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INCREASINGLY VOLATILE MARKETS

Some interesting facts from the increasingly financialized US markets (via Advisor Perspectives):

“Using the S&P 500 index as an example:

    • Since the beginning of 2010, nearly 30% of trading days have had closing price changes of more than 1%.  During the 1990s, only 20% of trading days had price changes of this magnitude.
    • A trend toward larger intra-day price movements has also occurred. Since 2000, intra-day price changes of 4% or more have occurred nearly six times more frequently than they did from 1962 to 2000.
    • From 1980 to August 2011, eleven of the twenty largest daily price declines have occurred during the last three years.”
Is it just the added turmoil from the lost decade or is there something bigger going on under the surface of these markets?  I don’t know, but I can’t help but wonder if our increasingly financialized economy isn’t contributing….

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