Daily Spotlight: Not a Good Start to 2025

Argus

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Apr 01, 2025

Summary

The archetypal 4th is successful the books. The S&P 500, which was higher successful January, slumped successful February and March and is down astir 4.9% for the twelvemonth to date. The archetypal 4th typically is affirmative for stocks, arsenic the mean summation for the play since 1980 has been 2.1%. Historically, banal person risen 65% of the clip successful 1Q. While the archetypal 4th was forgettable, that doesn't mean the afloat twelvemonth volition beryllium a hitch out. Over the play backmost to 1980, determination person been 15 antagonistic archetypal quarters and stocks person declined an mean 6.3%. But successful much than fractional of those years, stocks finished with affirmative yearly returns. In fact, the mean summation for those 8 betterment years was 14.4%. April historically is the second-best period of the twelvemonth for stocks. The mean summation for the S&P 500 successful April since 1980 is 1.6%. We enactment that marketplace returns successful April person exceeded 5% connected 8 occasions since 1980, including a 9.4% summation successful 2009 arsenic the marketplace was opening to retrieve from the fiscal situation of 2007-2009; a 12.7% surge successful 2020 arsenic the marketplace started to retrieve from the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic; and a 5.1% summation successful 2021 arsenic COVID-19 vaccines were rolled out. There person been immoderate clunkers, including 2002 (-6.1%), 2000 (-3.1%) and 1981 (-2.3%). Last year, stocks slumped 4.2% successful April, the worst period of the year. April is simply a engaged month, arsenic companies study first-quarter results. This year, 1Q gain