Joe Granville Predicts Another Earthquake: "Dow Jones INDU to 8000"

Earlier this morning I was told that our most popular post on Monday was "Long-time bear joins bulls: Controversial Joe Granville says Dow could rise 800 points"* from August 2008.

Joe was wrong on that one.

Here's his latest via BusinessWeek, Jan. 23, 2012:
Granville Says Dow Industrial May Drop Toward 8,000 in 2012

Joseph Granville, whose “sell everything” call in 1981 sparked a decline in U.S. stocks, said the Dow Jones Industrial Average will drop toward 8,000 this year because of waning momentum and volume.

“Volume precedes prices,” Granville, 88, a technical analyst who has been publishing the Granville Market Letter from Kansas City, Missouri for about 50 years, said in an interview on “Street Smart” on Bloomberg Television. “You are seeing much lower volume. That tells you that prices are going to go much lower, much lower than most people think possible and very few people have projected.”

The Dow average has gained 4 percent this year to 12,708.82 at 4 p.m. in New York. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index has climbed 4.6 percent this month, its best start to a year since 1997, as economic data on housing, manufacturing, and employment bolstered confidence in the world’s largest economy.

Trading in U.S. stocks fell to the lowest level since at least 2008 amid mutual fund withdrawals and Wall Street job cuts. An average of 6.69 billion shares changed hands on U.S. exchanges in the 50 days ended Jan. 18, the fewest on record in Bloomberg data starting three years ago that excludes over-the- counter venues. On the New York Stock Exchange, volume has tumbled to the lowest level since 1999, the data show.

Granville told newsletter readers to “Sell Everything” on Jan. 6, 1981. The Dow fell 2.4 percent the next day. He correctly forecast the bear market of 1977-78 and the burst of the Internet bubble that began in 2000. In March 2008, Granville said the Dow would end the year near 9,000, more than 27 percent below its level of 12,392.66 at the time. The gauge finished the year at 8,776.39....MORE

*That post begins:

I didn't realize he was still alive. There was a time when he moved markets, then he started predicting earthquakes. Then he called the crash of 2000 within 24 hours of it's March 10 Nasdaq peak of 5048. After the MW piece are a story, a stub and a bit of history....

It goes on to give you more detail on Granville than you likely care to know.

After that very, very early bullish call the market bottomed in March '09. Six months later Joe came back with: 

Joe Granville Predicts Two Year Long Bull Market - Mike Swanson (09/07/09)

which worked out pretty well.