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DOW – 200 = 17,776
SPX – 18 = 2067
NAS – 46 = 4900
10 YR YLD – .03 = 1.93%
OIL – 1.15 = 47.53
GOLD – 2.30 = 1183.70
SILV – .06 = 16.73
The S&P/Case-Shiller 20-city home price index showed steady gains in January, up 0.9% from December. Compared to January 2014, prices were up 4.6%. In Phoenix, resale home prices were unchanged from December to January, and posted a year-over-year gain of 2.6%.
The Conference Board’s consumer confidence index moved up to 101.3% in March from an upwardly revised 98.8 in February. The present situation index, a measure of current conditions, actually fell to 109.1 from 112.1. Yet the future expectations index increased to 96.0 from 90.
We’ve seen quite a bit of volatility in the markets lately. Today marks the 16 session in the month of March where the Dow Industrial Average has closed with a change in excess of 100 points. That is the second most of any month in history; following 20 triple digit moves in October 2008.
Sell in May and go away. You’ve probably heard this stock market advice. The idea is that you can divide the year into the best six months and the worst six months for the stock market; and we are now heading into the worst six months. Like most indicators, it is a measure of probabilities, not a guarantee. Mechanical selling on the last day of March and then buying back in on the last day of October only produces a slight advantage in returns but it eliminates a bunch of risk. Waiting for a market signal, such as a slight downturn in March to sell and a slight uptrend in October to buy produces a significantly better return; and even better, this market-beating return was produced with 39% less risk, which means it’s even further ahead of buy-and-hold on a risk-adjusted basis.
Today ends the first quarter for 2015. The Nasdaq posted gains of 3.5 percent for the quarter, marking the index’s first nine-quarter winning streak. The S&P eked out its own nine-quarter run with a gain of 0.4 percent last quarter. The Dow was negative for the quarter, down about one-quarter of one percent.
The S&P 500  finished the quarter with a small gain; marking the ninth straight quarterly advance for the S&P 500, and the longest winning streak since 1998. The index has only had three other stretches that long since World War II. That’s good news for bulls because the previous three times the market notched a nine-quarter winning streak, the S&P 500 index averaged an increase of 8.1 percent in the 10th quarter. The measure is still down 1.9 percent from a record on March 2 and among the worst performers in 24 developed markets this year.
