Tish'a B'Av and the Stock Market

Tish'a B'Av falls on Saturdays, Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Calculating stock market returns for the past 40 years on that day, the same $1 invested every year at the close of the evening prior and pulled out at the end of the day on the 9th of Av, would have turned into $.93656 at the end of 40 years.

The average Tuesday return has been .034% and the average Thursday return has been .025% (including Tish'a B'Av) for the past 45 years. (courtesy of http://techfarm.blogspot.com), while the average Tish'a B'Av return has been -.269% over the past 40.

I dont know what the St Dev has been, nor do I know if Tuesday/ Thursday returns have been different over the past 40 years than the past years. So this is just meant to be fun and a drop interesting and not significant.

Maybe we are lucky that the ninth of Av falls on an open stock market day only 6 out of every 10 years.

Fun with Charts: Stock Market 1929 - 1942 vs. 2000 - 2013

Not the first, Im sure, to compare the two, but interesting parallels.

Initial fall from the peak.

• The S&P, or whatever Bloomberg includes in the S&P from 1929 (possibly the entire market back then) peaked at close to $32 on September 16 1929. The market then fell for 33 months to $4.40, a drop of ~86%.

• QQQQ, the largest 100 companies on the NASDAQ, peaked at about 117 on March 27 2000. The market then fell for 31 months to $20.06, a drop of ~83%.

2. Long Recovery to next peak

• It took 57 months for the S&P to reach its next peak, in March 1937, for a gain of 324%
• It took 60 months for the QQQQ to reach its next peak, in October 2007, for a gain of 173%

3. Fall

• From the next peak of 18.67 in March of 1937, the market fell 54% in 12 months and bottomed on March 31 1938 at 8.5

• From our peak (QQQQ) in October 2007, we have fallen 41% in 12 months