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U.S. equity index futures red: Nasdaq 100 off ~0.8%
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March
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Dollar, bitcoin gain; gold, crude decline
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U.S. 10-Year Treasury yield ~3.37%
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INDIVIDUAL INVESTOR BULLS AND BEARS CONVERGE -AAII (0900 EDT/1300 GMT) Pessimism among individual investors collapsed, while optimism jumped in the latest American Association of Individual Investors (AAII) Sentiment Survey released last week. With this, neutral sentiment slipped.
AAII reported that bearish sentiment, or expectations that stock prices will fall over the next six months, tumbled 10.6 percentage points to 35.0%, putting it at a seven-week low. Still, bearish sentiment remains above its historical average of 31.0% for the 67th time out of the past 72 weeks.
Bullish sentiment, or expectations that stock prices will rise over the next six months, surge 10.8 percentage points to 33.3%. However, bullish sentiment is still below its historical average of 37.5% for the 70th time out of the past 72 weeks.
Neutral sentiment, or expectations that stock prices will stay essentially unchanged over the next six months, edged down by 0.3 percentage points to 31.6%. Neutral sentiment is above its historical average for the 13th time out of the past 14 weeks.
With these changes, the bull-bear spread increased 21.4 percentage points to -1.7 percentage points from -23.1 percentage points the prior week:
AAII said that "the improvement in optimism occurred as the S&P 500 index bounced back from its recent lows. In addition, individual investors mostly approved of the smaller interest rate hike announced by the Federal Reserve a few weeks ago."
Of note, however, AAII asked its members how recent headlines on banks have affected their six-month outlook for stocks. The largest cadre of respondents, 41.5%, said it was making them "more cautious."
(Terence Gabriel)
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(Terence Gabriel is a Reuters market analyst. The views
expressed are his own)
