8 Things to Know about the Bull Market on Its 8th Birthday 
 
 The stock market has accomplished something that only one other bull market in history has achieved — it survived to see its eighth birthday. 
 
 It was eight years ago today that the Dow Jones industrial average sank to its recent nadir of 6,547, as hundreds of thousands of workers were losing jobs and the global financial system teetered on the edge of collapse. 
 
 Since then, though, the Dow has skyrocketed more than 14,000 points to 20,855. The broader S&P 500 index of U.S. stocks has come roaring back too, returning an annual 20% to investors who had the nerve to stay in the scary market. 
 
 But this was by no means a straight shot back up. In fact, the second-longest bull market in the post-World War II era has been unpredictable, puzzling, and rather peculiar. 
 
 Here's how: 
 
 1. This Bull Has Been Unloved 
 
 "The current bull market has been the least loved, the most questioned and the most doubted bull that we certainly can recall in near 34 years of experience in the markets," noted Oppenheimer chief investment strategist John Stoltzfus in a recent report. 
 
 That's an understatement. 
 
 Even as this bull market more than tripled the value of stocks over the past eight years, the percent of households that actually own equities has sunk from 62% in 2008 to 52% last year, according to a survey by Gallup . 
 
 That's the lowest level of stock ownership in the 19 years that Gallup has been tracking this data. 
 
 2. This Bull Has Been Persistent 
 
 World events since 2009 have been anything but supportive for a major stock market rally. Major industries such as banks and automakers neared collapse. The Federal government shutdown for 16 days. And political posturing in Congress in the Obama years brought the nation close to defaulting on the national debt. 
 
 Overseas, major European nations were crippled by a debt crisis, terrorists attacks spread around the globe, and China's economy endured a dramatic slump. 
 
 Yet stocks kept chugging along. 
 
 3. This Bull Was Nearly Gored Last Year 
 
 Since President Trump's election in November, the stock market has been on a a roll, as most major economic metrics have been pointing higher. So it's easy to forget that as recently as a year ago, there was real doubt that equities would make it to this anniversary. 
 
 One year ago stocks were battered by a series of bad headlines, such as low growth in China and weak global demand for oil. A few months later U.K. voters decided to leave the European Union, and eventually Donald Trump was elected president — a plot twist that some analysts predicted would cause stocks to crash. 
 
 And yet stocks rebounded from their disastrous 2016 winter to deliver 22% over the past 12 months, according to CFRA, the third biggest year-over-year gain since March 2009. 
 
 4. This Bull Has Been Surprisingly Calm 
 
 Despite all of last year's uncertainty, stocks have been remarkably subdued. In fact, compared to the bull market of October 1990 to March 2000, investors could afford to take a long, deep breath for the past 12 months. 
 
 "During year eight, the S&P 500 recorded 85 [days of more than 1% gains or losses] in 1998, but only 23 in the year just past," according to CFRA's Sam Stovall. 
 
 5. This Bull Is Getting Expensive 
 
 " Most importantly for investors, both stocks and bonds are now significantly more expensive than eight years ago," says David Kelly, chief global strategist for J.P. Morgan Funds. 
 
 The current price/earnings ratio for the S&P 500 now rests at 18 based on projected profits over the coming 12 months. That's about 12% above the market's 25-year average, per Kelly. That could be a result of investors hoping that a GOP-dominated federal government will unleash billions in tax cuts and spending to jumpstart persistently lackluster post-recession economic growth. 
 
 By another P/E calculation, the market is even frothier. Based on 10 years of averaged corporate profits, the stock market's P/E now stands at 29.8. The only other times the market has been this expensive by this measure was during the dot.com bubble and the Great Depression. 
 
 6. This Bull Is Egalitarian 
 
 Different sectors of the market have experienced their own highs and lows. Financial stocks, for instance, gained 149% from March 2009 - 2010, according to CFRA, but fell 9.5% two years later, before leading the pack last year. 
 
 Two years ago sleepy, defensive-minded utility stocks earned investors the best return (14.8%), while energy companies lost big league (-16.2%). 
 
 These rough edges, though, have smoothed out over the long haul. From 2009 to 2017, there's only a 1 percentage point difference in annual returns between the top and second best sectors — consumer discretionary 25.7% vs. real estate's 24.6%. Five sectors returned between 22% to 26% per year, while the weakest performer (energy) returned a respectable 9.4%. 
 
