Zeev's Turnips Patch-No Politics (ZEEV)

[James T Kirk]

Your comment on the AAII survey got me thinking (don't make me do that again). Historically using 30% and 70% as a standard was probably effective. In earlier times (70's/80's) those were probably more normal readings.

I remember seeing Martin Zweig on TV saying that during the '74 bear market the percentage of bears in the Investor's Intelligence survey went to over 60% and stayed that way for months. We've never seen anything like that during the recent bear.

We seem to be more optimistic (in regards to market outlook) in the last decade and a half which skews the numbers. Maybe the economy had an influence on people's opinions in the 70's making those investor survey readings on the market more negative than today.