Trader’s Narrative

Let’s face it, this market has been driven by technicals not by any real fundamental health. So what happens when the same folks leave and take their rationale with them, fundamental investors may not be as keen to support the bids.

The recent softening in bids shouldn’t be a surprise. On October 15th the S&P 500 briefly traded 20.81% above its long term moving average. Now, it is only 14% above it. It was back on September 16th that the S&P 500 index first reached the 20% Maginot Line. Between then and now we had 4 other instances where price briefly pierced minutely above the 20% barrier only to be pushed back. Compared to historical precedence, this is part for the course.

As I presented in the detailed historical research report (What Happens This Far Above The 200 Moving Average?), usually when price moves this much away from its long term trend it has been unable to continue at the same pace. That’s what we’re seeing today as the S&P 500 is now below where it was trading on September 16th.

In this short video you can see the headwinds arrayed against the S&P 500. Both by the breaking of the uptrend line from March 2009 and the approaching downtrend line from the top of the bear market (October 2007):

One of the most important sectors, the Philadelphia Banking Index (BKX) has broken this uptrend line. We are also seeing some serious breadth (advance decline) weakness which is never really good but especially bad news while the market is so near a top.

Two institutional money managers have turned negative on the market recently. Jeremy Grantham of GMO Partners and Bill Gross of PIMCO. Click here for details on Grantham’s reasoning and to download his full quarterly report. Gross goes further than Grantham saying: “almost all assets appear to be overvalued on a long-term basis”. You can read his full commentary here.

For those who like to look at fundamental data like the quaint P/E ratio, here is a very long term chart, courtesy of Prof. Shiller:

As you can see, a lot of air was let out of the bubble. But, to mix metaphors, the pendulum didn’t swing back enough. During previous important market lows, the P/E ratio has fallen to much humbler depths. Thanks to the 60% rally from the March lows, we are once again back above the long term average. Which is unsettling, especially when you remember that Shiller uses a 10 year smoothing of the earnings data to iron out short term noise.

October’s P/E earnings, according to Shiller’s methodology is about 20 - well above the long term historical average of 16. Normally, a P/E ratio of 20 corresponds to economic expansion in its 5th year, not a major recession like the one we’re experiencing now. So understandably, Prof. Shiller is skeptical of the recovery in the equity market making the inevitable comparison to the aftermath of the 1929 crash and saying that “it can’t be trusted to continue”.

And turning our attention momentarily to the options markets, the equity only ISE sentiment index came in today at 191. Which means that while the equity market had a negative day with red all over the monitor, retail option traders tenaciously clung to hope and bought almost twice as many calls.

And if all that wasn’t spooky enough for you, to coincide with Halloween this year we have the 80th anniversary of the Great Crash of 1929. Boo!

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It takes less than a minute to sign up and you need to provide some basic information. But as I mentioned, you need to be a resident of the US (because you need to provide a US address). Enjoy!

While his work on valuation and bubbles receives more attention, Prof. Robert J. Shiller has been studying stock market sentiment for a long time. He has created several surveys which measure different aspects of sentiment. One of these is the Buy-on-Dips confidence index which we explored back in March. Unfortunately it has only about a 100 data points and doesn’t seem to provide much value added.

Today I wanted to check in with another one of Shiller’s surveys, the Crash Confidence Index. This new index, like the Buy on Dips confidence index, is limited in sample size but from the brief available data it seems to be provide much more insight.

The Crash Confidence Index is the percentage who think that “the probability of a catastrophic stock market crash in the US, like that of October 28, 1929 or October 19, 1987″ is less than 10%. So the higher the number, the less likely a crash is perceived as being imminent.

The highest level for institutional respondents was 58 on April 2006. While individual investors were the most confident on October 2003 when 49% believed that a crash was unlikely.

Not surprisingly, we tend to extrapolate the present into the future so during the darkest days of the stock market, further catastrophic declines in the form of a crash appear more likely. During the low of the last bear market cycle (November 2002) the institutional respondents were very pessimistic (only 21% believe a crash unlikely).

During this bear market cycle, institutional investors were the most pessimistic in February 2009 while individual investors took longer to be persuaded that things were improving. They were most pessimistic in April 2009. Since then both camps have recovered sharply. However, if you notice, we are still at very low levels historically.

If we compare the sentiment during the recovery from the last bear market bottom the difference is remarkable. In the six months from November 2002 to May 2003 the institutional Crash Confidence index almost doubled while the stock market as measured by the S&P 500 had hardly budged at all.

Today, we have a stock market that has rallied almost 60% and yet, the Crash Confidence index in relation to that performance, has gone from 18 to 28. While that is a respectable recovery in sentiment as measured by this index, it is hardly commensurate for the performance that the stock market has lavished on us.

To learn more about the Crash Confidence index visit the Yale Center for Finance.

Yesterday we looked at what happens when the S&P 500 is this far above its long term moving average. If you haven’t yet read that, click on the previous link and read it first because then what follows will make much more sense.

