The market was determined to go lower on Thursday. It didn't matter if it should go lower, the Dow still closed with the worst four-day start to the year ever.
"You need to know, though, that I do not like this market. I have said from the moment that the Fed started tightening that from now on we will be fighting the Fed. They are not our friend. They are not our mortal enemy, either," the "Mad Money" host said.
One of the main drivers to the stock market going up or down is whether the Fed is planning to help or hinder the economy. When it wants to hinder, there is a negative bias in the stock market that sends stocks down.
It was the combination of the uncertainty in the Chinese market and Fed anxiety that triggered the sell-off Thursday.
So if the stock market isn't yet historically cheap and many large investors are still willing to sell at prices below where stocks are trading, you have to wait.Jim Cramer
But those weren't the only things. Cramer thinks that it could all come down to supply and demand. And right now money managers just want to own less stock than they have in the past.
For instance, large money managers watching the decline in Apple and are tired of hearing about slowing cellphone sales and seeing the stock price drop.
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They don't care about the stock being inexpensive, its fantastic management or growing ecosystem. They only want to sell the stock below the current sale price because they fear owning the stock once it keeps going down.
Cramer speculated that the same mindset could apply to hundreds of other stocks out there. Money managers are telling traders to sell them at extremely low levels, and traders aren't asking questions.
Once the sellers of the futures who are dumping everything and the algorithmic traders were added to the mix, the market plummeted.
"Put them all together and that is how you end up with what's happening now," Cramer said.
The process will only stop once it is exhausted. This is once the sellers are done dumping their stock below current market prices, and new buyers will see value in these stocks and be willing to take the pain.
"So, if the stock market isn't yet historically cheap and many large investors are still willing to sell at prices below where stocks are trading, you have to wait," Cramer said.
Investors need to take the emotion out of stocks, and recognize that the market needs to experience a washout that will mark the end of a sell-off before a bottom is reached.
And that has not yet occurred.
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