 7. This Bull Has Gotten a Big Assist from the Fed 
 
 Normally, there's a pattern to bull markets. First, stocks rise, foreshadowing a rebound in economic growth. Then once the economy actually gets into gear, the Federal Reserve starts to tap on the brakes by raising interest rates to make sure the economy — and inflation — don't overheat. 
 
 The cumulative effect of Fed rate hikes are often what helps bring about the end to bull markets. 
 
 This time around, though, the Fed has kept interest rates at historically low levels throughout the eight years of this bull. The Fed has lifted rates only two times throughout this entire rally — each time by a mere quarter of a percentage point. 
 
 But that may change as the Fed is expected to lift rates next week. 
 
 8. This Bull Will Turn 9 
 
 This bull market has dovetailed with one of the longest business cycles in American history. But all things end, which have some worried that a recession, and stock market declines, could eventually reappear. 
 
 But old age would be the wrong cause of death, should it occur. 
 
 "Bull markets don’t die of old age, they die of fright," says Stovall. 
 
 Which means there has to be something to cause investors to sell en masse and move their money into safer assets. And usually that involves concerns over negative economic growth, i.e. recessions. 
 
 So will the economy contract in 2017? 
 
 It doesn't appear likely. Demand for automobiles and homes remain strong, and the Fed has signaled multiple times that it believes the economy is strong enough to endure higher interest rates. 
 
 But that doesn't mean you should expect prices to rise forever, or at least as much as they have in the recent past. 
 
 "With earnings growing more slowly, dividend yields and bond coupons low, and the potential for P/E ratios and real yields to mean revert, a traditional 60/40 U.S. stock/bond portfolio could well generate returns over the next five years that are less than half the roughly 8% annualized gain that such a portfolio provided over the past 25 years," says Kelly. ||||| NEW YORK (Reuters) - The run of gains on Wall Street turns 8 years old on Thursday and, despite its advanced age, is expected to rage on, with perhaps a few hiccups, based on a combination of stronger company earnings, lower taxes and a corporate-friendly administration in Washington. 
 
 A trader works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., March 6, 2017. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid 
 
 Strategists, however, warn that a correction of as much as 10 percent should be expected as the market is richly valued. The bull case for equities relies on analysts seeing little chance of recession in the short term. 
 
 “Just because the (bull) market has hit a birthday, or is among the longest ever, doesn’t mean that it will ‘die’ of old age,” said Paul Nolte, portfolio manager at Kingsview Asset Management in Chicago. 
 
 “Markets don’t really pay attention to the calendar or the candles on the cake.” 
 
 The S&P 500 index has rallied 250 percent since hitting a closing low of 676.53 on March 9, 2009. The gains since, uninterrupted by a decline of 20 percent or more, rank this bull market as the second longest ever. 
 
 The current run is nearly three years older than the average bull and more than a year shorter than the longest one: the rally from Oct. 11, 1990 to March 24, 2000. 
 
 The S&P continued to rise through a year-long decline in corporate earnings through most of 2016, supported in part by historically low interest rates which made stocks comparatively cheaper and more rewarding than U.S. Treasuries. 
 
 The index has risen nearly 6 percent in 2017, closing on Wednesday at 2,362.98. Analysts remain undeterred in their belief that more gains are coming as the economy and corporate earnings growth improve. 
 
 "With earnings growth expected to continue the rest of the year, it might be a rocky road but it could still be that the bull market makes it to nine," said Ryan Detrick, senior market strategist at LPL Financial in Charlotte, North Carolina. 
 
 Infographic ID: '2n9BKfK' 
 
 A Reuters poll in December showed analysts expected the S&P 500 to finish 2017 at 2,350, buoyed by the belief that President Donald Trump’s plans to stimulate the economy with infrastructure spending, lower taxes and financial deregulation would come to pass. 
 
 Strategists, including some with a lower target than that, see the bull market continuing, even if a correction is in the cards. 
 
 Julian Emanuel, executive director of U.S. equity and derivatives strategy at UBS Securities, said he expects a pullback of 5 to 10 percent to “refresh” the bull market and that such a correction would be a buying opportunity. 
 
 “The bull market is going to finish, in our view, when conditions begin to accumulate that tend to lead to a recession. We just don’t see that as a 2017 or 2018 event,” Emanuel said. 
 
 He warned, however, that “valuations have outrun earnings potential and the state of fundamentals generally.” 
 
