Weekend Economists Wring Out the Old December 31, 2015-January 3, 2016

[Proserpina]

45. 2015 Was First Pre-Election Year to End In the Red Since the Great Depression

only because the deficits were so large, there was no way to paper them over anymore...

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2015/12/2015-first-pre-election-year-end-red-since-great-depression.html



The year before elections is almost always the best year for stocks.

Investors notes:

Pre-election years takes the top spot as the best-performing year for stocks.

UBS reports:

Ahead of US Presidential Elections (Pre-Election Year or Year 3 and Election Year or Year 4) politicians often promote an accommodating and pro-business agenda so that the economy is strong, stock market is bullish, and voters are upbeat heading
to the polls.

The Stock Trader’s Almanac notes (via a press release by publisher Wiley):

Pre-election years are notoriously the best year of the four-year cycle and fifth years of decades are the strongest, so 2015 has some solid history behind it,” says the Almanac’s Editor-in-chief Jeffrey A. Hirsch. “The Dow has not had a loss in a pre-election year since 1939.

But in 2015, the Dow closed down for the year … 2.2% into the red.