In working on our 2017 annual outlook report, we decided to take a quick look at how the S&P 500 has historically performed in years ending in “7” going back to 1928 when the index was formed.  Unfortunately for market bulls, this is an instance where 7 is not a very lucky number.  As shown below, the S&P has historically averaged a slight decline of 0.97% in years ending in 7, with gains occurring only half of the time.  Years ending in “0” and “1” have also seen the S&P average a decline, and in these years the index has posted gains less than half the time.

So what has been the best year to be invested?  Years ending in a “5” have averaged a mammoth gain of 22.42%, and the index has been up 88.9% of the time in these years (8 out of 9).  Unfortunately we have to wait until 2025 to get the next one!

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While December is typically a strong month for equities, most of the month’s gains have historically come prior to Christmas, while the last week of the year tends to be trendless with a slight positive bias.  With just seven trading days left in the year, we wanted to highlight which stocks in the S&P 500 have historically seen the best and worst returns from the close on 12/21 through the end of December over the last ten years.  The first table below lists the 14 stocks in the index that have seen a median gain of 2% or more during this period, and for each stock, we include the year where it saw its best and worst gains.

Topping the list of winning stocks to close out the year, shares of Viacom (VIAB) have seen a median gain of 2.89% with positive returns 60% of the time.  The stock had its best end-of-year gain in 2008 when it rallied 5.4% and its worst in 2009 when it fell 1.59%.  The most notable name on the list of winners, however, is Apple (AAPL).  Over the last ten years, the stock has seen a median gain of 2.15% with positive returns 60% of the time.  AAPL’s best end to a year was in 2009 (6.31%) while its worst was 2008 (-5.17%).  In terms of sector representation, both the Consumer Discretionary and Materials sectors account for four of the fourteen stocks listed.

On the downside, fourteen stocks in the S&P 500 have seen a median decline of 1% or more to end the year.  Surprisingly, Netflix (NFLX) tops the list of losers with a median decline of 1.96% and positive returns just 40% of the time.  The next worst performer has been Akamai (AKAM), which has seen a median decline of 1.49% with positive returns just twice.  Along with Altria (MO) and eBay (EBAY), AKAM is the least consistent to the upside of the stocks listed.

Each month, Bespoke runs a survey of 1,500 US consumers balanced to census.  In the survey, we cover everything you can think of regarding the economy, personal finances, and consumer spending habits.  We’ve now been running the monthly survey for more than two years, so we have historical trend data that is extremely valuable, and it only gets more valuable as time passes.  All of this data gets packaged into our monthly Bespoke Consumer Pulse Report, which is included as part of our Pulse subscription package that is available for either $39/month or $365/year.  We highly recommend trying out the service, as it includes access to model portfolios and additional consumer reports as well.  If you’re not yet a Pulse member, click here to start a 30-day free trial now!

Yesterday we highlighted our Pulse survey data on social media account trends, and today we’re taking a look at account trends for streaming media services.  Each month in our survey, we ask participants if they have an account with any of the streaming media platforms shown in the chart below.  Netflix (NFLX) is to streaming as Facebook (FB) is to social as Amazon.com (AMZN) is to e-commerce.  More than 50% of survey participants have a Netflix account, which is a massive number.  Back in late 2014 this reading was less than 40%, so Netflix continues to trend higher but hasn’t yet hit critical mass in our opinion.  Looking at the remaining services, we’ve seen Amazon Prime, Hulu and Spotify all trend higher as well over the past two years, while Pandora (P) is essentially flat.  The percentage of consumers that didn’t have an account with any of the services in the chart has dipped from the mid-40s to 30.2% as of November.

If you’re not yet a Pulse member and would like to track our streaming media data going forward, click here to start a 30-day free trial now!

Get Bespoke’s 2017 Outlook Report with a 30-day free trial to Bespoke’s premium research!  Click here to learn more.

A lot has been said about the drop in correlations between stocks and sectors since the election.  Below is a chart that really highlights this.

We calculated the correlation between the daily price changes (%) of all eleven sectors during the current bull market and then just since the election on November 8th.  For example, we take the daily percentage change for the S&P 500 Technology sector and calculate the correlation between that daily percentage change and the daily percentage change of the Consumer Discretionary sector, the Consumer Staples sector, and so on and so forth.  We then calculated the average of the correlations between Tech and the other ten sectors to come up with a reading of 0.73 throughout the current bull market.  Remember, a reading of 1 is perfectly correlated, a reading of 0 means price movements are completely independent of each other, and a reading of -1 means they’re completely mirroring each other.  For Tech, the average correlation of 0.73 with the other ten sectors during the current bull market means they’ve mostly moved inline with each other.

Since the election, however, Tech’s average correlation with other sectors has been just 0.25.  And you’ll notice a similar pattern across the board.  Sector price change correlations since the election have been extremely low.  This definitely hasn’t been a “rising tide lifts all boats” type of market rally.

Each month, Bespoke runs a survey of 1,500 US consumers balanced to census.  In the survey, we cover everything you can think of regarding the economy, personal finances, and consumer spending habits.  We’ve now been running the monthly survey for more than two years, so we have historical trend data that is extremely valuable, and it only gets more valuable as time passes.  All of this data gets packaged into our monthly Bespoke Consumer Pulse Report, which is included as part of our Pulse subscription package that is available for either $39/month or $365/year.  We highly recommend trying out the service, as it includes access to model portfolios and additional consumer reports as well.  If you’re not yet a Pulse member, click here to start a 30-day free trial now!

Each month in our survey, we ask participants if they have an account with any of the many social media platforms.  Tracking this over time gives us an excellent look at how well they’re doing both collectively and individually.  Below is a chart showing historical account data for sites like Facebook (FB), Instagram, Twitter (TWTR), and LinkedIn (LNKD).  As shown, Facebook (FB) is very clearly the leader in the space with the remaining sites in a constant battle for second place.  Since the beginning of our survey, Facebook (FB) has remained stable around 70%, but it looks like it could be trending lower based on data over the last year.  On the other hand, Instagram and Snapchat have seen the biggest increases in users over the last 2+ years.  Twitter (TWTR) and LinkedIn (LNKD) have both seen small declines.

In our full Pulse report released each month, we break down these numbers based on various demographics like age and income.  If you’re not yet a Pulse member and you want to see the additional data, click here to start a 30-day free trial now!