bulldozer --
I have found a reliable online source for responsive data covering the
exact time frame you specified in your question. DAL Investment
Company, a respected San Francisco money manager, had this to say in a
September 2001 report:
"To put the current decline in perspective, we looked at bull markets
(minimum 20% rise), bear markets (minimum 20% drop) and corrections (a
drop of between 10% and 20%) since 1945, measured by movements in the
S&P 500. Since then there have been 30 bear markets and corrections.
The average time from peak to trough for bear markets has been 15 1/2
months, and, for corrections, a little more than four months. The
average decline has been 30.5% for bear markets, 13.5% for
corrections."
DAL Investment Company: No Load Fund X
http://www.fundx.com/gby9601.pdf
The DAL Investment Company report does not break out how many of the
30 market declines remained as "corrections" and how many developed
into full-blown "bear markets." I expect that you are mainly
interested in that total number. In any case, a different source
reports that "there have been … 15 "bear markets" in the S&P 500
index" since 1945. That leaves another 15 instances in the post-war
period where declines remained at the 10-20% "correction" level.
Financial Planning Perspectives (page 2 of this October 2002 document)
http://www.financial-planning-perspectives.com/news/Vol1Iss5.pdf
[Both of the above links are to PDF documents, so you need Acrobat
Reader to access them. If it is not already installed on your
computer, a free copy of Adobe Acrobat Reader can easily be downloaded
here:
Adobe Acrobat Reader
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html ]
"A correction is defined as a drop of 10% from a previous high."
Vantage Link
http://www.icmarc.org/xp/vl/marketview/chart/1999/chart19990806.xml
A "bear market" begins with a major stock index "closing down at least
20% from its previous high."
Andex Charts
http://www.andexcharts.com/u_bull.htm
Under these generally accepted definitions, there have been no
"corrections" in the S&P 500 index since the date of the DAL
Investment Company report because the market remains in the same "bear
market" that existed in September 2001. So the information in that
report may be considered to be current.
Search Strategy:
There is a lot of online information about stock market behavior,
including many references to "corrections" in market indices.
However, that term is often used loosely, referring to any substantial
pause in a bull market, for example. So sorting the "wheat from the
chaff" posed a challenge. And, of course, your special interest in
the post-World War II era made finding responsive information much
more difficult.
After many trial-error-searches, I got the best and most concise
results with the following Google search terms:
"s&p" OR dow corrections "since 1945"
://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q=%22s%26p%22+or+dow+corrections+%22since+1945%22
After finding the DAL report, I searched on its name to establish its
standing in the industry and thus the reliability of its research:
"dal investment company"
://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q=%22dal+investment+company%22
Finally, I successfully found the number of "bear markets" since 1945
with the following Google search terms:
"bear markets" "since 1945"
://www.google.com/search?q=%22bear+markets%22+%22since+1945%22&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&start=10&sa=N
I am confident that this is the information you are seeking. If any
of the above is unclear or if any of the links don't function, please
ask for clarification before rating this answer.
markj-ga |
