After what could be the worst four-day start to a year in history, bullish sentiment continues to take a hit.  According to the weekly sentiment survey from the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII), bullish sentiment dropped to 22.17% this week from last week’s level of 25.07%.  This now makes it 44 out of the last 45 weeks that bullish sentiment has been under 40% and six straight weeks below 30%.  Investors are not happy campers.

While bullish sentiment saw a decline of less than three percentage points, bearish sentiment really spiked.  At this week’s level of 38.26%, bearish sentiment increased by 14.6 percentage points which is the largest one-week increase since the end of July.  It is also the ninth largest one-week increase in bearish sentiment during the current bull market.  With this week’s increase in bullish sentiment, the spread between bulls and bears is the most negative since the end of July.