Published February 9, 2018
After two years of nearly non-stop gains punctuated by a vertical ascent to kick off 2018, the stock market finally ran out of gas this week. Those two years brought investors a +60% return in the S&P 500 and a +75% rise in our focus Nasdaq 100 (QQQ) index. This rally was of historic length and ease, with volatility dormant. This week, the bears got their long-awaited time to shine. Not one but two days of 1000 point plunges in the Dow Jones Industrial Average – each a record for raw point declines in the index. Monday afternoon through Tuesday morning saw volatility unleashed in a fury never seen before; the evaporation of one or more volatility-based securities causing a run on the volatility futures market. (more…)