Now that we all (or most of us, anyway) have settled in with the election results, it is pretty fascinating to look back at the market action during the fourth quarter of the year: from Election Day on Nov. 8 through the market close on Nov. 30, the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +0.60% rose 790 points to 19,123 (+4.3%) and the Standard and Poor's 500 Index SPX, +0.85% climbed 68 points to 2,199 (+3.2%).
Since then we have seen a succession of new highs on both indexes, vaguely reminiscent of the tech bubble of the late nineties when one prescient observer noted that the market discounts the future, but at that time, appeared to be discounting the hereafter as well. Except, maybe it really is different this time . . . and maybe not.
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