Political Reality Could Sink Stocks in 2nd Half – Ep. 479

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Recorded June 28, 2019
Dow Jones Had Best June Since 1938
U.S. stocks finished a down week on an up note, but the gains were not that large today. But of course, they were very big for the month of June. In fact, the Dow Jones just had its best June since 1938. That was during the Great Depression. S&P, not as big a record; you only have to go back to 1955 to find a June where the S&P did better than June 2019.  So these are big moves up. Percentage-wise, though, I think it's about 7%, approximately, maybe a little bit less.
Stock Market Actually Lost Value In Terms of Gold
Now the price of gold was up 8% during the month of June. In other words, while the price of stocks went up in terms of paper money - dollars - in terms of real money - gold - stocks actually lost value during the month.  Now, the first half of the year also comes to an end today, as does the second quarter, and this is the best first half of the year in 22 years. the S&P was up about 17.5% or so, the Dow about 14%. I think I'm counting dividends -  I'm just talking about the appreciation, so the total return would be a little better when you throw in the meager dividends that you can collect on U.S. stocks. NASDAQ was up about 20% - not much in the way of dividends there. Russell 2000 was up about 9%.  This is on the first half of the year.
Stocks Recovering From Worst December Since Great Depression
I'm sure you're going to read a lot of tweets from Donald Trump about how great the stock market is in 2019; how great the month of June is and why we should thank him for this spectacular performance in the stock market.  But the only reason that the market has done so well this year is because it got destroyed in the 4th quarter of last year. Remember, we had the worst December since the Great Depression, as well.