Record highs almost always are followed by more record highs, and a lot of hysteria on this site from permabears. We've seen this in the last economic recovery as well.
Good comments, good people. I ran the numbers on the OP simply to get a sense of balance and realize what's possible in a historical perspective as I've been cautious to play the long side lately. Even if I go mostly long anyway. So, considering those and with seasonality as well I'm less nervous, but can't say I'm completely calm either. The reasons and explanations are always crystal clear in hindsight, so I can easily see the head lines and explanations if the market should indeed plunge from here at some point. Let's see where the year takes us. I don't get the same impression. Sure - there's a few who's been bearish since S&P bottomed out at 666 in 2009 expecting the world around them to break down (and still do), but I feel most seem to go with the program regardless of their political views. You on the other hand seems to be a bit too bullish? You don't have any concerns at all with current index values and central bank policy? I'm no economist, but it seems to me that many economists and analysts consider the market overvalued at this point. As for economic recovery - did anything recover other than the stock market? As of today - the S&P500 is 38,82 % (!) higher priced in nominal dollars compared with the high prior to the covid plunge last year.
How am I too bullish ? I called the SPX year end close in 2019 almost to the number ( how rare is that ) and most of my forecasts this year have occurred. I'm not long anything in US markets right now; the TSX is less then half the price of the SPX on a valuation basis and I play undervalued and earnings based plays on commodity stocks for now. Let's say for arguments sake we said the QQQ was overvalued. Then by the same metrics almost everything I trade is undervalued, some ridiculously so. Some of my stocks used to be 3-10 times higher then they are now. And I've posted this several times. If people want to short US indexes because they are "overvalued", why aren't they buying the undervalued stocks on the market. Because certain sectors got super cheap even before Covid, then went lower. Cdn banks did the catch up earlier this year, now all the analysts love them at the new highs as a value play !!! March 2020 a week before the bottom I quoted BMO at $60 Cdn and TD at $50 Cdn as great value plays paying %7+ dividends. Even months later, there was one poster on here complaining they hadn't gone up enough to be worth talking about. Currently priced $138 and $92. Are they overvalued at current prices ? Probably not, but only good buys on pull backs. I liked TD a $81 a while back.
All I know is that everyone and their mothers is talking about crypto, stocks, reminiscent of 1999. That certainly doesn't mean anything in todays environment.
Inflation is running at 5% and the Fed is still printing over $100 billion a month. Seems to me that we're just entering the blow-off phase, and there's no real limit on how high equities can go.
I'm not saying you are too bullish - I've just noticed that you never seem to be bearish or have any concerns about stock market valuations. Well done on identifying sector plays and finding value at a discount.
There are enough people promoting the down side on here. I actually called the late 2015 - early 2016 correction a few months before it occurred and gave the reason why. I frequently mention certain aspects of IT are probably overpriced ( but not all of it ). My worst move in 12 years was sitting in bonds/cash for almost a year half way through this bull. Not only did I miss a nice move but Cdn$/US$ went down so that was a 40% opportunity cost ( maybe 32% I believe the time I was in bonds made 8% ).