Sun-Jupiter-Uranus aspect in latter part will be salutary

Stocks slumped last week as the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) hiked rates again and investors weighed the possibility of a Greek default.

The Sensex declined more than 2% closing at 17,870 while the Nifty finished the week near technical support levels at 5366.

This bearish outcome was in keeping with expectations as Thursday’s lunar eclipse corresponded fairly closely with the sell-off in the second half of the week. The influence of the eclipse appeared to overshadow other short term aspects, however, as Friday’s Mercury-Jupiter aspect did not produce any significant rebound.

The ongoing weakness is very much in keeping with the dominant influence of Saturn in the sky at the moment.

The latest RBI rate hikes and its hawkish tone for 2012 are very much an expression of Saturnian energy as the emphasis is on constraining and limiting unhealthy inflationary growth.

Where optimistic Jupiter symbolises expansion and inflation, Saturn’s pessimism seeks to counterbalance and rein in growth. 

While this can produce a necessary regression back to the mean, Saturn can sometimes become too strong and overshoot on the downside.  That is what happened in 2008 when we saw an unusually high number of simultaneous Saturn aspects.

If economist John Maynard Keynes had studied astrology, he perhaps would have recognised that the market was driven by the eternal celestial dance of Jupiter and Saturn as much as the “animal spirits” of the bull and the bear.

With last Monday’s direct station, Saturn has now culminated its retrograde cycle and will gradually gain more forward velocity.  Since planetary strength is partially correlated with velocity, we can suggest that Saturn’s strength will gradually begin to diminish.  As Saturn loses strength, sentiment may show signs of improvement as pessimism over European debt, slow growth and recession begins to recede.

This may occur more as a gradual shift in medium-term energy so it is somewhat unclear exactly it will take hold.

This week will be an important test of Saturn’s strength as it forms a difficult aspect with Mercury in the first half of the week.

Generally, this is a bearish influence although if Saturn is losing power here then the market could quickly shrug it off and move higher. However, a cautious mood is perhaps more likely to prevail as Mars is in square aspect with Neptune on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The late week period offers a reasonable chance for gains as the Sun moves into aspect with Jupiter and Uranus.

Crude oil was hit hard by the lunar eclipse last week as prices plunged to $93. As expected, the oil market suffered the double whammy of the eclipse and the Saturn direct station. Crude looks vulnerable to more declines this week as Tuesday’s Mercury-Saturn aspect may conspire with the bearish Mars-Neptune square. The late week seems to offer some hope for a rebound.
Ongoing currency uncertainty in Europe allowed gold to avoid the worst of the sell-off last week as it closed mostly unchanged near $1,530.

As expected, the early week Sun-Ketu aspect and subsequent lunar eclipse did correspond with a decline but prices rallied back later on.

The early week Mercury-Saturn aspect may generate some selling but gold should enjoy some kind of rebound by Friday’s Sun-Jupiter aspect.

— The writer is a neo-Vedic astrologer specialising in predictive astrology
He runs the website
www.modernvedic
astrology.com