What's Next for This Bull Market Will Give Main Street Investors a Rude Awakening

Shah Gilani

So far today U.S. stocks aren't celebrating the 5-year anniversary of the bull market, which technically speaking began on March 9, 2009.

Will they rally by the end of the day, in a formal salute to moving onwards and upwards?

If not today, then how about tomorrow, or the next day, or the next day?

Chances are better than good that stocks will go a lot higher.

But without a 10% correction since 2011, stocks are increasingly vulnerable at this juncture. The truth is there's an intense Wall Street battle about to be waged between bulls and bears.

And if you don't see this big picture, you could be in for a rude awakening. Here's why.

First, I believe we're nearing the end of the first stage of what I'm calling (on the record, under the media spotlight) a generational bull market.

Eventually, global markets will all heal (but don't expect them to heal at the same time), global growth will "pop," and stock markets around the world will double in 5 to 10 years.

That's the case for a global generational bull market. It's about the human race running headlong into a bigger, brighter, better future, one that we're constantly re-making.

Too bad we're not there yet. In fact, we're far from there. Where we are now is scary.

The big bad bull run we're celebrating took off from catastrophic lows caused by a credit crisis spawned by artificially low interest rates, massive yield chasing, leverage to achieve higher returns, and financial engineering run amok.

The bounce itself was engineered by global stimulus and by artificially flattened interest rates and massive bond buying to the Nth degree by the Federal Reserve of the United States.

And that is the problem.

Global growth isn't healthy, it certainly isn't strong, and whether it's growing much at all is suspect at best.

So, the question investors are asking themselves on this anniversary is: What's next?

Shah Gilani

About the Author

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Shah Gilani boasts a financial pedigree unlike any other. He ran his first hedge fund in 1982 from his seat on the floor of the Chicago Board of Options Exchange. When options on the Standard & Poor's 100 began trading on March 11, 1983, Shah worked in "the pit" as a market maker.

The work he did laid the foundation for what would later become the VIX - to this day one of the most widely used indicators worldwide. After leaving Chicago to run the futures and options division of the British banking giant Lloyd's TSB, Shah moved up to Roosevelt & Cross Inc., an old-line New York boutique firm. There he originated and ran a packaged fixed-income trading desk, and established that company's "listed" and OTC trading desks.

Shah founded a second hedge fund in 1999, which he ran until 2003.

Shah's vast network of contacts includes the biggest players on Wall Street and in international finance. These contacts give him the real story - when others only get what the investment banks want them to see.

Today, as editor of Hyperdrive Portfolio, Shah presents his legion of subscribers with massive profit opportunities that result from paradigm shifts in the way we work, play, and live.

Shah is a frequent guest on CNBC, Forbes, and MarketWatch, and you can catch him every week on Fox Business's Varney & Co.

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