Cramer on BloggingStocks: This Rally Has Been Easy to Miss

The second time came after a too-quick run-up in May, where you then saw a deluge of bank equity deals that basically ended the financial rally once and for all. We've been trying to get ignited since then, but it simply hasn't happened and we have been trapped ever since. When we lost the financials, we lost a lot of people who believe that no rally can occur without the financials. That turned out to be totally wrong, as the industrials and then health care launched because of a weak dollar and because the health care reform turned out to be a big win for the "interests" that it was supposed to defeat. That non-financial rally took many by surprise who have never seen a move like this before. I also think that some of the bulls recognized that the president, who had been quite destructive to wealth in general with an agenda that was perceived as anti-business, began to lose support and alienated those who wanted a centrist president and didn't get one. That gave the rally more impetus to continue.

The final shakeout came after the Dow ran past 10,000 and then turned down to 9600. After that spike, it just didn't seem worth it to stay long. We had had a huge run off the bottom and it looked like there just wasn't that much more to gain, so what was the point, especially because we became addicted to the gold/dollar/oil conundrum that was just too stupid for most long-only stock managers to follow, so many got shaken out.

Not only that, we never had the money come in that we all expected.

But something else happened that made people really kick themselves. We realized that GDP was coming in stronger, that autos had caught fire, that housing had bottomed (all but the usual bearish press acknowledged that) and we got an extension of the housing tax credit that even the bears admitted could play a role. Tech companies preannounced, and that kept the balls in the air. Plus, the stock market became an important source of liquidity, letting many companies fix their balance sheets and get off the do-not-resuscitate list. China pulled the world higher with its correct stimulus, not politically motivated but job- and spending-oriented. Perhaps most important, big mergers came roaring back, eating up supply and making the lack of new money less onerous than one would have thought.

All three air pockets shook people out, and given that we did not have another drop after them, there was no opportunity to get back in. That made it so those who took money off the table just couldn't put it back in. Bears who left the market were left for dead as we kept going higher; they could only dig in their heels and miss the rally.

And it's been that way ever since. I doubt that these historically benign days are going to produce that selloff to let people in, especially because we can see that the hedge funds aren't leaning on stocks despite commodity declines.

It's been a remarkable run, and it eluded far too many people, particularly because one by one as people left they decided that the market was simply done going up.

When it wasn't, they precluded themselves from getting bullish. And that was all she wrote.

Jim Cramer is co-founder and chairman of TheStreet.com. He contributes daily market commentary for TheStreet.com's sites and serves as an adviser to the company's CEO. At the time of publication, Cramer had no positions in the stocks mentioned.