S&P 500 Snapshot: Another Fractional Gain

The S&P 500 today was quite similar to yesterday. It traversed about a nine-point range to the morning low and slowly rallied to an early afternoon high and then drifted down in the last two hours of trading for a fractional gain of 0.15%. Nevertheless, today's close sets a new 2012 high -- up 7.50% year-to-date and only 0.86% below its interim high at the end of April 2011.

From an intermediate perspective, the S&P 500 is 99.8% above the March 2009 closing low and 13.6% below the nominal all-time high of October 2007.

Below are two charts of the index, with and without the 50 and 200-day moving averages.





For a better sense of how these declines figure into a larger historical context, here's a long-term view of secular bull and bear markets in the S&P Composite since 1871.

For a bit of international flavor, here's a chart series that includes an overlay of the S&P 500, the Dow Crash of 1929 and Great Depression, and the so-called L-shaped "recovery" of the Nikkei 225. I update these weekly.

These charts are not intended as a forecast but rather as a way to study the current market in relation to historic market cycles.