(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-01-21 16:48

As Wall Street continues its startling decline, investors are asking what is the cure and market experts for the most part are answering: time.

A street sign is seen on Wall Street outside the New York Stock Exchange York January 18, 2008. [Agencies]

There is no piece of economic data, no corporate earnings report, no move by the Federal Reserve and no government tax plan that will be able to soothe the market's anxiety in the next couple weeks over the weakening economy.

That's not to say the stock market will keep plunging the way it has been. To be sure, bargain hunters will likely see Wall Street's recent slides as buying opportunities, particularly if encouraging news comes along like a hefty interest rate cut or better-than-expected profits at the nation's big-name companies.

Upbeat financial results in the coming week from some of the large, multinational companies that make up the Dow Jones industrials - Microsoft Corp., AT&T Inc., Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Caterpillar Inc. and Honeywell International Inc. - could lead to some rallies. But no one should be surprised if the gains evaporate as soon as they develop.

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Investors simply have too many questions to buy into stocks with confidence -- questions that are not going to be answered until all fourth-quarter results are in, and until Wall Street has a better sense of how the still-young first quarter is going.

"We've baked in a lot of bad news. But we don't know the magnitude of the bad news yet. We don't know if we've overdone it," said Arthur Hogan, chief market analyst at Jefferies & Co. "I don't think there's any combination of things next week that will necessarily turn things around."

With market pessimism at heights not seen in years, it is certainly possible the market is near its bottom. But there are few investors eager to bet on when stocks will resume their climb, and how long it will be before new records are reached again.

"Maybe by the end of the first quarter, things will line up for the market to find to some stability," said Steven Goldman, chief market strategist at Weeden & Co.