2015 Optimism Is Fully Bought
"...'Investors and traders over the last number of years have been conditioned to buy on the dip,' said Quincy Krosby, a market strategist based in Newark, New Jersey, at Prudential Financial Inc., which oversees $1 trillion in assets. 'This year was no exception.'"Stocks have dropped on 107 days in 2014, two more than in 2013, and never once declined more than three straight times, a first in data compiled by Bloomberg going back to 2000. Stocks jumped an average of 0.1% on days after they fell, helping underpin a 235-point advance in the S&P 500 that pushed its 10-year annualized return to 7.8%. It was minus 4.5% as recently as March 2009."Companies are doing what they can to keep shares aloft. Through the first three quarters of the year they spent $515 billion on repurchases, a rate that were it maintained would trail only 2007 for the highest level ever, Birinyi data show."