Rahu-Uranus aspect on March 4 could stir the pot

Stocks slumped last week as the violence in Libya and spike in oil prices added to inflation worries.

The bearish result was more or less in line with expectations given the highly charged alignment involving Mercury Mars, Neptune and Ketu.

In last week’s column I noted how Ketu often created “unexpected situations that force sudden adjustments”.

This shocking development reflected the fallout from the Libya crisis as unwanted and abrupt changes (Ketu) involving violence (Mars) and oil (Neptune) put investors on alert. The geopolitical instability appears to be fulfilling the promise of uncertainty and volatility I had previously noted from the aspect of Rahu and Uranus. For example, in my column of February 7, I suggested how the current Rahu-Uranus square aspect might reflect “sudden moves and shocking turns of events”.

The combination of these two restless energies is a key factor in the ongoing instability in the Middle East.  With the aspect due to be exact on March 4, the period around late February and early March is therefore marked by this disorienting and unstable influence, so the market may have to grapple with significant levels of continuing uncertainty.

Even if the market discounts some measure of uncertainty, it is quite possible that we could see tensions continue in Libya until this aspect passes.  But the stars seem to favour the bears in the near term as the upcoming Jupiter-Saturn aspect of March 29 also has distinctly bearish connotations.

This week may well begin positively as Venus is in aspect with Uranus and Neptune on Monday, just in time for the Budget. The Moon also conjoins Venus during Tuesday’s session so that generally increases the likelihood of a favourable reception to the Budget. This initial post-budget optimism may dissolve by mid-week, however, as Mercury forms a minor aspect with Saturn.

This may well spark declines. The late week period seems mixed at best with more downside possible. Friday’s Moon-Mars conjunction in Aquarius stands out as a potentially negative pattern.

As the chaos in Libya threatened to disrupt world oil supply, crude surged 10% last week closing around $98. I frankly missed this move as I thought the Mars-Neptune-Ketu pattern would be damaging to crude sentiment.
As it happened, however, this aspect proved to be quite positive. It was a reminder perhaps that strong planetary patterns can be big market movers in terms of magnitude, but their direction is sometimes harder to see. 

This week’s Venus aspect with Neptune may well produce more gains although they are unlikely to be as explosive as last week’s.

While we could see prices stay high in the very near term, the Jupiter-Saturn aspect in late March will likely undermine crude sentiment.

Gold was brought back to life by the uprising in Libya.

Again, the aspects unexpectedly inverted their polarity here and what I thought would be a significant downside move ended up as a large gain.
Monday’s Venus-Uranus aspect may well add to bullish sentiment and drive prices higher.

The balance of the week looks less positive, however, so we could see more profit taking as the week progresses.

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