As you’d expect, when the stock market is stretched 20% or more above its 200 day moving average, it has a hard time continuing such a heady move. Instead, we find that the market pauses or retreats in the short term (1 to 3 months). But as Barry pointed out in the comments, there is a difference to how the market behaves in a bear market rally and a real secular bull market. With that in mind let’s analyze the data further.

If you looked at the historical data table that I showed outlining the previous extremes you probably noticed that 4 out of the 13 instances occur very close together in late 1982 and early 1983. This was, of course, the launch pad of the super bull market. The S&P 500 closed at 102.84 on August 10th 1982 and never looked back.

So naturally, there is a cluster of data points (chart below) as the market went on a rampage. This also explains why the 6 month period returns are so inordinately high:

That’s a lot of red marks! Between January 1st, 1980 and June 30th, 1983 there were 28 days when the S&P 500 was above its 200 day moving average by at least 19.5%.

If you look at the chart carefully, you’ll notice something remarkable. Even in such a super-strong bull market, this simple indicator is still able to identify short term tops in the market. But in the intermediate term, the market simply ignored any and all overbought signals. And eventually, by May 1983, they were’nt even able to mark a teeny bit of a correction. After all, in a strong bull market, ‘overbought’ is meaningless.

The question then is, are we about to see something similar? That is, do bull market rules apply? will this most recent extreme be simply the first of many? will the stock market simply ignore each and every one as it goes on yet another rampage the way it did in 1982?

No one knows of course. But personally, I think such a scenario to be highly improbable. It just wouldn’t make sense to expect a repeat of the 1982 experience. For one, we do not have the volume to fuel such a move. Second, and most importantly, we do not have the valuation.

I know, I know, fundamental analysis is for chumps. But I’m not talking about trying to game next quarters earnings estimate. I’m referring to the aggregate valuation of the market. Something for which we have much evidence to indicate excellent predictive value in the long term. For details, I refer you to Shiller’s excellent book: “Irrational Exuberance“.

Let’s pretend to ignore that the market has never rallied 60% in 6 months before. Let’s also ignore that never before has it performed even remotely close to that when the unemployment rate was this high. And ignore that corporate insiders are selling like lemmings. That sentiment is way too optimistic. That 95% of issues closed above their 200 day moving average (and 93% above their 50 day moving average). Even if we brush all of that and more under the rug, we can’t ignore how expensive the market is here:

• the trailing P/E (for operating earnings) is 26
• at the onset of the bear market in October 2007, it was 19
• the trailing Price Earnings ratio is 184 (reported earnings)
• on October 2007 it was merely 23 (in October 1987 it was just 20)
• the price to dividend ratio (click for chart) is at 53
• on October 2007 it was 55 and way back at the start of the super bull (1982) it was 16
• based on one year forward (operating) earnings the P/E ratio is 16 - highest in 5 years
• on October 2007 the forward est P/E was 14 (same as on Oct 1987)
• Price to Book ratio is 2.3 - August 1982 it was below 1 (discount to book)
• based on recent Tobin’s Q analysis, the market is 40% overvalued

While the market is a forward discounting mechanism, there is a limit to how much and how far ahead it can do so. Arguably, at these prices, the stock market is discounting the next 3 years operating earnings (2012). Historically, the market faces strong headwinds when P/E reaches 25. The average 1 year return at that valuation (or higher) is -0.3%. (All valuation data sourced from David Rosenberg’s invaluable research at Gluskin Sheff).

All of the above leads me to conclude that the most apt script is the one we’ve seen before many times in the aftermath of secular bear markets. While the performance of the stock market since March has been more than impressive, the stage is not otherwise set for the launch of a secular bull market.

By Robert Folsom

The following article discusses Robert Prechter’s view of the Efficient Market Hypothesis. For more information, download this free 10-page issue of Prechter’s Elliott Wave Theorist.

When a maverick idea becomes vindicated, there’s a good story to tell. It usually involves a person (or small group of people) who courageously challenge the orthodoxy of the day — and, over time, the unorthodox yet better idea prevails.

A “good story” of this sort has surfaced during the current financial crisis. A chapter of the story appeared in a recent New York Times article, “Poking Holes in a Theory on Markets.” The theory in question is the efficient market hypothesis (EMH), which the article suggested is so hazardous that it “is more or less responsible for the financial crisis.” This quote tells you most of what you need to know:

“In the last decade, the efficient market hypothesis, which had been near dogma since the early 1970s, has taken some serious body blows. First came the rise of the behavioral economists, like Richard H. Thaler at the University of Chicago and Robert J. Shiller at Yale, who convincingly showed that mass psychology, herd behavior and the like can have an enormous effect on stock prices — meaning that perhaps the market isn’t quite so efficient after all. Then came a bit more tangible proof: the dot-com bubble, quickly followed by the housing bubble. Quod erat demonstrandum.”

In case your Latin is rusty, Quod erat demonstrandum means “which was to be demonstrated.” Its abbreviation (QED) appears at the conclusion of a mathematical proof. In this case, the massive financial bubbles of recent years are the proof that refutes the efficient market hypothesis, which argues that markets move in a “random walk” and are not patterned.

