Talk:Grand supercycle

2000's as K Winter
I cannot see how the 2000's can possibly be a K Winter. Kondratiev's own work showed a Winter beginning 1914-20. That would normally have ended around 1945, but most theorists would agree that it lasted until 1949, with a new Spring commencing in that year. Given the shortest time period for the K-Wave of 40 years that would mean a new Spring Phase beginning in 1989, and an Autumn Phase beginning in 1999, with the Winter beginning in 2009. With the longest time period for the wave of 60 years, then the new Spring Phase should have begin in 2009, but that would mean the Winter Phase should have begun in 1994, and now be almost over. Given any time period between the shortest 40 year and longest 60 year span of the cycle it is impossible to arrive at a Winter Phase beginning in 2000 or thereabouts.

In fact, a Spring Phase beginning in 1949 and last around 25 years until the mid 70's does appear to conform with the post war boom period, and the collapse of that boom into the slump of the 1970's, and protracted rcessions of the 1980's and early 90's. Trying to connect this to periods of Stock Market performance is a corruption of Kondratiev's work which was to do with cycles in the real eocnomy not in the fictional economy of Stock Markets.

ArthurBough 13:32, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Elliott Wave section edits
This section read as a diatribe against Elliott Wave. Forecasts by Elliott Wave analysts are consistently referred to without citation. Although one well known Elliottician has called for a major bear market, far from all of them have. Relying on such notoriety as a basis for bashing an idea adds little value.

I am not quite sure how the author comes up with the idea that a "vast majority" do not believe EW to be correct (academics yes, everybody else, is pure speculation).

The discussion of changing wave counts is spurious. Counts related to very long term ideas, such as a Grand Super Cycle, will not change often at all. Shorter-term counts might, as one finds more information clarifying the current market position. I am not sure how that would invalidate Elliott. If an analyst keeps changing his/her counts, then he/she might not be doing a great job, but that is a problem with the analyst, not the Elliott Wave Principle.

Further, pure speculation that the Fed is or is not illegally buying stock futures is a particularly poor way of trying to argue that EW works or not. As the Bank of England learned when it was trying to keep the pound in the old EMS, the markets have more money than a Central Bank does. EW is meant to only work on open and free markets. If people apply it to managed markets, then they might not get very good results. That does not invalidate Elliott.

To be honest, I do not think there is a great need for the Elliott Wave section at all. Definition of grand supercycle from the Elliott Wave perspective belongs in that article. It can be linked from here, but the idea does not really rise to a true separate Wiki. Sposer 20:50, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Pseudoscience and Pseudohistory
These categories have been removed elsewhere, and I honestly do not believe they belong here either. That is an opinion. For reasoning, please see the Elliott Wave page. However, I am not going to start an edit war. To me, very long waves, be they Elliott or Kondratrieff, are much harder to prove or disprove. As part of Elliott, or Kondratrieff, they may very well be, and according to the theories, are absolutely correct, but we will not have enough data for thousands of years, if ever, to prove or disprove them. If other editors have an issue, now is the time to bring it up. I think this is a poor categorization, but will not fight it. Sposer 00:45, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Considering request for deletion
I do not think this page stands on its own. Does Kondratrieff call its long-term wave a grand super cycle? If so, please somebody speak up. Elliott does, but I do not think this article can stand on its own. Rather, if we build up the Elliott article to discuss the longer-term terminology, or some part of it, should be in that article. Finally, I do not see how an encyclopedia article is a place for a discussion of the current trend in the market. Any thoughts here? If nobody comes back in a reasonable period, I will put in an AFD request. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sposer (talk • contribs) 01:21, 16 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Please don't delete it, at least I'm interested in it. Especially considering the crash of '08 and new lows in the Nikkei. (BTW Kondratrieff wave I think is equivalent to an Elliott Super Cycle, Grand Super Cycle is a degree longer) ICouldBeWrong (talk) 16:46, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Kondratiev wave theory does not use the term Grand Supercycle or make any reference to the scale of cycles, nor does it try to predict the timing of the ending of waves. Kondratiev wave theory is mostly used for historical studies. A person who reads modern Kondratiev wavetheory will get a much better understanding of what long economic cycles are about than someone who tries to analyze charts, which provides none. The one predictive part of Kondratiev theory is the logistic function. I recommend reading Cesare Marchetti's work for this. Also see Productivity.Phmoreno (talk) 20:59, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

