Courtesy of Doug Short.
The market had second thoughts after the Bernanke rally on Monday. On Tuesday the S&P 500 took a step back. After trading in a narrow range throughout the day, the index faded in the final hour to close with a modest loss of 0.28%. That trims the year-to-date gain to a still spectacular 12.32%.
From an intermediate perspective, the S&P 500 is 109.4% above the March 2009 closing low and 9.5% below the nominal all-time high of October 2007.
Below are two charts of the index, with and without the 50 and 200-day moving averages.
For a better sense of how these declines figure into a larger historical context, here’s a long-term view of secular bull and bear markets in the S&P Composite since 1871.
These charts are not intended as a forecast but rather as a way to study the current market in relation to historic market cycles.
