Ken Fisher Debunks “So Goes January” Market Myth

Title screen appears, “Ken Fisher Debunks “So Goes January” Market Myth”

A man appears on the screen wearing a navy suit, sitting in an office in front of a fireplace.

He begins to speak.

A banner identifies him as Ken Fisher, Executive Chairman and Co-Chief Investment Officer, Fisher Investments.

Ken Fisher doing hand gestures time to time explaining.

Ken Fisher: So often in January you hear this concept of as goes January, so goes the year. And I'm just going to tell you that's just a lot of non-sense. It's one of those things that it's snappy sounding. It actually has some things about it that are true that confuse people. I mean just said simply, and you don't need to be a genius to figure this out, if you get January being up or down, either one, that starts you off 1/12 of the way toward an up or down year. So, the odds of being after that in the next eleven months that way are tilted by the amount that January was up or down. So that's kind of like saying the one that starts the race earlier, other things equal has an advantage.

Ken Fisher: But of course, in reality, as I say, often in capital markets, other things are never equal. And the fact is that as goes January does not go the year. We have a very large history of Januaries and a very large history of years. And other than the fact that there's that one feature that you've already bought off one 12th of the year, there's nothing magical about the January returns.

Ken Fisher: So, you could think of this in two ways. You could think of it as people saying, gee, January is up or down, I don't care which, it ends up being in this way, therefore I should do this. Well, to the extent you see that, you can bet against it because there's no basis for that. There is one thing to think about in January that's worth your consideration, which is that and it doesn't last long, but the stocks that tended to do the very worst in December, pressured by tax loss selling in December, tend to bounce more in January. That also does not continue. It goes a little bit into February, but then tends to fizzle out as it's a completed tax transaction. And you shouldn't extend that either.

Ken Fisher: The whole concept of as goes January, so goes the year is just sort of an old saying that really doesn't have a lot of validity to it. Thank you for listening. I know you may not like hearing that, maybe you do like hearing that, but January is just one of the twelve months, and, in that regard, you shouldn't otherwise think about it much differently.

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