Today’s gain following Friday’s decline is the 19th direction change since the market’s high on May 21. That amounts to nearly every other day over the last 28 trading days.
It is also the 16th pair, so far this year, of an up day following a down day; there were just seven such twosomes in 2012, and ten the year before.
As a result, prices have stagnated, even declined a bit, since May 21, resulting in a profile quite similar to those following the last two bull market highs, in 2000 and 2007.
Our diagram plots these prices for the 20 days before, and the 50 days after, these market tops. It also adds the current profile, using the last, May 21 S&P500 high as a provisional peak.
This comparison reveals a stunning similarity of these three different periods that could indicate the topping out of this market. It certainly does not show an energetic difference between today and the previous two tepid contours.
DJIA .44 percent
NASDAQ .92 percent
S&P500 .54 percent
