Stocks' Death Cross Is Another Overblown Fear

Pundits are no doubt sharpening their pencils over the prospect that the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index is about to form a technical pattern called a "death cross." And a death cross, as the name would suggest, should be quite deadly for stocks.

But is it?

The problem is that death crosses are quite unreliable signals in the stock market. Sometimes they do forecast a major selloff ahead. But other times they actually mark good buy signals.

What's a Death Cross?

A death cross occurs when a shorter-term moving average (more on that in a second) crosses, or moves below, a longer-term moving average. Put