6 replies to this topic

[OEXCHAOS]

AAII

 

http://schrts.co/HIgXwuRI

 

 

[Douglas]

Mark, do you have any insight as to the makeup of this survey's participants?  I have tracked this survey for many years and something has clearly gone out of kilter since the low in 2009.  The number of bulls has only exceeded 60% once in all those years.  Their bullishness has been dampened since this low despite the tremendous steady up move.  Other sentiment surveys that I track currently show 70% to 90% bulls.  AAII are certainly a pessimistic lot.  I just wondered if it is related to the demographics of the survey population.  

 

Regards,

Douglas

Edited by Douglas, 11 January 2020 - 06:59 PM.

[Rogerdodger]

"Pessimism jumped to a six-week high but remains below average."

 

My guess is the recent drop in bullishness has to do with Iran last week.

I believe that the survey (released on Thursday) was affected by the airliner being shot down.

 

There is a nice AAII Sentiment chart at Stockcharts under Member's Dashboard, DecisionPoint Chart Gallery near the bottom.

It provides a comparison picture of some 6+ years of sentiment to the S&P 500 levels.

 

Also: https://www.aaii.com...ey/sent_results

Is the AAII Sentiment Survey a Contrarian Indicator?

Analyzing the AAII Sentiment Survey Without Hindsight

Using the AAII Sentiment Survey as a Contrarian Indicator

Edited by Rogerdodger, 12 January 2020 - 01:05 PM.

[OEXCHAOS]

Is it this one?

http://schrts.co/wAHhkGzu

 

There is a nice AAII Sentiment chart at Stockcharts under Member's Dashboard, DecisionPoint Chart Gallery near the bottom.

It provides a comparison picture of some 6+ years of sentiment to the S&P 500 levels.

[OEXCHAOS]

Mark, do you have any insight as to the makeup of this survey's participants?  I have tracked this survey for many years and something has clearly gone out of kilter since the low in 2009.  The number of bulls has only exceeded 60% once in all those years.  Their bullishness has been dampened since this low despite the tremendous steady up move.  Other sentiment surveys that I track currently show 70% to 90% bulls.  AAII are certainly a pessimistic lot.  I just wondered if it is related to the demographics of the survey population.  

 

Regards,

Douglas

I don't have any confirmed insights into this survey's participants, BUT, I would guess that they are mostly longer term investors and mostly fundamentalists rather than technicians. I'd also suspect that they aren't all that sophisticated. I also strongly suspect that they are older. My read on that demographic is that things started feeling really, really wrong during that last recession. Things didn't make sense and they were scary both in the market and the real economy. This left particularly this demographic with a lingering sense of distrust and fear. That's just my operating theory.

 

Now, perhaps of interest, if we look at the FinTwits poll (which is, I think, largely made up of less sophisticated traders), fundamentalists are running 19.9% Bulls and 28.8% Bears. Those numbers roughly approximate AAII's. That at least supports my supposition of AAII being mostly fundamentalists.

 

Now, if one is a fundamentalist, and not very sophisticated (and not doing primary research oneself), with all the negative bias on the economic news that's presented out there, how could one NOT be more Bearish than Bullish? In fact, I recently read that analyst predictions have consistently been far more negative than the actual results have been for years now. If you look at equity flows (see chart below), you can see that a lot of folks with big money haven't believed this Bull market.

 

Mark

[Iblayz]

And I suppose that absolutely NONE of the AAII respondents EVER read anything on the internet and that NONE of them have the slightest clue that most of the so-called sophisticated and knowledgeable market players refer to the AAII crowd as if they are blithering idiots.

[OEXCHAOS]

And I suppose that absolutely NONE of the AAII respondents EVER read anything on the internet and that NONE of them have the slightest clue that most of the so-called sophisticated and knowledgeable market players refer to the AAII crowd as if they are blithering idiots.

I think that they read plenty and it makes many of them more Bearish than they should be, generally.

 

M