From Dec. 31, 2010, the euro is a mere 3 cents below where it was against the dollar.

But this hardly reflects the volatile year that this pair has seen as currency traders have grappled with the all-consuming euro crisis. Nor does it reflect the fact that, from a longer-term perspective, the annual chart suggests a weak euro might persist for years.

Those charts mark a big turnaround in fortunes.

In early 2008, when people wrongly though that Europe was a haven from the U.S. subprime-mortgage crisis, the euro hit a record high of $1.6040. This shouldn't be viewed as an isolated crumb of history. According to the charts, the numbers generated in 2008 (including that record high) will be influencing 2012's presumably early bearish trading as the euro-zone debt crisis grinds on.

The year 2008 produced both that record high and a sharply lower low of $1.2327, a level hit during the global breakdown sparked by the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. in mid-September of that year. As the starting point for the long downtrend, we'll call 2008 the Year of the Bear.

The technical point is that the current 2011 range--between a high of $1.4946 and a low of $1.2858--is embedded in that 2008 range, so it continues to partake of it technicals. In particular, the midpoint of the 2008 range is $1.4183. And by comparison to that, the euro's current value of around $1.3055 is, frankly, weak.

It also means that a move below the 2008 low--which I believe the euro may be set to revisit--would touch off a long-term bear market. Although the euro did get below that level in 2010, its rebound wasn't strong enough to remove it from the shadow of the 2008 bar on the annual charts.

A long-term euro bull move would depend on decisive trading above $1.4183. For now, that looks like a long shot.