What an interesting week in store for us! A week where emotions rule-- irrelevant facts and reason are on the back burner; fear, passion, hope and faith are in the driver’s set. How do we know this? Because you Googled it!
For over a decade of doing research connecting changes in social mood with events in the world and changes in the markets, it’s been found that the “mood” of what we collectively pay attention to on a daily basis shows up in some form a few days later. Likewise, on a weekly basis, the mood reflected in what we are searching for most on the internet, shows up a few weeks later. From this foundation, we can get a glimpse of the ambiance of the week ahead, the types of news stories, and what to expect in the markets, all from what we were looking at most intently a few weeks ago.
To start with, we can get a lot of information just from the top two trends from this week’s source data. They are “Holi Festival” and “St. Patrick’s Day.” The first is a Hindu festival that reflects the conquest of good over evil and the healing power of love. The second is named for a Catholic saint, and is in effect a celebration of Ireland and Irish culture. They both have religious roots and they both originate or are about places outside of the United States. They both reflect a sense of community and celebration. Interesting!
On the face of it, it would seem to be a fairly upbeat week. A week of hope and celebration. Yet it’s not that simple. Perhaps to keep us on our toes, every so often the source mood and the effect we see a few weeks later “flips.” What may have been fear becomes hope; what may have been optimism shows up as anxiety. It just so happens that this coming week is a flip week. Sometime during the week ahead, this “flip” should come about. That is when the emotional roller coaster should really kick in!
To further analyze our mood data for the week, we break the search trends down into themes and then translate that into what we call the four primary mood qualities: Vulnerable, Expansive, Manic, and Controlled. For example, the themes I came up with for these two top search trends are religion, international, activity, love, green, and celebration. The picture below illustrates how that looks as a “MoodCompass” of the four primary mood qualities:
You can see that Expansive and Controlled on the left or “West” side of this picture are much bigger than Vulnerable and Manic on the right or “East” side. This is made even clearer by the inner circle. The blue part shows the total of the two West mood qualities which are associated with emotions or the non-rational. The yellow part shows the total of the two East mood qualities which are associated with facts, data and reason. When comparing the blue part of the inner circle with the yellow part, it’s easy to see that this week is ruled by emotions (e.g. passion, fear, hope and belief), and that reason (e.g. facts, data, objectivity) will not be the primary driver of decisions or behavior.
So, it’s likely to be an intense week, and it’s likely to be full of emotional ups as well as downs. We can look forward to irrationality starring in the news, for events and actions to make less “sense” than usual, and for markets to participate with ambiguity and possibly large swings in either direction as traders try to make sense of an especially irrational moment.
At MarketMood.net, we explore this information further by translating the four mood qualities into expected point changes in the stock market, crude oil, gold, and the U.S. Dollar on a daily basis, and discuss this in our live traders’ room. You’re welcome to come check it out!
For over a decade of doing research connecting changes in social mood with events in the world and changes in the markets, it’s been found that the “mood” of what we collectively pay attention to on a daily basis shows up in some form a few days later. Likewise, on a weekly basis, the mood reflected in what we are searching for most on the internet, shows up a few weeks later. From this foundation, we can get a glimpse of the ambiance of the week ahead, the types of news stories, and what to expect in the markets, all from what we were looking at most intently a few weeks ago.
To start with, we can get a lot of information just from the top two trends from this week’s source data. They are “Holi Festival” and “St. Patrick’s Day.” The first is a Hindu festival that reflects the conquest of good over evil and the healing power of love. The second is named for a Catholic saint, and is in effect a celebration of Ireland and Irish culture. They both have religious roots and they both originate or are about places outside of the United States. They both reflect a sense of community and celebration. Interesting!
On the face of it, it would seem to be a fairly upbeat week. A week of hope and celebration. Yet it’s not that simple. Perhaps to keep us on our toes, every so often the source mood and the effect we see a few weeks later “flips.” What may have been fear becomes hope; what may have been optimism shows up as anxiety. It just so happens that this coming week is a flip week. Sometime during the week ahead, this “flip” should come about. That is when the emotional roller coaster should really kick in!
To further analyze our mood data for the week, we break the search trends down into themes and then translate that into what we call the four primary mood qualities: Vulnerable, Expansive, Manic, and Controlled. For example, the themes I came up with for these two top search trends are religion, international, activity, love, green, and celebration. The picture below illustrates how that looks as a “MoodCompass” of the four primary mood qualities:
You can see that Expansive and Controlled on the left or “West” side of this picture are much bigger than Vulnerable and Manic on the right or “East” side. This is made even clearer by the inner circle. The blue part shows the total of the two West mood qualities which are associated with emotions or the non-rational. The yellow part shows the total of the two East mood qualities which are associated with facts, data and reason. When comparing the blue part of the inner circle with the yellow part, it’s easy to see that this week is ruled by emotions (e.g. passion, fear, hope and belief), and that reason (e.g. facts, data, objectivity) will not be the primary driver of decisions or behavior.
So, it’s likely to be an intense week, and it’s likely to be full of emotional ups as well as downs. We can look forward to irrationality starring in the news, for events and actions to make less “sense” than usual, and for markets to participate with ambiguity and possibly large swings in either direction as traders try to make sense of an especially irrational moment.
At MarketMood.net, we explore this information further by translating the four mood qualities into expected point changes in the stock market, crude oil, gold, and the U.S. Dollar on a daily basis, and discuss this in our live traders’ room. You’re welcome to come check it out!
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