I recommend keeping Grand Supercycle because a segment of the investment community uses the term, although they make a lot of misleading or incorrect claims about past cycles. Some of these refer to cycles in pre industrial hisory about which we have no economic data, so most of these claims are stated without ever citing the evidence. It is only in recent dacades that economists tried to reconsturct the period before 1900 because there is no data. The whole period beginning with the Industrial Revolution may be considered a Grand Supercycle that is slowing in industrial economies (lots of hard data and analysis available to support this statement) and will go into decline because of resource depletion. Anything factual and well documented supporting this aspect is certainly worth reporting here.Phmoreno (talk) 13:25, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Supportive evidence - X Wave - Misc Comments
I'm interested in contributing to this article. I think the Grand Super Cycle (GSC) is an interesting idea and have been researching it and the larger proposed X and Y waves (lower frequency Elliot Wave fractals). I'm intrigued but skeptical. I hope the theory is wrong, but can not ignore the increasing amount of supportive evidence.

I don't consider the GSC to be scientifically proven. But I do see leading (durable?) Elliot wave analysts ("Ellioticians") such as Robert Pretcher (author of Conquer the Crash) and Tim W. Wood (and "Captain Hook") supporting the idea, (I'll provide supporting references as time permits).

So I consider the GSC to be a hypothesis suggested by Ellioticians. If the predicted severe depression (either deflationary or hyperinflationary or a sequence of both) comes about then I believe that would provide (some) evidence that Elliot Wave Analysis is scientific. Specifically in the sense that it would have been used to make a prediction of an exceptional event, that has proven to come true. Conversely no severe depression would reflect critically on at least the Ellioticians I've mentioned (especially Pretcher who has perhaps been the most vocal and stubborn supporter of the theory).

I mentioned the X and Y waves these are lower frequency Elliot Waves than the GSC. Wavelets 1 to 5 of the X wave are hypothesized to extend from 1,000A.D. to 2,000A.D., Wavelets 1 to 5 of the Y wave are hypothesize to extend from 10,000BC to at least some hundreds of years in the future. Specifically in the ambitious paper 12,000 YEARS OF ELLIOTT WAVES. Apart from Captain Hook (supportive) I don't know the position of other Ellioticians I've mentioned above on the X and Y waves.

Finally I don't claim to have any great qualifications. Apart from being an educated mathematician and professional trader who has profited from the crash of '08 (short S&P500 and short AUDJPY), as can be seen on my Seeking Alpha comments. ICouldBeWrong (talk) 15:01, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Comments on 'Possible Elliott wave position of world stock markets in the 2000s'


 * 'Some Elliott Wave analysts believe that a Grand Super Cycle bear market in US and European stocks started in 2000. Others view the 2000-2002 bear market in US stocks and 2000-2003 bear market in European stocks as being of lesser degree, such as Primary, Cycle or Supercycle.[citation needed]'. I can provide supportive citations for a GSC2000 top. Robert Pretcher of ElliotWave.com wrote a book supporting the GSC started in 2000 (GSC2000) hypothesis called Conquer the Crash. Tim Wood recently (Aug08) released an audio interview with Pretcher where they discuss the GSC2000 hypothesis and both clearly (still) consider it to be a serious possibility if not probability (I'll try to do more work to come up with an exact time offset in the audio file).


 * I don't have any citations of Ellioticians who refute the GSC2000 hypothesis, but I'm very interested in knowing about them. It sure would be be nice if this thing doesn't hit us at all. Although I guess none of the Ellioticians I've mentioned are saying the GSC topped in 2000 for sure, rather they are saying we are close to passing or have since 2000 passed the peak of a speculative mania that has been building up for hundreds of years (as is evidenced by excessive/record amounts of debt and perhaps unsustainable natural resource usage).


