The past week has been filled with one heart-stopping development after another. It reads somewhat like a Hollywood movie trailer ... banks fall, markets surge, bailouts abound.

This week has been one for the record books. Wall Street went into crisis mode when Lehman Brothers failed Sunday evening and declared bankruptcy. This pushed Merrill Lynch into the arms of Bank of America in a takeover that stunned investors.

The Federal Reserve bailout of the distressed Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae unleashed a Mac Attack on markets worldwide with around a 3 percent pop Monday. Can the pop turn into a lengthy rally, similar to the rally that occurred after the Bear Stearns bailout? Has this the potential to signal the end of the dreadful run of news and the beginning of a new sustainable uptrend? The short answer -- no. The charts suggests this Mac takeaway is more a burp than a trend changing experience.

Templeton Asset Management's misery index of high inflation and high unemployment has spiked in Thailand.

In one of my past incarnations, I was -- I kid you not -- a gold miner. Yes, I actually worked underground in an Australian goldmine. Since then I have found it much easier, and much more profitable, to mine for gold in the financial markets. Here, gold is a mother lode of opportunity, as indicated by the weekly NYMEX chart.

Malaysia's KLSE Composite Index (KLCI) has tracked its regional peers downwards to lose more than 20 percent of its value this year alone. Amid the gloomy sentiment and political upsets facing the market, some of our readers have written in requesting for analysis on the index. Charting Asia finds out if there is light at the end of the tunnel.

The KLCI is in the grip of a long bear hug. This is most easily seen on the weekly index chart. This puts daily price activity into a wider context. The dominant feature is the long term head and shoulder pattern . This is a bearish pattern and is useful in two ways.

First it confirms the bearish nature of the market and this directs our attention to downside support levels. Second, the pattern is used to establish potential downside target levels. These pattern projections have a high level of reliability as seen with the DOW and NASDAQ patterns.

Lenovo is banking on the Beijing Olympics to promote its brand on the global stage. But China's largest PC-maker, the only local worldwide sponsor of the Games, has seen its shares fall nearly 40 percent since hitting a peak in November 2007. Will the computer maker's Olympic efforts help it score gold? Let's hit the charts to find out.

With a very minimal involvement in these games, Li Ning Co. (HK; 2331) has all of a sudden come away as a big winner, thanks to its namesake and chairman lighting the torch at Friday's Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony.

In April of 2001, Australians could do little but stay at home with the Australian dollar trading at 48 U.S. cents. Fast forward 7 years and the weakness of the Australian dollar is a distant memory as the Aussie magic pushes towards parity with the U.S. dollar.

It's been a rough year for financial counters, with banks hard hit by the fallout out of the subprime crisis and the subsequent credit crunch. Investors are fearful and no one seems able to say for sure when the worst will be over.