Well, it's happened: The global financial world has moved one step closer to witnessing the creation of the largest stock exchange on the planet: A near $10-billion merger between the New York Stock Exchange and Deutsche Boerse AG.
On Thursday, July 7, news broke that 96% of voting NYSE shareholders said "Yay" to a union with the German entity.
So, there's no time like the present to start learning a few key German phrases to welcome Wall Street's would-be financial in-laws. The four expressions below make for a fitting introduction:
Wunderbar: "Wonderful," "super," "out of this world."
According to the mainstream experts, the creation of the behemoth German/American bourse is an UBER-bullish event, reflective of the global economic recovery. Here, the following news items capture the overall optimism surrounding the merger:
- New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg: "This is one of the better things for New York because what you'll do is you'll have the two strongest stock exchanges together...This is really very good." (NY Post)
- AND -- "It seems as if the market has a very strong bid under stock prices. [Mergers & Acquisitions] is a market that people are trying to get back involved with." (Bloomberg)
Doppelganger: "A double, or look-alike."
The mega-deal zeal surrounding the potential Deutsche/NYSE merger is a spitting image of another time in recent financial history: the year 2007. Back then, M&A activity had soared to an all-time record high, valuing over $1.33 trillion. And, much like today, the main focus of consolidation was on global unification. "Merger Mania Is Back With A Vengeance," wrote a March 30, 2007, Independent cover story, as everyone -- from airlines to metal mines, and banks to bourses -- aimed to bring east and west together.
The culminating event came in April 2007, with the $14-billion merger of the NYSE and Euronext to create the first trans-Atlantic financial market AND largest stock exchange in the world.
Blitzkrieg: "Lightning-like destruction" and "obliteration."
Three months after the finalization of the NYSE/Euronext union -- in July 2007 -- the U.S. stock market peaked to usher in its most devastating decline since the Great Depression, alongside the credit market bust, housing collapse, and shattering, across-the-scale global market meltdown.
Gestalt: "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts."
While the mainstream pundits view the February 15, 2011, Deutsch/NYSE bid in the context of the current global economic rebound, Elliott Wave International's analysts take into account the entire picture of past, present, and future. EWI has long since identified a historical pattern in the global "urge to merge," and first touched on the matter over a decade ago in the February 2000 Elliott Wave Financial Forecast.
That February 2000 issue went live two weeks after the January 14, 2000, union of AOL and Time Warner -- a $3-billion deal hailed world over as "The Merger of the Century." Our analysts offered this contrary point of view:
"One of the main ways companies express optimism is by taking over other companies. Such activity is indicative not of minor bull market tops, but of ones that preceded prolonged and devastating bear markets... There are so many reasons to suspect that the union of AOL and Time Warner will mark the end of the M&A boom... and market top."
The day of the deal -- January 14, 2000 -- also marked the day of the DJIA's all-time peak that remained in force for six years.
The same bearish chords were struck again in the months prior to the April 2007 NYSE/Euronext union. There, the December 2006 Elliott Wave Financial Forecast issued this alert:
"Once again, the near-panic to 'do deals' signals a massive reversal for mergers, and the market itself."
From observing market behavior for over 30 years, we at EWI know that "memory loss is the number one cause of stock market loss. That's why we write this stuff down and compare what's happening to what was going on at" prior tops and bottoms.