OK, I will grant you that there is something of an asterisk this time around. Most people I ask “what are you doing for the holidays”, simply shrug and say “not much.” And certainly, a lot of people who lost their jobs due to the coronavirus related shutdown are somewhat unmoved by “time off.” Still, in the whole big spectrum of things, holidays are pretty great. Especially in the stock market.
“Holiday Days” versus “Other Days”
For our purposes we will consider “Holiday Days” to be the 3 trading days before and the 3 trading days after all Federal Holidays that result in the stock market being closed for business.
“Other Days” are those days that do not fit into the above category.
For the record, since December 1, 1933 there have been:
*4,264 “Holiday Days”
*18,298 “Other Days”
In other words, there have been 4.3 times as many “Other Days” in the past roughly 86.5 years. So, one would naturally expect the stock market to gain more ground during “Other Days.” But then you would be completely ignoring the title of this article.
Figure 1 displays the cumulative price gain for the Dow Jones Industrial Average since December 1, 1933 during “Holiday Days” (blue line) versus “Other Days” (red line)
Figure 1 – Cumulative price gain for the Dow Jones Industrial Average since December 1, 1933 during “Holiday Days” versus “Other Days”
Notice a difference?
In sum;
*During 4,264 Holiday Days the Dow gained +2,260%
*During 18,298 Other Days the Dow gained +1,003%
Like I said, Holidays rock!
Hope you have a good one, doing, you know, whatever.
See also Jay Kaeppel Interview in July 2020 issue of Technical Analysis of Stocks and Commodities magazine
See also Jay’s “A Strategy You Probably Haven’t Considered” Video
See also Video – The Long-Term…Now More Important Than Ever
Jay Kaeppel
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