My simple answer is, no, the fact that the Dow Industrial Average climbed back to the 10,000 level does not have any significance for your investments. Too many investors -- and media -- focus on this index, which consists of only 30 stocks of large U.S. companies. Calling this index "The Market" makes no sense to me, but many people do that.

Stock market indexes have climbed dramatically since early March of this year, and your portfolio probably has earned some nice gains since then if at least a reasonable portion of it was invested in the stock market over the past few months. As for whether the Dow Jones Industrial Avg, or any other stock market index, will continue to rise over the next few months is anybody's guess.

To me, the more interesting thing is that the S&P 500 Index climbed above its level twelve months ago in the last few days. It is the first positive 12-month return in a good long while, maybe close to two years. It is down from two years ago, but the twelve months is definitely positive.