John Bollinger Q&A: And the Bands played on

By Mark Etzkorn
Active Trader last interviewed analyst, trading advisor, and author John Bollinger in the April 2003 issue, an article that consisted of a conversation conducted in January 2003.

In that interview, Bollinger remarked:

“I think it’s important to understand that all stock markets — not only ours — go through cycles of expansion and consolidation. And these are fairly long-term cycles we’re talking about.

In our market the cycle is typically 16 years. The expansion after World War II, which started in 1950 and continued into 1966, was followed by a consolidation phase that ran from 1966 to 1982. Then there was another big expansion phase from 1982 to summer 1998, which is when the broad market topped out. So, we’re now (in 2003) four and half years into a consolidation phase…[T]he important thing to understand right now is that we’re not in a buy-and-hold environment, we’re in a trader’s environment.”

Bollinger continues that discussion just a little more than a half-decade later, in March 2008 — almost exactly 25 years since he introduced his eponymous indicator to the trading world.



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