 With the S&P 500 currently trading at a forward price-to-earnings ratio of about 18, well above its average of 15, corporate profits will need to improve in order to bring down valuations. 
 
 Earnings are seen growing 10.7 percent this year compared to last, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S data. Even though that is a lower expectation than the 12.5 percent estimate at the start of January, it still allows for a healthy gain in 2017. 
 
 U.S. economic data, including a private sector jobs report on Wednesday that showed growth recorded its biggest increase in more than a year in February, continues to improve and is far from indicating a downturn, further supporting stock prices. 
 
 “We do not yet see any of the warning signs that point to a larger decline,” said Kingsview’s Nolte, who sees a pullback of up to 5 percent. “A recession does not seem to be in the cards just yet.” ||||| CLOSE It took years for the Dow to climb to 19K, but in just months it has soared to 22K and isn't slowing down. USA TODAY 
 
 This file photo taken on December 8, 2016 shows the Wall Street Bull sculpture in the Financial District in New York. (AFP PHOTO / Bryan R. Smith/AFP/Getty Images) (Photo: BRYAN R. SMITH, AFP/Getty Images) 
 
 The Dow hit a fresh milestone Wednesday, cracking the 22,000 barrier for the first time in its 121-year history. 
 
 So-called "Dow 22K" is the latest sign that the stock market's long climb that began in March 2009 and that has gained momentum this year amid a global economic recovery continues to charge ahead. 
 
 The Dow topped 22,000 minutes into the trading session, climbed as high as 22,036.10 before closing up 52 points, or 0.24%, at 22,016.24. The Dow's first-ever close above 22,000 was fueled by a 4.7% advance and record high finish for iPhone maker Apple, which reported strong earnings late Tuesday. 
 
 The latest milestone for the blue-chip stock gauge, which includes iconic U.S. companies such as Boeing, Coca-Cola, McDonald's and Johnson & Johnson, ignited a fresh debate on Wall Street as to whether the stock price run-up has more room to go or if a market peak is nearing. 
 
 The Dow Jones industrial average has gained 11.4% this year. It is up 236% since its bear market low of 6547.05, which means a $10,000 investment would be worth $33,600 now. 
 
 Joe Quinlan, chief market strategist at New York-based U.S. Trust, downplayed the significance of the Dow's latest 1,000-point climb. The reason? It represents just a 4.3% gain since it topped 21,000 on March 1. 
 
 What would worry Quinlan, however, would be if investors on Wall Street and Main Street get overly excited and start to pile into the market and quickly push the Dow up another 3,000 points. 
 
 "Chatter about Dow 25,000 would worry me," he says, calling it "a sign of a market top" and "too much exuberance." 
 
 Related: 
 
 It took the Dow 154 calendar days to climb from 21,000 to 22,000, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices. In contrast, it took the Dow 2,119 days -- or nearly six years -- to jump from 14,000 to 15,000 due to the Dow's more than 50% plunge during the 2007 to 2009 bear market. 
 
 The Dow's advance is being powered by better business conditions, recovering economies and improving corporate profits in the U.S. and overseas. 
 
 Stock market optimists say the Dow's current rally is based on improving sales and revenues for U.S. companies and not irrational exuberance like the dot-com stock hysteria back in 2000. 
 
 "Don't let the milestones cause you to miss the simple underlying story: corporate earnings are at all-time highs. So stocks are at all-time highs," says Donald Luskin, chief investment officer at TrendMacro in Chicago. That's how it is supposed to work, he adds. 
 
 CLOSE Following an announcement about legislation to overhaul the U.S. immigration system, President Donald Trump touted the record high of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, saying "we picked up four trillion dollars in net worth." (Aug. 2) AP 
 
 A weakening dollar against a basket of foreign currencies is also helping boost profits at big U.S. companies like McDonald's and Boeing that do a lot of business abroad. That's because it makes their products more affordable when purchased with stronger currencies. The Federal Reserve's patient approach to raising interest rates -- which are still near historic lows -- is also providing support for stocks. 
 
 Stocks "can work their way higher, maybe much higher" if interest rates stay very low and central banks around the world continue to provide stimulus to markets, adds David Kotok, chief investment officer at Cumberland Advisors, an investment firm based in Sarasota, Fla. 
 
 Milestones are fun to celebrate, but they don't necessarily tell you where the market is headed next, says Lindsey Bell, an investment strategist at CFRA, a market research firm in New York. 
 
