Jim Cramer spent August explaining why beaten-down stocks recovered. Called them comeback kids. Stocks went up because they had previously gone down. This counts as analysis on cable television.
The bearish narratives apparently died. Nobody knows when or how. They just stopped working. Cramer reviewed what drove the biggest winners. Spoiler: the biggest winners were driven by buying. More people bought than sold. Revolutionary stuff.
August was the month of the comeback kids. July was presumably the month of the go-away kids. September will be the month of the please-come-back kids. October gets the therapy kids. November gets the kids who discovered options and now live in a 1997 Camry.
Retail traders watched this segment and learned that stocks battered by bearish narratives can recover if the bearish narratives stop being bearish. They will apply this lesson by buying stocks battered by bearish narratives in September. The narratives will remain bearish. The stocks will remain battered.
Cramer believes in stories. The market believes in nothing. Stocks that went down went back up because that is what volatile securities do when short-term participants change their minds. No narrative required. No comeback story. Just math wearing a CNBC chyron.
The biggest winners in August will be the biggest losers in September or they will keep winning forever. Both outcomes will generate segments. Both segments will feature Cramer explaining what drove the movement. Both explanations will be different stories describing the same random f*cking noise.
Those comeback kids? They are not your kids. They do not know you exist. They will leave you holding the bag the second you believe in their comeback.
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