Professor Bainbridge...on law, politics, religion, culture & food

A Fun New Efficient Capital Markets Anomaly

Dealbreaker:

The markets have been off to a rocky start this year but maybe the bulls can breath a sigh of relief now that the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue is on the newsstands with Marisa Miller on the cover. The folks over at Bespoke Investment have run the numbers and created a Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue Indicator. As it turns out, having an American on the cover is a bullish indicator.

“Over the last 30 years, an American has appeared on the cover of the annual Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue in 15 different years,” the Bespoken write. “The average performance of the S&P 500 during those 15 years is a gain of 13.9% with 13 positive years (87%). Of the fifteen years where no American appeared on the cover, the S&P 500 has averaged a gain of only 7.2% with 11 positive years (73%).”

Not that I condone it, of course.