 * "The picture in Asia is occluded by the divergence of the Japanese market from other Asian indices; the Nikkei 225 is still far below its late 1980s high, whilst other indices are presently (2006) at all-time highs.". I guess this should be revised, many Asian markets are down over 50% from their highs, and the Nikkei recently (Oct08) just hit a new post 1990 low. Markets may be converging, downwards.


 * "If a Grand Supercycle bear market started in the USA and Europe in 2000, the Elliott Wave forecast would be for several hundred years of turmoil.". I don't believe this is necessarily true. As I understand Elliott Wave analysis it's not so much time that is important but rather severity. For instance consider the possibility 2000-2002 is bear Wave A of GSC2000, 2002-2007 corrective Wave B, and if we say had a severe destructive world war or famine lasting until, say, 2012 then 2008-2012 could be the completion of Wave C, the end of the GSC, and the beginning of a new period of economic prosperity. Please note this is just an example.


 * Please also consider the brevity of the 1929-1932 crash (dow jones hit a low in 1932 and has gone up since), this corrected the supposed super cycle from the 1850's to 1929 in just 3 years. On the other hand the 12000 Years of Elliot Waves authors suggest a 100 year bear market. Basically I suggest replacing "several hundred years of turmoil." with 'a global depression being the most severe depression since the mid 1700's when the Mississippi and South Sea bubbles burst.'.


 * "If there are an infinite number of fractal degrees in the Elliott Wave fractal, then the wave position at above Grand Supercycle degree is unknown, meaning that the forecast bear market in stocks could be at least one degree larger than that of 1929 to 1932.". I think there's room for improvement here. 'Infinite number of fractal degrees' is overly complex, and the 1929-1932 bear was just a Super Cycle top, so GSC2000 already indicates at least one degree worse. So I suggest something like 'If the Elliot Wave is fractal in nature, then the bear market in stocks and general economic decline should be at least one degree larger than that of 1929-1932, but could be two or more degrees larger.'.


 * "As of October 2006, the situation has been clarified: the Dow Jones Industrial Average made a new all-time closing high, which confirms that 2000-2002 was not the beginning of a Grand Supercycle bear market, but a complex correction of the bull market that began in 1982." I'm not convinced this is correct, the '07 market high was only a nominal high, it wasn't an inflation adjusted high using even CPI as a deflator, and it definitely wasn't a high when measuring the dow in ounces of gold ('real money' some say).


 * "Those who believe in the Grand Supercycle expect their bear market to begin once five waves up are complete from the October 2002 lows. Those who do not believe in the Grand Supercycle say that a new bull market is underway and that a Grand Supercycle bear market will never occur, instead forecasting a never-ending series of Supercycles.". I also request citation. Does anyone object to me removing this paragraph? IMO it's simply false. ICouldBeWrong (talk) 16:40, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I honestly don't remember, but I think I questioned those counts in my book, "Applying Elliott Wave Theory Profitably". My main issue is that those "historical counts" are not based on anything that is reasonable (i.e., splicing questionable gold data, to London stocks and then U.S. stocks.Sposer (talk) 21:07, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I've applied the proposed updates now. I've also started to address a misconception that K-Waves are equivalent to Grand Supercycles (GSCs). They clearly are not equivalent as the current GSC started in the 1770s while the K-Waves are meant to be about 40-60 years long. I would like to move the K-Wave material out of this section but rather than delete it propose to start a new Supercycle article that also covers K-Waves and Long Waves which may all refer to similar concepts.


 * I would also like to update this article further to include a chart of the current GSC divided into individual SCs, but can not find a chart in the public domain so may need to create one. Also I would like to include Prechter's Dow will fall below 400 prediction (please excuse my earlier incorrect spelling of his name).


 * Sposer by 'I questioned those counts in my book' I'm not sure if you are referring to the X/Y wave counts or the SC counts since 1776. I did try to find this info in the google books preview of your book but it didn't seem to be covered in the preview provided, and I don't currently have access to the full book. ICouldBeWrong (talk) 10:21, 29 December 2008 (UTC)