the analogy you're using is flawed: one person getting a hang nail doesn't increase the chances of someone else getting a hang nail. when someone sees a stock decline, they google "stock market" or some other term. If they then sell their stock it will further depress the price of stocks. this will make more people google for stocks... and so forth i agree with the website that its a reinforcing cycle. regardless its something new to look at.
tom, a nice find but I may have to spoil the theory: the problem is that the google trend chart for "stock market" is optimized afterwards to what happened (crash). If you try similar terms (e.g. "investing", "dow jones"), each will come up with a very different time/# series and it's easy to produce an appropriate google query "after the fact". "counter-proof" http://www.google.de/trends?q=general+motors&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0
http://www.google.com/trends?q=anti+christ&ctab=0&geo=US&geor=all&date=all&sort=0 http://www.google.com/trends?q=jack+hershey&ctab=0&geo=US&geor=all&date=all&sort=0 interesting
bond bubble... just starting to show... http://www.google.com/trends?q=treasury+bubble&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all http://www.google.com/trends?q=bond+bubble&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0
Sheesh, been using this toy for most of this year, what you do is to use it as a gauge of current investment themes and to what extent has the public caught on ! As we all know Joe Six Pack tends to be the last one to join the band wagon, by which time most smart money would have sold out already. What l found useful was taking the data into excel and comparing it against closing price for it. But if you have not engaged in any form quantitative sentiment analysis then it will be a couple of squiggly lines to you. As with most esoteric data, if you are not actively involved or trading the underlying instruments then you will certainly lack any ability to harness it and use it to your advantage. Over and out http://www.google.com/trends?q=coal+stocks&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 http://www.google.com/trends?q=monoline+insurers&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 http://www.google.com/trends?q=china+shares&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 http://www.google.com/trends?q=peak+oil&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 http://www.google.com/trends?q=wheat+prices&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 http://www.google.com/trends?q=crox&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 http://www.google.com/trends?q=vix&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0
Wow, thanks to the OP for bringing this tool to our attention. Really cool, limitless possibilities here... Even though I agree that google searches for "oil bubble" do not predict future price.
Might be useful indication of blowoff reaching a max. Like high trade volume appearing near the end of parabolic moves. If the public is now really involved, the trend may be ready to collapase under it's own weight...