Positive Economic Reports Continue To Outpace Negative Ones

 | Jul 05, 2015 05:14AM ET

REVIEW

The week started off at S&P 500 2102, then dropped to 2057 on a gap down Monday. After that the market gapped up three days in a row, but only managed to get back to S&P 500 2085 by Thursday. Then ended the holiday shortened week at S&P 500 2077. For the week the S&P 500/DOW lost 1.20%, the NDX/NAZ lost 1.25%, and the DJ World lost 1.6%. On the economic front positive reports continued to outpace negative ones. On the uptick: pending home sales, the Chicago PMI, consumer confidence, the ADP, ISM manufacturing, construction spending, the WLEI, plus the unemployment rate declined. On the downtick: Case-Shiller, auto sales, factory orders, plus weekly jobless claims rose and payrolls declined. Next week’s reports will be highlighted by the FOMC minutes, ISM services and Consumer credit.

LONG TERM: bull market

For the past eight months the market has remained in a 162 point trading range with the mid-point around S&P 500 2054. Which was nearly hit on Monday (2056). During this period some market pundits have declared: the market is now extremely overvalued, the EW pattern suggests a bull market top, equities are in a bubble, etc. Our analysis suggests none of these claims can be confirmed. The claims that equities are in a bubble and ‘now’ extremely overvalued does not match basic valuations.

The last time equities were in a bubble was the late 1990’s. Then the PE multiple on the S&P 500 was 37 while the 10-Year bond rate was over 6.5%. The earnings yield (1/37) 2.7% was less than half the bond yield. That’s a bubble! Currently the S&P 500 PE is 20, for an earnings yield (1/20) of 5% while the 10YR rate is 2.4%. No bubble here. As for the market is ‘now’ overvalued. We do not see that either. In late 2013, more than 18 months ago, the S&P 500 reached the same PE multiple it has today: 20. During that entire 18 month period the PE multiple has ranged from 18 to 21. The reason the market is now higher is simple because earnings are now higher. There has not been a multiple expansion to suggest an overvaluation.

Lastly, each bull market in EW/OEW terms unfolds in five waves. What creates the five waves are two significant selloffs during the long term trend. These two selloffs are the second and fourth waves of the bull market. Generally they are the two biggest corrections in the bull market. You can go back in history and they are easily identified. During this bull market we have only witnessed one significant correction in 2011: -21.6%. Every correction since then has been less than half that value. And since mid-2012, there has not been one correction of even 10%. Clearly the fourth wave of this bull market has yet to occur. Until it does we can not have a fifth wave to end the bull market. No market top yet.

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