Tag Archives: S&P 500

What would you say if I told you that the S&P 500 is going to 7,000, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is going to 56,000, and the Nasdaq is going to 29,000 in the next 6 to 7 years. If you're waiting for the punch line, convinced that it's a joke well, it's no joke. Here's why.

Whenever oil prices make a big move in either direction, there are some fairly standard arguments made of its effect on the overall stock market but, rarely, is any actual evidence presented to substantiate these more or less intuitive arguments. Let’s take a look at the data and see what the historical relationship has actually been between oil and the stock market.

Mark this day on your calendars. The Dow is at 16974, the S&P 500 is at 1982 and the NASDAQ is at 4549. From this day forward, we will be looking to see how the stock market performs without the monetary heroin that the Federal Reserve has been providing to it.

Right now the monthly chart of the S&P 500 Index (SPX) is crying out -- screaming, even -- for a 38.2% retracement to 1740. Here's why.

The Russell 3000, a broad equity index representing 98% of the investable U.S. stock market, is up 9.3% for 2014 on a total-return basis...[but] the median total return for Russell 3000 constituents is just 1.5% reflecting the fact that small- and mid-cap stocks are under-performing... This current alarming deterioration in breadth, a term that refers to how much of the market is participating in the advance, begs the question: "Is the stock market sitting on a trap door?" This article looks at 2 trap door indicators that suggest that that might, indeed, be the case.

The stock market is presently a roulette wheel with dimes on black and dynamite on red. We continue to have extreme concerns about the extent of potential market losses over the completion of the present market cycle.

A near-term market pullback of as much as 10% is likely but we're still in bull market cycle that has just begun to run. There are years left to go on this secular bull market and, indeed, Benjamin Graham's P/E formula implies a 2015 S&P price target of somewhere around 2476 to 2545.

We look at this market and we see "too much." Too much divergence, too much complacency, too much embedded downside risk…the list goes on and covers many things. Let's make the rounds and see what we find [and what it means for the immediate well-being of the various stock markets.]

[No wonder you are confused!] Several technical and fundamental indicators have flashed caution to no avail and this has given way to an uncomfortable tension beneath the surface as investors try to find answers while keeping pace with performance. Below are 10 mixed signals about the near-term direction and theme of the markets.

There continues to be an uncanny relationship between a company’s market capitalization and year-to-date returns. The largest 500 stocks in the Russell 3000 are up an average of 8.5% this year, while the smallest 500 are down an average of -6.1%. What is driving this incredibly strong relationship between market cap and return?