1. 3-IN-A-ROW - The S&P 500 has fallen for 3 consecutive months (November-December-January), the first time the stock index has done that since February 2003 In the 1-year after its last period of 3 straight down-months, the S&P 500 gained +39% (total return). The S&P 500 is an unmanaged index of 500 widely held stocks that is generally considered representative of the US stock market (source: BTN Research).
2. AFTER A BAD MONTH - The S&P 500 lost 6.0% (total return) in January 2008, the 17th time since 1990 that the stock index has fallen at least 5% in a single month (i.e., 17 times in the last 217 months or 8% of the time). In the 6 months following the previous 16 market drops, the S&P 500 has had a positive total return 8 times and suffered a negative total return the other 8 times. The subsequent 6-months have been as good as up +30% and as bad as down 19% (source: BTN Research).
3. WHAT HAPPENS NEXT? - The NASDAQ Composite fell 9.9% in January 2008, its 19th worst monthly performance since its February 1971 inception (i.e., 19th worst out of 443 total months). Of the 18 worse-performing months in the index’s history, 10 of them occurred during the 2000-02 bear market. The 6-months following the previous 18 market drops have been as good as up +53% and as bad as down 50%. The NASDAQ Composite is an unmanaged index of securities traded on the NASDAQ system (source: BTN Research).
4. BEAR SIGHTING - From a 10/31/07 closing value of 2859, the NASDAQ Composite fell 20.3% to last Wednesday finish of 2279, meeting the “20% decline” definition of a bear market (source: BTN Research).
5. CLOSE TO AVERAGE - The S&P 500’s actual total return in each of the past 4 years (2004-07) has fallen within a range of “plus or minus 10%” from its trailing 50-year total return average of +11.0%, the only 4-year period in the last half-century when this has occurred (source: HLS Research).
6. A GOOD YEAR - The largest capitalized stock in the S&P 500 at the end of 2007 (worth $512 billion) is also its most profitable, earning a record $41 billion last year, equal to $1,287 of profit per second (source: AP).
7. MANY ZEROS - The fiscal year 2009 budget submitted by President Bush to Congress last Monday calls for government spending of $3.1 trillion for the year beginning 10/01/08. If you were to spend $1 billion a day, it would take you 8 ½ years to spend $3.1 trillion (source: White House).
8. BREAK THE BANK - Planned expenditures for Social Security in fiscal year 2009 are $649 billion, an increase of +66% in the last decade (source: White House).
9. ROUGH TIMES AHEAD? - A Wall Street firm has predicted that the average US home price will drop 25% in the next 2 years. Chris Flanagan, head of research at JPMorgan Chase for asset-backed securities, believes home prices will suffer a major fall before hitting bottom in the year 2010 (source: BusinessWeek).
10. NOT EARLY ENOUGH - Americans work on average 6 years longer before retiring than they would have liked to. Although the ideal retirement age for Americans who were surveyed is 58 years old, their actual retirement age was 64 years old on average (source: AXA Equitable Retirement Scope).
11. BEGIN TODAY - 51% of 401(k) plans in the USA allow newly-hired employees to begin elective-deferrals immediately upon starting work without any waiting period (source: PSCA).
12. I MIGHT BE WRONG - Even though 57% of employees that are deferring at least 8% of their salaries into an employer-sponsored 401(k) plan say they enjoy managing their own finances, 65% of this high-saver group are not confident that their investment choices today will ultimately prove to be correct decisions (source: MassMutual Financial Group).
13. SUPER WRONG – In spite of being 12-point underdogs in Super Bowl # 42, the New York Giants beat the favored New England Patriots 17-14. The Giants won their last 11 games they played on the road, including 4 in the playoffs (source: BTN Research).
14. THE HIGH COURT - 4 of the 9 Supreme Court justices are at least 71 years old, including Justice John Paul Stevens who will turn 88 years old on April 20th (source: Supreme Court).
15. I QUIT – The presidential election is still 267 days from today (11/04/08), yet the long campaign has already seen 13 announced candidates dropping out, including Democrats John Edwards, Bill Richardson, Christopher Dodd, Joe Biden, Dennis Kucinich and Tom Vilsack, along with Republicans Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani, Fred Thompson, Tom Tancredo, Sam Brownback, Tommy Thompson and Duncan Hunter (source: BTN Research).
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