Musclemen have a phrase for when they are very lean and in competition shape. It's called "ripped".
Body fat has been sucked out from between every sinew, quadriceps bristle with striation and abdominals pop like billiard balls. Skin looks like it's been shrink-wrapped to the muscle. It is a temporary peak of perfect condition.
Not even the fantastic lasts forever, though, and the crest of incredible vascularity, like the trough of equities market doom, is a point in time on a flux continuum.
These situations are too far out of whack with nature and their long-term equilibriums to be sustainable. Retracement is just around the corner. The bodybuilder, having dieted for six months for a show date, finds after only three days of cheesecakes he is back to square one.
The United States benchmark index, the S&P; 500, having been on what can only be described in technical terms as a mega-downer for the last four months, last week regained 50 per cent of those losses in five days. A quick bailout-binge, a shot of sugar into the Euro-banking bloodstream and a brief arm-wrestle with the major creditors in Brussels, and we're racing back up to normality.
The deal has to stick, of course, but make no mistake - many major index companies have been brutally starved of investor attention this year. Fundamentals count for nothing at the bottom of a market, as investors run around dry-mouthed looking for any drink of water they can find. History and the numbers show normal lies upwards from here.
Timing's always a good idea too, not much point watching and flopping about until the market has already gone up 25 per cent. Statistics show that in over 60 years of investing in the United States - October 28 has been the best day to buy stocks, with a holding period until the May 5 the year after. This phenomenon is not a spooky coincidence; it occurs because of the annual clustering of positives in the American market. Tax-selling, anticipation of annual reports, analysts reviewing their expectations and US holidays contribute.
Why do I keep on about the American market? If you read between the lines, America is not actually on its knees and begging for mercy from China and Europe. The United States has been shredded in recent times with debt bubbles, stock crashes, plummeting real estate markets and a dollar that looked to be in a death spiral. Don't be fooled.
America is the number one producer globally of natural gas and will be energy self-sufficient in about five years. It meets 72 per cent of its own oil needs. The hollowing out of the manufacturing base and the outsourcing to China is in reverse.
The economic weekly data is turning around. Company earnings are strengthening and the weak dollar gives an export advantage. Incredibly, a return to surplus is possible within five to seven years. The long winter of recession has made the nation a financial lean, mean, fighting machine in the shape of her life for what lies ahead.
Caroline Ritchie is an authorised financial adviser with Forsyth Barr in Napier. She can be contacted at caroline.ritchie@forsythbarr.co.nz or on 0800 367 227. This column is general in nature and should not be regarded as personalised investment advice. Disclosure statements are available on request and free of charge.