 "I don't think it foretells the next leg of the market," says Bell. 
 
 Risks still remain. The Dow, in addition to getting pricey relative to the earnings streams of its 30 components, also faces potential risk from the inability of Washington lawmakers to work together and get things done, Bell says. The delay in getting many of President Trump's economic agenda items passed through Congress could also weigh on stocks, as a lack of tax cuts and infrastructure spending could curtail growth, Bell adds. Potential budgetary gridlock in coming months could also spook investors. 
 
 Critics of the Dow's recent assault of 22,000 note that it is a "price-weighted" index -- which means its up and down moves are driven largely by its most expensive stocks -- which distorts the true health of the index and the broader market. 
 
 For example, Boeing, which is now the Dow's highest-priced name at $237.95 per share, soared nearly 25% in July and had surged more than 14% in the four trading days after its strong earnings report on July 26 -- accounting for a big chunk of the Dow's gains in its final run to 22,000. The shares slipped less than 1% Wednesday. 
 
 "The Dow is a flawed index where price matters and nothing else," says Mark Arbeter, president of Arbeter Investments, a Holland, Pa., firm that analyzes the health of the market by stock chart patterns, trading volume and trendlines. In the past six trading days, the Dow has risen 403 points. Boeing accounted for 43% of that gain. 
 
 "When should an index be dominated by one stock? Never," says Arbeter. 
 
 Investors should also never get overly confident, no matter how strong the stock market is acting, warns U.S. Trust's Quinlan. 
 
 "Investors tend to forget about risk levels as markets hit new highs every session," says Quinlan. 
 
 Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2wlFU8a ||||| Thursday marks eight years since the low point of the last bear market on Wall Street. On March 9, 2009, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 6,547.05. Since then, it has more than tripled. If you’d invested twenty thousand dollars in the Dow index eight years ago, it would now be worth about sixty-four thousand dollars. 
 
 The vast majority of the market’s gains came while Barack Obama was President, but since Donald Trump was elected the Dow has tacked on more than twenty-five hundred points, or about twelve per cent. Last week, it closed above twenty-one thousand for the first time, and we also saw the I.P.O. of Snap , the social-media company that owns Snapchat . At the end of Snap’s first day of trading, the market placed a notional valuation on the firm, which has always operated at a loss, of thirty-four billion dollars. “Since November 8th, Election Day, the Stock Market has posted $3.2 trillion in GAINS and consumer confidence is at a 15 year high. Jobs!” Trump boasted on Twitter . 
 
 Looking at numbers like these, many people’s reaction is to try to get in on the action. Since October, about seventy-five billion dollars of new money has flowed into U.S. equity funds and exchange-traded funds, according to figures from the Investment Company Institute. Evidently, investors believe that Trump can keep the bull market going. 
 
 They might be proved right—but I doubt it. That’s not an opinion driven by my animus toward Trump’s politics, or even my belief that investors are ignoring the economic and financial risks inherent in having a man like him in the White House. (My colleague James Surowiecki wrote recently about the business world’s view of Trump as a risky but not completely uncertain bet.) My skepticism about stocks is primarily based on nonpolitical factors: valuation, monetary policy, and herding behavior—all of which can play key roles in driving the market. 
 
 I’m not arguing that we are in a full-on speculative bubble of the sort we saw in stocks during the late nineteen-nineties and in the housing and mortgage markets during the early two-thousands. Although the stratospheric valuation placed on Snap last week should be seen as a warning sign—in the past few days, the company’s stock has fallen back—it can’t be compared to the rash of dot-com I.P.O.s in 1999, or the proliferation of “liar loans” in the mortgage market between 2004 and 2007. Still, the price-to-earnings ratio of the S. & P. 500 index, which is perhaps the most widely followed valuation metric, now stands at more than twenty-six. 
 
 That’s not as high as it was during the late nineteen-nineties, but it exceeds the levels seen during any other bull market since the Second World War. Other valuation measures, such as Robert Shiller’s cyclically adjusted P/E ratio, and the late James Tobin’s “Q ratio”—which measures the price of investment assets relative to their replacement cost—are also emitting warning signals. Andrew Smithers, an investment analyst who tracks both of these metrics closely, wrote recently , “Although the overvaluation of the stock market is well short of the extremes reached at the year ends of 1929 and 1999, it is near its other previous peaks of 1905, 1936, and 1968.” 
 
