Are you happy the market is a mess? Or do you find it frustrating?
Keep in mind, the S&P500 is still at the same price it was 2 months ago.
Both the Nasdaq100 and Dow Jones Industrial Average are still at the same prices they were back in February.
We're almost half way through May.
The Technology Index, which is the largest component of the S&P500 (30%) and has the largest weighting in the Nasdaq100 (50%), is still where it was back in January.
Again we're half way through May!
Meanwhile, don't forget about the Small-cap Russell2000 that's hilariously still stuck below where it was way back in December.
The Consumer Discretionary Index and Dow Jones Transportation Average are also down for the year.
That's the market we're in.
Some people keep pretending that this year is just like last year.
But I cheated. I actually looked at the data. So I know better.
Imagine being one of these people who are lying to US citizens about falling interest rates?
Or worse, imagine being one of the poor victims who actually believed them?
Ouch.
The people lying to you include journalists across old media, a few economists that are somehow still employed, and even the President of the United States of America.
Or maybe the Biden didn't actually lie to you. It could have been the intern, who tells him what to say, that is the one behind the false information.
Either way, none of these people are here to help you. They're only here to help themselves. That's how this works.
So as investors, it's important for us to actually look to see what's happening, instead of blindly trusting some random source, even if that includes the President of the United States, who's been lying to you about falling interest rates all year.
Is the fact that he is up for reelection later this year further incentivizing these lies?
When investors are primarily on one side of a market, the pendulum swings to the other extreme.
One of my heroes John Roque said it best, "We're not in a reversion TO the mean business, we're in a reversion BEYOND the mean business".
In other words, from extremes in positioning, the market doesn't just go back to the average positioning. It tends to continue towards the other extreme.
This is the situation we currently find ourselves in as investors.
You can now add the Dow Jones Industrial Average to the list of indexes that are DOWN for the year so far.
I've argued many times that the Dow Jones Industrial Average is the world's most important stock market index.
And while I'm not going to get into all the reasons again today, I'll just show you the chart of the S&P500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average going back 60 years.
There is a big theme going on right now - and that's the inability for important indexes to get above their 2021 highs.
You're seeing it at the individual stock level, you're seeing it across specific sectors and industry groups, and you're definitely seeing it in the S&P500 and Nasdaq100 Equally-weighted.
These indexes below eliminate the excessive weightings in certain stocks and sectors and equally-weight all of its components.
Look at both of them still stuck below their 2021 highs: