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INDIVIDUAL INVESTOR BULLS STAMPEDE - AAII

Optimism among individual investors over the short-term outlook for U.S. stocks surged in the latest American Association of Individual Investors (AAII) Sentiment Survey. With this, pessimism ticked up, and neutral sentiment plunged.

Meanwhile, a significant portion of investors surveyed said that the election results make them more optimistic over their outlook for stocks.

AAII reported that bullish sentiment, or expectations that stock prices will rise over the next six months, jumped 8.3 percentage points to 49.8%. Bullish sentiment is "unusually high" and is above its historical average of 37.5% for the 53rd time in 54 weeks.

Bearish sentiment, or expectations that stock prices will fall over the next six months, added 0.8 percentage points to 28.3%. Bearish sentiment is below its historical average of 31.0% for the 13th time in 14 weeks.

Neutral sentiment, or expectations that stock prices will stay essentially unchanged over the next six months, dove 9.1 percentage points to 21.8%. Neutral sentiment is "unusually low" and is below its historical average of 31.5% for the 18th time in 19 weeks.

With these changes, the bull-bear spread increased 7.5 percentage points to 21.5% from 14.0% last week. The spread is above its historical average of 6.5% for the 27th time in 28 weeks.

In this week’s special question, AAII asked its members for how the results of the U.S. elections is impacting their short-term outlook for stocks.

Here is AAII's graphic showing how they responded:

(Terence Gabriel)

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