(22 February 2016) Should the UK stay or should it go?  After completing a series of difficult negotiations with his European counterparts, British Prime Minister David Cameron announced that a national referendum will be held on the final EU deal on the 23rd of June.  Cameron successfully won some important concessions for the UK which grants it "special status" within the European Union on a number of contentious issues. 

But will it be enough to mollify the opponents of the EU who point to a frustrating loss of sovereignty over immigration, labour, welfare and many other areas of British life?  The current economic and immigration problems of the EU are obviously making matters worse and raise the possibility that Great Britain could actually vote to leave.

The "Vote Leave" (i.e. Brexit) side got a big boost today as the charismatic Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, said he will break with his own party and actively campaign for leaving. Despite being a member of the Conservative Party and enjoying a good working relationship with Cameron, Johnson has nonetheless decided to chart a very different course.  Recent polls suggest Cameron’s "Stay" side has a 15-point lead of the "Leave" side with about 20 percent undecided.  But analysts have suggested that now Boris Johnson’s personal popularity could deliver a strong boost the fortunes of the Leave side. 

So the next question is: what do the planets say?  Fairly emphatically, they say: Brexit.  There are any number of ways of looking at the outcome of this referendum.  The first are simple transits for the day of the referendum on 23 June.  Incredibly, the planet Uranus enters the fiery sign of sidereal Aries on that very day!  Please note that I am using the Krishnamurti Ayanamsha which is about 5 arc minutes ahead of Lahiri.  Using Lahiri, Uranus enters Aries about five days later.  And it is worth reiterating that I am using the Indian sidereal zodiac for this ingress and not the tropical zodiac that is used in the West.  The Indian sidereal zodiac gives better results in my opinion, and it is more evident in such mundane mattersof politics and finance.

Although not a traditional Vedic planet, Uranus nonetheless is closely identified with notions of change, often sudden change.  Uranus commonly symbolizes independence, rebellion and innovation — and this is pretty much exactly what one would look for if the UK voted to leave the EU.  We should be strongly expect the exit of the UK from the European Union on this factor alone.  This Uranus sign change or ingress only occurs once every 7 years and is often associated with significant events.  For example, the biggest stock market crash in history occurred on 19 October 1987 just two days after Uranus changed signs and entered Sagittarius.  This doesn’t mean that a big event happens with every Uranus ingress (the previous one occurred in 2009 but was fairly uneventful), but it raises the odds of such an event.  The fact that the UK votes the very same day as this ingress is suggestive that change and a spirit of independence may be in the air. 

We can also see that PM David Cameron’s horoscope looks tense and likely incompatible with winning the referendum.  Cameron enters his Sun-Rahu dasha period on 4 June just three weeks before the referendum.  The Sun is good enough but Rahu is poorly placed in the 8th house in Aries.  Worse still is that its dispositor, Mars, is sitting in the 12th house of loss in Leo.  Cameron will fight the campaign while in the Sun-Mars dasha period.  This is bad for him also since his 12th house Mars is not in a good place for successful persuasion or getting what you want.  If Lahiri is used, then he will still be in Sun-Mars on 23rd June.  Either way, it doesn’t look good.

His transits also lean towards difficulty.  The transiting Nodes are aspecting their natal positions — never a good sign.  Transiting Rahu (along with Jupiter) will trine his natal Rahu within two degrees. If his side was going to win the referendum, then his 11th house of gains would likely be in good shape or highlighted in some obvious way.  But it is not.  Transiting Saturn approaches its station at 17 Scorpio and is just a few degrees from aligning (but not aspecting) with the Moon, which is also his 11th house ruler. 

The clincher is the EU horoscope.  This chart is heavily afflicted by both Uranus and Mars at the time of the referendum.  The horoscope of the European Union features a near exact opposition between the Moon (0 Taurus) and Mars (0 Scorpio).  Pluto at 1 Scorpio is also part of that powerful and coercive configuration.  In late June that three planet alignment will be highlighted not only by the Uranus ingress at 0 Aries but also the Mars direct station at 29 Libra that happens just a week later.  Mars therefore conjoins the EU’s Mars-Pluto natal position and opposes the Moon within one degree.  Ouch. Slow moving or stationary planets possess greater power to do good or ill and Mars has a clear tendency toward the dark side. 

So we have both Uranus and Mars extra strong and delivering a double shot of instability and upset to the EU.  Therefore, it seems very likely that the UK will leave the European Union following the referendum.  The departure of the UK will likely raise more questions about the long-term viability of the EU.  We can expect another existential crisis to beset the EU in September and October 2017.  At that time, Rahu will conjoin the Ascendant and Ketu will conjoin the natal Saturn in the EU chart.  This should coincide with another significant negative development, such as the loss of another major member nation or perhaps a fundamental rewriting of its constitution.

Weekly Market Forecast

Stocks generally rose last week as the absence of any more bad news out of China and an agreement by OPEC to freeze production was enough to put a floor under prices.  The Dow climbed almost 3% closing at 16,391 while the Indian Sensex also rose by a similar amount finishing the week at 23,709.  The gains were not surprising as I noted the ongoing bullish conjunction of Mercury-Venus in last week’s market forecast.   As it turned out, the Mars-Ketu (South Node) alignment didn’t produce much downside late in the week, although US and European markets did see some profit taking at that time. 

Stocks are off to a positive start so far this week after modest gains in Asia and stronger gains in Europe and the US at the open.  Mercury is still moving in tandem with Venus so we could see more upside in the first half of the week.  However, Mercury comes under the aspect of Saturn by Thursday so that could shift the overall mood of the market.  Declines therefore could become more likely as the week progresses. 

For more details on market trends this week, this month and this year, please check out my weekly MVA Investor Newsletter.  The newsletter covers US and Indian stock markets, as well as gold, oil and major currencies.