With yesterday’s 0.67% decline for the S&P 500, the index ended a streak of 99 trading days without a decline of just 0.60% or more. As shown in the chart below, that’s the longest streak on record! If you needed further evidence that this market has been unbelievable lately, there you have it.

Another streak that’s just as — if not more — unbelievable is that the S&P 500 has now gone 310 trading days without experiencing back-to-back declines of 0.50%+. Think about that — it has been 310 trading days dating back more than a year to November 2nd, 2016 (just before the election) since we had two days in a row of declines of just half a percent.

As shown below, the current streak of 310 trading days — which may actually be broken today — is double the length of the 2nd longest streak without back-to-back declines of 0.50%+.

We’ve been saying it for the last few weeks now, but we’ll say it again — when the market does finally experience a pullback, it’s going to feel exponentially more painful for investors because of the simple fact that we haven’t experienced any kind of meaningful pullback in so long. And when emotions run higher than normal, it makes investors more eager to push the sell button. This, in turn, can cause even bigger declines, and the feedback loop begins.

 

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