Remember the joke about Russian workers and their Communist bosses? “We pretend we’re working and they pretend they’re paying us.”? Now it’s the American worker’s turn to play make-believe. With July 4^th falling on a Wednesday, this week was over last Friday as far as U.S. productivity is concerned. On Wall Street, the bulls won’t even have to pretend they’re working. Indeed, “seasonality” is so blithely powerful at the moment that rallies will tend to happen almost by themselves, as though willed by some cosmic force as oblivious to reality as the dolts and shills who champion stocks each day on CNBC.  

Take yesterday, for instance. In the 390 minutes from bell to bell, the S&Ps did nearly all of their correcting in about 20 of those minutes; the other 370 were spent with stocks moving either sideways or higher -- much to the torment of those who had bet Friday’s remorseful price action would spill into July. Not a chance. Or at least, statistically speaking, not a very good chance.