The S&P 500 Reaches New Highs in the Doldrums of Summer

It took 147 trading days to do it, but on Friday, 24 August 2018, the closing value of the S&P 500 (Index: SPX) reached 2,874.69, finally surpassing its previous record high closing value of 2,872.87 that it set back on Friday, 26 January 2018!

At the same time, the fourth week of August 2018 also saw the S&P 500 apparently set a new record for bull market duration, where some analysts are measuring the length of the market’s current bull run from its closing low value of of 676.53 on 9 March 2009, which marked the bottom of the market’s Great Recession-era decline.

Then again, that particular record depends on how you might define a bull run, where there’s a great debate about that topic between Nir Kaissar and Barry Ritholtz over at Bloomberg, where they reveal that there’s more than one valid way to keep score in the record books!

That kind of argument even carries over to the seemingly incontrovertible new high closing value set by the S&P 500! While we acknowledge the new record high in its nominal value as being worthy of note, we can make the argument that the portion of the stock market represented by the S&P 500 still has yet to reach a true new high even in nominal terms, which is something that we’ll explore in the very near future!

Until then, we find that the current trajectory of the S&P 500 is still falling well within the range that we projected that it would be likely to several weeks ago, where we’ve just passed the midpoint of our five-week long redzone forecast.

The market moving news of the week continued to be slow, until the final day of Week 4 of August 2018, when Federal Reserve Chair Jay Powell’s comments gave markets the boost they needed for the S&P 500 to reach a new record closing value.

Monday, 13 August 2018

• Fed’s Bostic expects one more interest rate hike in 2018
• Wall St. rises on trade optimism, pares gains after Trump Fed comments

• Exclusive: Trump demands Fed help on economy, complains about interest rate hikes

Tuesday, 14 August 2018

• Oil hits one-week high as Iran-driven rally gathers pace
• Fed’s Kaplan sees three or four more rate hikes, then a pause
• S&P 500 touches record high, equals longest-ever bull run

• Instant View: S&P 500 trades above January high, sets record

Wednesday, 15 August 2018

• Oil jumps 3 percent on big U.S. crude draw, Iran sanctions
• Fed bond unwind may be evenless thrilling for Trump than rate hikes
• FOMC minutes: More hikes coming soon; trade a worry
• Wall St. end mixed as S&P marks longest bull run

Thursday, 16 August 2018

• U.S., China impose further tariffs, escalating trade war
• Oil stabilizes, weighed down by trade war
• QE lives! U.S. Fed buys $1.4 billion of mortgage bonds, sells none
• Wall St. weighed by new round of U.S.-China tariffs

Friday, 17 August 2018

• Oil rises as China demand resumes, signs that Iran supply curbed
• Fed’s Bullard wants pause on rate hikes: interviews

• Fed’s Bullard warns of recession risk in raising rates
• Fed’s Bullard wants to pause rate hikes, Mester does not

Fed’s Powell defends policy of gradual interest rate hikes

• Fed’s Powell: more rate hikes likely if economy stays strong

S&P 500 reaches new high to clinch record bull run

Elsewhere, Barry Ritholtz broke down the bigger picture of economy’s and the market’s news of the week into an equal number of positives and negatives.