Similar articles in the financial press have reported the demise of the EMH. Just this week an Economist magazine blog included this bold declaration:

“No one has yet produced a version of the EMH which can be tested and fits the evidence. Thus, the EMH must logically be discarded, as a valid hypothesis must be testable.”

QED, indeed — I agreed years ago that the random walk was implausible. But I didn’t come to this view because of behavioral economists, although their work over the past decade has certainly been valuable. Instead, I was persuaded by the work of someone who first challenged the financial orthodoxy more than three decades ago, specifically April 1977. As a young technical analyst at Merrill Lynch in New York, his research circulated among several of Merrill’s clients. His name for these studies was the Elliott Wave Theorist: the April ‘77 study was a detailed analysis of the 1975-76 stock market, which offered this comment on the random walk model:

“If market moves are arbitrary (as the random walk proponents suggest), then internal components would rarely ‘make sense’ mathematically, and then only by statistically insignificant fluke occurrences. However, there seems to be enough evidence that mass psychology, as recorded in the Dow Jones Industrials, form patterns that are uncannily interrelated….At least this much can be fairly reliably stated as a result of this work: This idea that the market is a ‘random walk’ is probably false.”

Robert Prechter left Merrill soon after; he has published the Elliott Wave Theorist in every month since. Every issue has, in one way or another, “convincingly showed that mass psychology, herd behavior and the like can have an enormous effect on stock prices.”

So while there may be a good story to tell about behavioral economists, I trust you see why I believe there is a vastly better one to tell.

The “enormous effect” of “mass psychology” and “herd behavior” is exactly what explains the financial downturn that began in late 2007. Prechter’s Elliott Wave Theorist anticipated the crisis and warned subscribers beforehand. Likewise, he alerted them to the bear market rally that began last March.

For more information from Robert Prechter, download a FREE 10-page issue of The Elliott Wave Theorist. It challenges current recovery hype with hard facts, independent analysis, and insightful charts. You’ll find out why the worst is NOT over and what you can do to safeguard your financial future.

Related:

• Did Overconfidence Cause The Financial Crisis?

There are many different ways to value the stock market. We are waiting for the Coppock Guide to give us a signal by month’s end (just a few more days left). The usually reliable price earnings ratio has gone haywire, but the dividend yield ratio is still valid.

But what if I told you there is an even better way to sum up the valuation of the stock market in just one number? A method that is both rational and comes with an astonishing track record, having identified every single generational buy opportunity?

Tobin’s Q was created by the late James Tobin, a pre-eminent economist and professor at Yale. His work garnered him a Nobel prize “for his analysis of financial markets and their relations to expenditure decisions, employment, production and prices.” But he’s probably best known for his work on the stock market. Put simply, Tobin’s Q is a ratio of the current value of the market divided by the replacement value of those same assets.

Think of a factory. It has a market price at which it would be bought and sold. And it also has a replacement cost - what one would have to spend to rebuild it from scratch. The ratio of the two is Tobin’s Q. Obviously, that would imply that when the ratio is greater than 1 the market is overpriced because one could theoretically ‘rebuild’ it for a cheaper price than it would take to purchase it. The Q ratio for US equities has fluctuated between 0.3 and 3 in the past 130 years.

It has signaled all the great bear market lows: 1982, 1974, 1949, 1932, 1921. Tobin’s Q moves at such a glacial pace that other indicators - even the Coppock Curve - seem twitchy by comparison. But when it does approach an extreme, it pays to give it the respect it deserves.

The best book on Tobin’s Q is Valuing Wall Street by Andrew Smithers (of Smithers & Co.). It came out at the same time as Shiller’s more famous Irrational Exuberance.

Both books had the same message and both were published at the exact peak of the 2000 bubble, but Shiller’s work got more attention because it was written to be more accessible to the general public while Smithers is more targeted to educated traders and investors. Although both books are good Shiller’s book stole much of Smithers’ thunder. You can pick up a copy from Amazon for less than $4 - which is a steal really.

As you might imagine, calculating the replacement value of such a diverse set of ever changing assets is mind bogglingly complex. Thankfully, the Federal Reserve does the heavy lifting. They provide the data in the Flow of Funds Report (pdf document). Look for the numerator on B.102 line 35: Market Value of Equities Outstanding (on page 103) and the denominator: Net Worth on line 32 (same page).

So the ratio resolves to:

9554.1 ÷ 15389.8 = 0.6208

Due to the nature of the data, it is only available quarterly with a lag of a few months. The latest report was released March 12th, 2009 which means the above number is for the fourth quarter of 2008. We should be getting the release of data for the first quarter of 2009 soon. But some analysts also guesstimate the number ahead of time. John Mihaljevic, the former research assistant to Tobin says the current value of Q is around 0.43 - which would be extremely close to the historic low of ~0.30. Following the previous link, you can not only get further details but purchase his complete report.

Obviously the market could fall more and take the Q ratio down with it. But this is further evidence that we are much, much closer to a generational buy point here rather than somewhere along the line of a continuing downtrend. Similar to the Coppock Curve, the Q ratio is not only setting up for a bullish signal but one of epic proportions.

Here is a chart of the Q ratio (from 1952 onwards when Federal Reserve data is available):