The economic boom that started earlier this decade will continue to fuel the greatest bull market in history, said Harry S. Dent Jr., an economic futurist and author.

Dent -- and much of Wall Street -- seems to feel secure that the stock market's great run will continue, fed by a growing enthusiasm for technology, especially the Internet.

Dent is an unabashed bull.

In fact, he predicts that the Dow will hit as high as 13,800 in May 2000, and it could reach as high as 30,000 by late 2007 and 34,100 late the following year.

So confident is Dent in his forecast that he said he's willing to give 2-to-1 odds to anyone who wants to bet against him.

Dent bases his theory on the idea that the best decades of an economy occur when a new generation moves into the mid- to late-40s age bracket.

That's when consumers' debt ratios go down and their savings and investments start to rise dramatically, said the author of "The Roaring 2000s" and "The Great Boom Ahead." He also publishes a newsletter, the H. S. Dent Forecast.

"A new generation begins every 40 years, and every 80 years we get an economic and technological revolution," Dent said.

He began his affinity for demographics -- generational trends, population growth and consumer habits -- when he went to work for a strategic planning company in Boston soon after obtaining a master's of business administration from Harvard University in 1978, he said.

"We had to study demographic trends and other fundamentals to figure out where businesses were going," Dent said. "I started questioning why people couldn't do that for the economy."

Dent left the company after two years and has been a full-time investment trend forecaster ever since.

To fully take advantage of the current bull market, Dent says, stock pickers should strongly delve into four sectors: technology, financial services, health care and the international market.

Although he projects steady growth ahead, Dent does expect corrections, but of 5 percent to 10 percent.

As for the avid bears who think bulls like him are way off-base, Dent said they are simply missing the magnitude of the market.

"It's not that they don't know what they are doing," he said. "They have studied past performances and say the market is out of whack. They are not realizing there has been a paradigm shift."

Pub Date: 3/30/99