Price Changes

I've attached some charts showing that price changes are one of the predictors of a trend change (transition from +ve to -ve or -ve to +ve).  While crude, it's the only 'technical' indicator that has any use.

Here is an interesting chart showing the ROC in the VIX or volatility.  See the obvious breakout in June 2007.

For $SPX, I use ROC or rate of change over 45 weeks with a 22 week moving average. 

I say bear market begins as of Jan 7, 2008.  We now have a negative ROC.

gae

Here is ROC and exponential moving average crossover.  Also a good chart.

Here is the bear transition...

and bull...

It seems the indexes are less 'noisy'.  In May 07, you could've been faked out BUT the mortgage volumes were down year over year and credit was decelerating and the trend change hadn't gone on long enough.

This index has had a number of positive years.  With credit decelerating I would expect a large downside. 

Here price changes are a much better indicator as the moving averages are crossed many times.

But an individual stock in the HGX index shows many transitions.  Clearly the trend change is much harder to predict here. 

Fundamentals such as credit deceleration and length of bull market, 4.5 years,  give clues that the bear has a while yet to play out.

CRB shows almost 5 years of positive changes so I would say it's due for a number of negative ones.