Market bottoms are typically marked by despair. It's a painful process - sort of like waiting for Godot, except despair will eventually show up.

Currently, there are some signs of despair in the Venture. The index is down 40% since March, and many of the individual stocks are down 70% or more. Unfortunately, US markets are nowhere near that. Before we have any reasonable hope that a bottom is imminent, one of two things have to happen. Either we get a true panic capitulation in US markets, or the Venture stops going down in the face of a declining US market.

But it is October, so at some point this month, one of those two events is likely. In the meantime, it is still best to sell strength (what little there is). When an intermediate low is made and markets start to rally, I'll be buying the stocks that went down the most - they tend to do best during the first leg up.