by Jason Bodner

August 13, 2024

We think that life is stable, but over the last 450 million years, there have been five mass extinctions:

  • End Ordovician (444-million years ago)
  • Late Devonian (360-million years ago)
  • End Permian (250-million years ago)
  • End Triassic (200-million years ago)
  • End Cretaceous (65-million years ago) – the event that killed off the dinosaurs.

We expect life to continue, to be smooth and predictable, but life doesn’t always just “go on…and on.”

If this feels familiar, it’s probably because we just got rocked with market volatility. Last week was the most volatile week of the year. According to my research, August 1-8 it was the most volatile six trading sessions since November of 2022.

Despite that volatility, the S&P 500 closed Friday right where it closed on Friday, August 2nd. After losing 2.9% on Monday and gaining 2.3% Thursday, the S&P changed a total of 2.4 points (-0.05%) last week.

First, let’s look into the volatility, what it tells us about the future, and why we shouldn’t panic.

We’ll start by breaking down stock volatility since August began. I’ve told you that August and September are the most volatile months for stocks since 1990. This August so far hasn’t deviated from the norm. The good news is that the fourth quarter has been historically exceptional for stocks:

MAIN Index Chart

Graphs are for illustrative and discussion purposes only. Please read important disclosures at the end of this commentary.

Breaking down daily performances since August began, we see a wild ride.

SPY Table

Graphs are for illustrative and discussion purposes only. Please read important disclosures at the end of this commentary.

What caught my eye, looking at the “absolute moves,” was the sum total of volatility. The six sessions from August 1-8 summed to 10.1%, averaging 1.7% per day. Given the S&P 500’s market capitalization of $44.6 trillion dollars, that means the index swung a total of about $4.5 trillion over 6 trading sessions.

We also see in the table above that unusual selling hit fever levels in a very short time, and the selling rocked small and mid-caps, which were July’s Angels, the hardest:

Big Buy-Sell Market Cap

Graphs are for illustrative and discussion purposes only. Please read important disclosures at the end of this commentary.

We haven’t seen selling this intense since November 2022, when volatility was also this high.

I’ll elaborate on that combination in just a moment. But first, visually, I want you to see how all similar selling episodes in the last three years compare. The orange line in the chart below shows the last time selling eclipsed last week, namely November 2022. The yellow lines show similar huge selling episodes.

Notice how they all mark immediate market bottoms? Significant bounces always followed:

Big Money Stock Buy-Sell

Graphs are for illustrative and discussion purposes only. Please read important disclosures at the end of this commentary.

I said I’d elaborate on this volatility. I went back to look at similar instances of volatility to last week. I looked for any other six-session periods of absolute moves 10% or greater. Here’s what I found:

There were 439 prior instances of 10% or greater absolute moves within six days of trading. Including August 1st-8th, the 440 instances (out of 8,690 trading days since January 1st, 1990) translate to about 5% of the time. That’s rare. In other words, markets aren’t this volatile 95% of the time.

So, what did history tell us about these volatile times and forward returns? It’s quite bullish.

SPY Table 2

Graphs are for illustrative and discussion purposes only. Please read important disclosures at the end of this commentary.

Markets were higher 1, 3, 6, 9, 12, and 24 months later. And with high accuracy too: ranging from 61.5% of the time higher after one month to 78.1% of the time after two years. That’s the good news! The bad news is that history also says volatility is likely to continue from August through the November election.

Volatility is causing heavy rotation. The tables below compare sector shifts from July 1st to last Friday:

July 1st, 2024                                                                                                           August 9th, 2024

Sector Table

Graphs are for illustrative and discussion purposes only. Please read important disclosures at the end of this commentary.

Yes, it looks like an air-traffic-control grid. Utilities, Financials, Real Estate, and Health Care all made meaningful strides, while Technology, Energy, and Discretionary dropped.

Next, we look at unusually large buying and selling since July 1st… the pattern is clear:

Percent PIE Charts

Graphs are for illustrative and discussion purposes only. Please read important disclosures at the end of this commentary.

It’s always interesting to visualize the rotation in terms of unusual buying and selling within each sector. Again, we see recent buying in Utilities, Financials, Real Estate, and Health Care, and we see selling in Technology, Energy, Industrials, and Discretionary. Yesterday’s leaders are today’s laggards:

Utilities vs XLU

Energy vs XLE

Graphs are for illustrative and discussion purposes only. Please read important disclosures at the end of this commentary.

But what is causing this volatility? As you may have heard me say, up to 90% of all daily trading volume is institutional, according to both JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley. Of that 90% of trading, a vast amount is quantatative-trading or algorithmic-trading. The machines are in control. And machines love it when liquidity dries up because that means the machines, all by themselves, can amp-up volatility.

Here’s one of many scenarios that algorithmic firms exploit:  Daily options (those that expire at the end of the day) are the algorithmic trader’s favorite toys. When liquidity thins out, like in August, price movements can become exaggerated. Due to uncertainty (volatility) being part of an option’s premium calculation, when a stock or index tanks, the options premiums naturally inflate. An algorithmic-trader will then short the index, pushing down the price and spiking the volatility. They will then short the option with the inflated premium. Next, they buy back the index, which then makes the options premiums fall. All that’s left now is to cover the option short position. They make money on both ends: coming and going.

It’s like owning a printing press that prints money.

Algorithims also copy each other, which intensifies the phenomenon. Add in low liquidity and a lot of uncertainty and you get a powder keg. High-frequency-trading (HFT) firms can make all their annual money during events like these. Therefore, I forecast this will happen more. Easy money is hard to resist!

That means the ridiculousness of last week will happen again.

We perceive life as stable and predictable. Earth’s 4.5 billion years were actually quite volatile, but only for a small percentage of the time. Markets have their own wild volatility, and last week was an event that has happened only 5% of the time since 1990. The good news is that the future looks bright, so when volatility rears its ugly head remember what Marcus Aurelius said:

“You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.”

All content above represents the opinion of Jason Bodner of Navellier & Associates, Inc.

Please see important disclosures below.

Also In This Issue

A Look Ahead by Louis Navellier
Look to Japan for the Cause of the Latest Volatility

Income Mail by Bryan Perry
A Rotation into Corporate Debt is Underway

Growth Mail by Gary Alexander
The Perma-Bears are Roaring Again

Global Mail by Ivan Martchev
A Dramatic Increase in Yen Correlations

Sector Spotlight by Jason Bodner
August is Market Extinction Month

View Full Archive
Read Past Issues Here

About The Author

Jason Bodner
MARKETMAIL EDITOR FOR SECTOR SPOTLIGHT

Jason Bodner writes Sector Spotlight in the weekly Marketmail publication and has authored several white papers for the company. He is also Co-Founder of Macro Analytics for Professionals which produces proprietary equity accumulation/distribution research for its clients. Previously, Mr. Bodner served as Director of European Equity Derivatives for Cantor Fitzgerald Europe in London, then moved to the role of Head of Equity Derivatives North America for the same company in New York. He also served as S.V.P. Equity Derivatives for Jefferies, LLC. He received a B.S. in business administration in 1996, with honors, from Skidmore College as a member of the Periclean Honors Society. All content of “Sector Spotlight” represents the opinion of Jason Bodner

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