dec 17  welcome to the home for realtime coverage of markets brought to you by reuters reporters you can share your thoughts with us at marketsresearchthomsonreuterscom the percentage of investors with a bullish shortterm outlook for the us stock market has slid to its lowest level in three months in the latest american association of individual investors sentiment survey aaii with this the number of investors describing their outlook for stocks as bearish rose to the upper end of its historical range aaii reported that bullish sentiment or expectations that stock prices will rise over the next six months fell 45 percentage points to 252 this is the fourth consecutive week that bullish sentiment remains below the historical average of 380 bullish sentiment was last lower on september 16 2021 224 bearish sentiment or expectations that stock prices will fall over the next six months gained by 88 percentage points to 393 this is bearish sentiment’s fourth consecutive week above the historical average of 305 neutral sentiment or expectations that stock prices will stay essentially unchanged over the next six months declined by 43 percentage points to 354 this is the second consecutive week that neutral sentiment is above the historical average of 315 aaii noted that bullish sentiment is at an unusually low level historically unusually low levels of optimism have been followed by betterthanaverage and betterthanmedian returns for the sp 500 index over the following six and 12month periods additionally aaii said that bearish sentiment is near the top end of its typical range as noted above the breakpoint between typical and unusually high levels of pessimism is currently 401 with these changes the bullbear spread fell to 141 from 08 last week read more  wall street slid into the red right out of the starting gate on friday as investors with little or no catalysts to chew on continued to acclimate themselves to the new normal of pending rate hikes and tapering asset purchases from the federal reserve all three major us stock indexes are sharply lower with energy spny financials spsy and materials splrcm all vying for the title of biggest loser indeed in a change from the previous trading day value stocks ivx are faring worse than growth igx the sp 500 and the nasdaq are on track for their third weekly decline over the last four and the dow has set a course for its fourth losing week in the last five new york federal reserve president john williams in an interview on cnbc parroted fed chair jerome powells wednesday remarks that inflation and other economic data will be closely watched in the coming months for clues regarding the feds taper timeline and rate hikes read more the word omicron remains on everyones lips as the nature and extent of this latest covid variant is causing scientists to reconsider their 2022 expectations for the pandemic read more today is triple witching nee quadruple witching until onechicago ceased offering single stock futures in september 2020 which is the simultaneous expiration of stock options stock index futures and stock index options contracts which takes place once every quarter triple witching can cause an increase in trading volume andor volatility here is your opening snapshot the sp 500 index spx ended at a record high of 471202 on december 10 it has since backed away from that level by only about 1 meanwhile however the percentage of sp 500 stocks trading above their 50day moving average dma remains severely depressed relative to earlier in the year when the spx was much lower this measures divergence vs the sp 500 has been a problem for quite some time in april it peaked at 92 more recently in midnovember it could only hit 74 currently only around 54 of spx stocks are trading above this closely followed intermediateterm moving average that said recent sub30 lows in this measure offer the potential that enough stocks within the benchmark index may have become sufficiently washed out that there may be potential for a rotation away from the few tech titans driving the index and a broader advance to take hold read more there were a number of lows from the latespring to earlyfall 2019 in the 2731 area in september and october 2020 there were lows at 25 and 28 more recently in september and november this measure stabilized at 24 and 29 read more a push above the december high at 63 may lead to increasing momentum and see this measure push up above 75 conversely a fall below this weeks low at 50 may see downside pressure intensify which may become increasingly difficult for the spx to endure especially if the recent lows give way of note in the severe sp 500 declines in late2018 and early2020 this measure bottomed very close to zero for fridays live markets posts prior to 0900 est1400 gmt  click here read more terence gabriel is a reuters market analyst the views expressed are his own