Investors reverted to their worrisome ways yesterday, taking stocks for a rollercoaster ride after seemingly contradictory statements about the Fed's intentions were made, respectively, by Alan Greenspan and Jack Guynn, a member of the Open Market Committee. I won't try to deconstruct either guy's words here, since that might run afoul of the Fed's modus operandi of sowing confusion whenever the second-guessers grow too brazen. No more rate hikes after June? That's what the buzz has been predicting for the last few weeks. But the Fed chairman evidently has other ideas, and it's even possible that he used Guynn as a straw man to help make the central bank's intentions perfectly unclear. Given yesterday's gyrations in the stock market, it would appear that he succeeded. But Guynn had the final word -- 'My view is that we've still not reached a neutral policy stance' ' and that's probably why shares finished the day on the downswing. Speaking of sowing confusion, a poison-penned lurker from Saskatchewan, Dennis P., sent me an unprintable message execrating me for my bullish/bearish two-step over the last couple of days. On Monday I reiterated a forecast for a tediously bullish summer; then, yesterday I warned against a possible swoon over the near term. I see no contradiction whatsoever between these two predictions, only the disquieting implication that summer could produce no more than fleeting satisfaction for bulls and bears both ' but no epiphanies for either. It's hardly inconceivable that stocks could dive soon but still recover and then some by summer's end. In fact, that's what I expect, based on the stochastic evidence presented here over the last two days. We can always change our minds if a modest rally over the next few days alters the menacing trajectory of this indicator, but as I
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