Without peeking at the November 2012 stock market performance, how do you think it did? First consider the early November stock sell-off in the wake of a contentious and close presidential election. Now we end the month with anxiety and uncertainty over the fiscal cliff.
You might guess stocks had a terrible month. The S&P 500 Index started the month at the 1427 mark and, as you may recall, it dipped below the crucial technical support level of 1380 and then closed down as low as 1353, which represents a 5.19% drop in price, by mid-November.
November 2012 Stock Market Forecast: World Not Ending Yet
But where do we end November and begin December 2012? As I write this, with just minutes to go until the close of trading 11/30/2012, the S&P 500 has lost right at 1.00% for the month -- a non-event month from a performance perspective.
Considering the relentless negative noise coming from mainstream media and talk radio, you'd think the world was about to end for any one of several reasons: Obama will kill the economy, Congress will run taxpayers over the fiscal cliff, Europe will go bankrupt, or Iran and Palestine will destroy Israel and pull us into Armageddon.
Instead we have Americans spending $1 billion on the Internet to buy things and the stock market ending the month with no significant change in value.
Apparently, the world is not ending (at least not yet according the Mayan Calendar end-of-the-world forecast).