How the S&P 500 can get to 2200 and beyond

Preface: Explaining our market timing models
We maintain several market timing models, each with differing time horizons. The "Ultimate Market Timing Model" is a long-term market timing model based on research outlined in our post Building the ultimate market timing model. This model tends to generate only a handful of signals each decade.

The Trend Model is an asset allocation model which applies trend following principles based on the inputs of global stock and commodity price. This model has a shorter time horizon and tends to turn over about 4-6 times a year. In essence, it seeks to answer the question, "Is the trend in the global economy expansion (bullish) or contraction (bearish)?"

My inner trader uses the trading component of the Trend Model to look for changes in direction of the main Trend Model signal. A bullish Trend Model signal that gets less bullish is a trading "sell" signal. Conversely, a bearish Trend Model signal that gets less bullish is a trading "buy" signal. The history of actual out-of-sample (not backtested) signals of the trading model are shown by the arrows in the chart below. Past trading of the trading model has shown turnover rates of about 200% per month.

The latest signals of each model are as follows:

• Ultimate market timing model: Buy equities*
• Trend Model signal: Neutral*
• Trading model: Bearish*

The performance chart and model readings have been delayed by a week out of respect to our paying subscribers.

Update schedule: I generally update model readings on my site on weekends and tweet any changes during the week at @humblestudent. Subscribers will also receive email notices of any changes in my trading portfolio.


Where's the growth?
My last post (see Why you need to give the bull case a chance) elicited a considerable amount of comment. Most of the pushback I got on the equity bull case amounted to a question of, "Where's the growth coming from?"

I recognize the concerns. As this chart from Factset shows, the equity market has had to endure five consecutive quarters of falling year-over-year EPS growth. How can anyone possibly be bullish under such circumstances?

In this post, I would like to explain my bull case for stocks, with an initial SPX target of 2200 and, depending on the Fed's reaction function, up to 2400-2500.

The full post can be found at our new site here.








Website notice
If you found the above post to be of interest, come over to the new site and check out our track record. We have something for traders and investors alike: