The game is changing. It's time to play defense. Two weeks ago the U.S. stock market was in a bullish trend with no end in sight. Now international events are taking center stage. How long the markets can ignore these events is the question of the day.

Brent crude oil is trading at $116 per barrel. This has serious implications for the U.S. economy. If you recall, when oil spiked in 2008, it was a major factor in the recession that followed. People simply could not afford the price of gas and slowed their driving dramatically. We must remember that many people commute 50 to 70 miles a day just to go to work. The money is coming out of the household budget. Some people spend more in gas than they do working, especially if they work part time.

It comes as no surprise to me that current investment blogger consensus is bullish on the markets. They're not bullish by an extremely wide margin, but they are optimistic nonetheless.

An ongoing investment blogger survey, conducted weekly by Ticker Sense from Birinyi Associates Inc., indicates that nearly 54% of the investment writers it surveys are holding a bullish stance for the S&P 500 for the next 30 days. Meanwhile, just over 15% of the survey respondents are bearish on the S&P 500, and approximately 30% are declaring a neutral position.

The S&P 500 Index (SPX) has battled back from its brutal month-long sell-off, but it seems that traders aren't exactly confident in the market's fledgling rebound. According to data from the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), options players are betting on additional turbulence by purchasing calls on the CBOE Market Volatility Index (VIX).

During the past five sessions, speculators on the exchange have scooped up 142,544 calls on the VIX, along with 126,391 puts. In other words, 1.13 calls have been purchased for every put on the VIX, which is meant to reflect investors' expectations for the SPX's near-term price action.

• CBOE DJ Industrial Average Index (DJX) -5.2% to 22.1
• NASDAQ (NDX) -5.5% to 25.4
• Russell 2000 Index (RUT) -6.4% to 24.7
• SPDR Trust Unit (SPY) -5% to 24.8
• CBOE Russell 1000 Index (RUI) -6.5% to 25.3
• S&P 100 Index (OEX) -6.2% to 24.9

Standard & Poor's Depository Receipts (SPY) is recently down 42 cents to $106.24 in pre-open trading. February and March put volatility is at 28; April is at 26; above its 26-week average of 24 according to Track Data, suggesting larger price movement.

MSCI Emerging Markets Index (EEM) closed at $37.20. EEM overall option implied volatility of 34 is near its 26-week average according to Track Data, suggesting non-directional price movement.

Option Update is provided by Stock Specialist Paul Foster of theflyonthewall.com

This post is part of our feature on Money Winners of 2008. See all 20.

This past year has been a pretty rough one for CEOs in general. The stock market has tanked since October of last year, dragging down strong companies' share prices to some extent and weak companies' even further. It has been even worse for most financial executives, who have been ousted as their stocks fall to roughly zero and their company goes bankrupt or is taken over by a stronger institution. While many of these CEOs have golden parachutes that open upon their dismissal, much of their compensation is in the form of the company's stock and when that value dwindles, they feel the pain as well. One of our other 2008 Money Winners, Alan Fishman, who walked away with more than $11 million for three weeks work at Washington Mutual, had 600K shares of WM that he saw evaporate.

James "Jamie" Dimon, CEO and chairman of JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM), has not had this kind of trouble over the past year, which places him squarely in the minority among his peers and makes him a money winner. Strictly speaking, Mr. Dimon raked in a salary for this year of "just" $1 million. His bonus allows for an additional $14.5 million, and the way things have been going for JPM, I'd wager a hefty portion of my savings that he gets the full amount. Plus on top of that, he has exercised options worth about $40.1 million this year, bringing the grand total compensation to $55.6 million.

Q. John, are we at the bottom yet (in equity markets) and what do you see for world markets in the next 12 months?

A. The US economy has substantially worsened in recent months; and the US and global economies are now in the early stages of a significant recession.

In early 2007, the problem was confined to the leveraged loan market as banks revealed their $300 billion in toxic loan commitments to US private equity deals. This was an isolated capital market problem, which had not materially impacted GDP. But in September 2008, the safety of money market funds came into question, seriously frightening individuals into taking cash from their bank accounts, putting all spending on hold and hoarding cash. Since then, GDP has been in serious decline.

Ironically, beginning in March 2008, the Federal Reserve's series of liquidity measures, designed to provide cash to troubled Wall Street institutions, made this situation worse. They sold Treasury bills simultaneously, withdrawing reserves from the banking system, resulting in less than a 1% annual rate of growth in bank reserves and the monetary base in the 12 months leading up to September 2008. Since the September crisis, both reserves and the monetary base have more than doubled, which will eventually solve the problem. But the Fed was very late to the party.

"While watching the Olympics, I couldn't thinking about the investment opportunities of the various countries participating in the games," says exchange-traded fund expert Carl Delfeld.

Recognizing that this is not a "scientific" approach nor a primary basis for seriously determining one's asset allocation the editor of Around the World with ETFs speculates, "While it is admittedly a stretch, let's consider what an ETF porfolio of the top ten countries in the Beijing Olympics medal count would look like."

"I hope that while watching the Olympic games many investors were also reminded at how the world is changing and why they need a global portfolio to capture value and growth around the world.

"The U.S. did remarkably well across the board underscoring its role as the world's leading investment destination. China surged to win the most gold and reach the symbolic level of 100 medals.

"Quite an achievement that punctuates China's growing heft. With the Shanghai Composite down 55% this year, it has come down to earth and is interesting from a valuation perspective.

"Next comes Russia with a performance fueled by a strong Olympian tradition and petro dollars but perhaps a bit overshadowed by the Georgian fiasco. I will take a pass on this one even though it is off 36% since just May.