Time to bump this thread and see how everyone did. Who could have predicted the pandemic with the correction in March and the amazing recovery which followed? Not many. It's interesting to see that we're as of now pretty close to my 'mean' expectation at 3760 (current high is 3702,25). I do not think I would have made this prediction in March, but this was what I said by end of 2019. As of today, the S&P 500 is up + 16,91 % for the year.
Easily the worst forecasts occurred in March when several people on here were convinced we were going down to 1000 or minimum 1500. Poster Schizo made one of the worst forecasts in the history of this site, saying we'd never see 3390 again in our lifetime ( memories of previous posters "deadbroke" and "GrandSuperCycle" ). I'm not sure what leads people to make ridiculous claims other then youthful ignorance and extreme overconfidence in their own abilities. You'd think the 2008/2009 crash is recent enough away that people would have learned from it but apparently not. I called for a recovery in March within days of the bottom, but the size and speed of it surprised me ( I said we'd see 3000-3200 when we were dropping every day ).
I was stubbornly thinking markets would sell back down at some point due to the pandemic. Lost thousands trying to bottomfish inverses. Frustrating. At least I did do some long swings like AAPL recently, and MGM off March lows. I still have a hard time reconciling why markets continue to rally to ath during the worst economic downturn and health crisis in our lifetime. Earnings misses, record unemployment and deaths and homelessness, shattered consumer confidence and the world shaken, but record high stock prices?! Seriously wtf. Makes less than no sense. I'm puzzled by the disconnect. I'll continue focusing on daytrading vs trying to figure out directional volatility. But if and when markets finally sell, it will likely be huge and fast. In the meantime I'll continue swing trading breakouts like AAPL.