Prices remained almost unchanged from the day before, the NASDAQ’s string of consecutive gains notwithstanding. It moved higher by just .08 percent. While the DJIA rose .21 percent, the S&P500 lost -.04 percent. In fact, the lack of direction of security prices since dropping from their recent mid April high continues. The diagram illustrates that the market’s stability, even though some substantial daily changes occurred.
But rather than unusual, small changes dominate the daily price action. In fact The average of all daily changes of the S&P500 comes to zero since January 2000. The NASDAQ has the identical zero mean, while the DJIA’s daily mean is just .01 percent.
In fact, today’s closing prices remain below their January 2000 levels of 1455 for the S&P500, 11,357 for the DJIA, and the NASDAQ’s 4131.
Nevertheless, the intuitive feeling of significant daily price changes is confirmed by the median of the market’s movements. These stand at .04 percent for the DJIA, .05 percent for the S&P500,
and .06 percent for the NASDAQ. Thus, even though the average of all changes come to zero, the actual number of daily changes cluster around these smaller, yet positive levels.
DJIA .21 percent
NASDAQ .08 percent
S&P500 – .04 percent