falls 8.4%, and Russia's RTS stock exchange start dropping 7% in the first 20 minutes and the Russian markets were frozen entirely after their markets dropped 10%. Needless to say the US followed suit - The DOW closes below 10,000 for the first time since 2004.

October 7th - (Tuesday) The DOW went down -508.39 points or -5.11%. The DOW goes to it's lowest point in nearly 5 years.

October 8th - (Yesterday) The DOW went down -189.01 points or -2.00%. "BIg BEN" Bernanke as he's called announces a 1/2 point rate cut - the DOW and the other indicators continue treading downward.

October 9th - (Today) The DOW went down -675.97 points or -7.30%. And then, there's today...the ban on short selling -which had been enacted temporarily in light of short-selling's affects on company's like Lehman brothers and AIG - was lifted and Morgan Stanley's stock headed south -26% and many financial stocks followed suit.

Did I mention my 401k has lost a good 5-6% too? Yesterday I called up my 401k provider and politely asked them to cut my losses and invest mostly in 'safer' things. Lord knows what tomorrow will bring - good thing I'm not planning on retiring anytime soon nor do I plan to rely solely on my 401k to do it.

Article/News bit of the week: Panic on Wall street

I found this article yesterday on CNNMoney.com. The aritcle is entitled - Panic on Wall Street: A brief history of fear.

It talks in detail about prior stock market messes & panics.

One interesting excerpt of this article is:

"Before it became known as the Great Crash, it was, for a few days, the Panic of 1929. Weeks of volatility accelerated into a free fall on Black Thursday. Once again a rescue effort was organized by private bankers at the corner, who made conspicuous buys of blue-chip stocks, but its effects were short lived."

Hopefully, America is only headed towards a short recession and not a prolonged depression. Although, the more I read the more Likely a depression seems possible.

I personally nominate Warren Buffett & Alan Greenspan as Federal Reserve Co-Chairmen. Not that Bernanke doesn't know what he's doing but, I think Buffett & Greenspan can definitely keep the markets from getting 'nervous'.