S&P 500 & Nasdaq Analysis and Trends

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S&P 500 Election Year 2024 vs. 1968 & 2012
By: Almanac Trader | May 3, 2024



With all the college protests in the news it brings comparisons of 1968 to mind. 2024’s Big Election Year Q1 gains have already put the 2012 analog in my sights. Both were election years with somewhat correlated yet somewhat different narratives to 2024. The chart is from my members only webinar yesterday. S&P is clearly tracking 2012, not 1968 so far this year.

1968 was marked by escalations in Vietnam, the Tet Offensive, and protests on US college campuses and elsewhere. Sitting President Lyndon Johnson dropped out of the race on March 31. Robert Kennedy senior, the leading democratic candidate, was assassinated on June 6. George Wallace ran a formidable third-party candidacy garnering 13.5% of the popular vote and won 5 states and 46 electoral votes. But Q1 was down, and April was up.

In 2012 sitting President Barak Obama ran and won reelection. It was a year with the market driven by the Fed and interest rates. Zero interest rate policy (ZIRP) and quantitative easing (QE) were dug in deep. The Fed spun out QE3 and Operation Twist. Q1 was up big followed by a down April. Again, aside from the protests and wars 2024 is correlated more closely to 2012 than 1968.

This updated S&P 500 Election Year Seasonal Pattern chart underscores the market’s tendency to be weaker in April and May after big Q1 gains in election years 1956, 1964, 1972, 1976, 1988, 1996, 2012. However, the market is likely to be flatter than the green line above due to inflation, the Fed, interest rates, a prominent third party candidate and two ongoing wars. Page 26 of the 2024 Stock Trader’s Almanac reminds us that “War Can Be a Major Factor on Presidential Races. Democrats historically lost on foreign shores while Republicans lost at home.



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