6 responses to “Are stocks bouncing back?”

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  Jess March 30th, 2009 at 11:29

  Yeah I dunno. I’m not sure there is enough data in to get conclusions from, but the analysis is good. By the way, the DJIA is currently down 270 points on the day.

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  nrapp March 30th, 2009 at 11:33

  I know. Sent this graphic to newspaper on Friday. Last week, the future seemed brighter I guess…

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  Ethan Stock March 30th, 2009 at 20:13

  This visual seems extremely bull biased. The non-inflation-adjusted stock index at the top reduces previous savage bear markets to tiny blue wiggles, and emphasizes the fallacy that we are currently at meaningful historic highs despite the recent collapse. In the lower half, the use of linear months on the left and log years on the right minimizes the historical and therefore expected time to recovery, and the visual placement of the current decline “V” decisively calls a bottom, though your plausible deniability is delicately maintained with the caption.

  Since you’re a pro at visual design, I assume you made all these choices deliberately. Do you consider yourself bull biased? Do you not consider these representations slanted? Do your media clients prefer a certain POV in your graphics? I am genuinely interested in understanding how and why this graphic got constructed in this way.

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  nrapp March 30th, 2009 at 21:32

  Ethan,
  Thanks for your note, this are all good points which highlight the choices and sacrifices one has to take to create a graphic that would be clear and meaningful in a reduced space.
  We could have use a logarithmic scale for the index at the top, but people are usually more destabilized by such display. The choice of using a double scale with different scales at the bottom is drove only by an attempt to make this chart readable, since all these fall lines would have been too close and impossible to read if we used a yearly scale. The caption on the left highlight that the fall seem to be on the short side compared to other falls, meaning that we may not be at the bottom yet.
  I want to assure you all these choices were taken to insure the ease of reading. The AP is a non-profit organization, and the only goal of our graphics is to inform. The members of the cooperative do not have any input in the editorial decisions. Those members are general news outlets, and our primary goal is not to drive economic decisions of our readers, but to give them more of an historical perspective. This chart shows that only the 1929 meltdown drove the index to such a loss, which doesn’t underestimate the gravity of the situation.
  Thanks again for your input, I’ll make sure to keep it in mind for future graphics, maybe by highlighting in a more obvious way the difference in scale for the bottom chart.
  Keep checking new graphics on this blog, and let me know of additional comments, those are always welcome.
  Nick

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  Ethan Stock March 31st, 2009 at 02:46

  Nick,
  Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I appreciate that putting so much information into a small space is a tough task with many design decisions that require tradeoffs. One further question based on your reply - what do you mean by, “people are usually more destabilized by such display”? That they misunderstand it? Or that it makes them unhappy?

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  nrapp March 31st, 2009 at 08:06

  Ethan,
  Most people who are not regular consumer of finance/business information are not familiar with logarithmic scales. Occasionally, when i used it for newspapers, I received mail from readers complaining about the information distortion. As you see, we are always trying to content everybody, but compromises are necessary.
  Nick