An apparatus and method for assessing market conditions, or for analyzing of other parameters that appear to fluctuate randomly, compare the changing conditions to the changes that would be predicted by Brownian Motion. When the changes exceed those predicted by Brownian Motion, a trend is considered to exist and can be expected to continue, and when the changes are less than those predicted by Brownian Motion, then a congestion condition exists. When enough measurements are taken, the length of the trend or congestion can be predicted. In one embodiment, the computation necessary to analyze the data on the condition being monitored is distributed among computers of subscribers to a monitoring service based on the method.