If this were an ordinary year, you'd be crazy not to buy stocks over the next few weeks, when the Wall Street pros typically gussie up their portfolios so they can show their customers just how smart they are.
But there's nothing ordinary about 2009 -- especially the last nine months.
Stock prices zoomed from their depths mainly on hopes that the economy was turning around (and it did improve somewhat).
Or was it because the labor market seemed to be doing better starting in the spring -- a fact that is now in dispute.
Maybe the market rallied simply because people saw other people making so much money that they just couldn't resist following the leader.
Whatever the reason, this much is clear: Stock prices have gone up a lot, for little reason, and investing in the market now isn't nearly as easy a call as it was last year.
If you've been monitoring this column for a while you'll know that I told readers to buy stocks last December but to get out in January. That was simply a calendar call: The pros usually buy reflexively at the end of the year when trading volume lightens and the market can be pushed around.
After the pros do that, they take a look at market fundamentals like corporate profits -- as they did in January -- and say, "Whoa, what the hell did I do?"
Then they retreat faster than the average person can.
I also wrote at the beginning of this year that the economy would start to look better -- not necessary be better -- in the spring because of seasonal adjustments to economic reports and a favorable quirk in how the Labor Department records its jobs data.
At the time, I said that these events could be used by Wall Street to boost stock prices. And that happened -- in spades.
For all of 2009, the Dow Jones industrial average is up a healthy 17 percent. But the gain from the lowest prices in March has been an amazing 57 percent.
To be sure, the index is still 27.5 percent off the all-time high it recorded in October 2007 and people still have massive losses.
But we are now a heck of a lot better than the 54-percent loss the market was suffering before the rally began last March.
Where will the market go next?
That's the problem: It could go down as quickly as it has gone up.
In the first place, most of the action lately seems to be coming from professional traders. Day trading by amateurs also appears to be picking up, if anecdotal evidence gleaned at bars and coffee shops is any indication.
But average buy-and-hold investors still don't seem to trust the market, and anyone who is venturing into stocks is doing so mainly because the Federal Reserve continues to punish savers with low interest rates, which help banks record profits.
If anyone wants a reasonable return on their investments, they have little choice than to become a stock-market speculator. A 57-percent gain in nine months' time looks a lot like another bubble, and this bubble may not be as durable as the last few.
A lot of things could go wrong, especially in an era where Washington feels obliged to spend money it doesn't have on stimulus programs that haven't worked before and which may not have any better luck this time.
But my biggest concern is that the stock market could be hurt if the economy weakens (bad for business), or if the economy strengthens.
The latter is the quickest road to concerns about a Fed tightening of interest rates, which, of course, would make other investments more competitive with stocks and rein in speculators.
Just look at what happened last Friday: The Labor Department reported an unexpectedly good employment situation in November and Wall Street didn't respond with the joy it should have had.
I've said this before, but I want to say it louder now -- be very careful if you get lured into the stock market.
That steady 1.5 percent interest you're getting from the bank could look pretty good if this hard-to-figure stock market decides to correct its latest excesses.
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The other day at breakfast I ran into Louka Katseli, the economics minister of Greece, a country that is rumored to share Dubai's problems with making debt payments.
So, I asked, should Wall Street be concerned about Greece reneging on its debt?
Katseli, who was educated in the US and taught at Princeton, responded: "I would be more concerned about US debt." Touché!
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An Irish bookie is taking bets on who will make the next 911 call from Tiger Woods' house.
Woods is the favorite at 6-to-4. The gardener is the long shot at 18-to-1.
Put me down for $10 on the paperboy, if cellphone calls from outside the house are counted.
The bookie, Paddy Power, thinks Ac centure -- a manage ment firm -- is a 9-to-4 favorite to drop Woods as its spokesman, followed by watch maker TAG Heuer at 3-to-1.
Titleist, which, of course has a lot of balls, is the least likely at 33-to-1.
john.crudele@nypost.com
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