 Stock-market bulls respond to this type of analysis with two counterarguments. First: with interest rates at very low levels, stocks still represent better value than bonds and other interest-bearing investments. Second: even overvalued markets can sometimes rise a lot further before they go pop. 
 
 Regarding the first argument, there can be no doubt that one of the primary drivers of the bull market has been the Federal Reserve’s determination to keep the cost of borrowing very low. But the Fed is now raising interest rates, and it may well be about to step up the pace of monetary tightening. At their policymaking meeting next week, Janet Yellen, the Fed chair, and her colleagues are widely expected to raise the federal funds rate by a quarter point. Based upon recent projections from the Fed, it looks like there will be at least another two additional hikes before the year is out. 
 
 Rising interest rates don’t necessarily presage lower stock prices, but the two things have often gone together. They did in the mid two-thousands, the late nineteen-nineties, the late seventies, and the late sixties. The early nineties were an exception—one that can be explained by an unexpected surge in productivity and G.D.P. growth, which, in turn, boosted corporate profits. To be sure, something like this could happen again: Trump is promising as much. But looking at the already low unemployment rate (4.8 per cent) and weak productivity figures, few economists think a sustained growth spurt is likely. 
 
 Why, then, is the market still going up? Undoubtedly, there is a “Trump factor.” Many billionaire hedge-fund managers have welcomed the President’s promise of lower taxes and less regulation. “If nothing else happens, that releases animal spirits,” David Tepper, the head of the hedge fund Appaloosa Management, told CNBC on Wednesday. In the current environment of decent growth, low inflation, and pro-business policies, Tepper added, investors “can’t be short.” 
 
 That last comment, I suspect, is the real key to the market’s buoyancy. Professional investors are buying stocks because others are buying, and they fear that if they deviate from this pattern they will be punished. (George Soros was punished late last year, when he shorted the market and, reportedly, lost a billion dollars .) Keynes warned us that herding behavior can drive markets far from reasonable valuations, and that the mispricing can last for a considerable period. Referring to short sellers who try to make money by selling high-priced stocks, he is reputed to have said, “The market can stay irrational for longer than you can stay solvent.” 
 
 It is folly, then, to predict what will happen on Wall Street tomorrow, next week, or next month. With many investors still upbeat, stock prices could rise further for a time. Eventually, however, overvalued markets do correct and revert to levels justified by economic fundamentals. When that happens, it is seldom pretty. There is no reason to believe things will be different this time. ||||| CLOSE Skip in Skip x Embed x Share See what could jeopardize the second-longest bull market in Wall Street history. USA TODAY NETWORK 
 
 This file photo taken on Dec. 8, 2016 shows the Wall Street Bull sculpture in the Financial District in New York. (AFP PHOTO / Bryan R. Smith/ /AFP/Getty Images) (Photo: BRYAN R. SMITH, AFP/Getty Images) 
 
 Forget the doubters. The numbers don’t lie. This Wall Street bull’s got game. 
 
 The rising market for stocks, which turns 8 on March 9, might finally have silenced critics who questioned its staying power. 
 
 From a statistical perspective, this market's no slouch. It has posted big enough returns to rank No. 4 all-time in terms of performance, with the mega-bull run from the 1990s taking top honors with a gain of 417%, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices. The current market can’t be faulted for a lack of endurance, either, as only one bull has lasted longer. 
 
 It has also generated more than $21 trillion in new stock market wealth. 
 
 The star stock of this bull run? Incyte (INCY), a biotech firm whose shares have gained more than all others in the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index. The drug company is a Wall Street favorite for its dominant bone marrow treatment, Jakafi, and its loaded pipeline of potential drugs. The bull’s biggest dud? Southwestern Energy (SWN), a victim of a price crash in oil. 
 
 The best-performing group of companies the past eight years can thank U.S. shoppers. The consumer discretionary sector, which includes home improvement retailer Home Depot, coffee shop Starbucks and athletic apparel and sneaker giant Nike, has benefited from an improving economy and people’s willingness to buy things not deemed necessities. The energy sector was the biggest laggard, which is no surprise given plummeting earnings for hard-hit companies in that industry. 
 
 Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2lsIuIr ||||| No one can predict when the current bull market will end. But we can all agree on when began, right? 
 
 
 
 You might think so, but no. 
 
 
 
 By the most commonly accepted definition, the bull market in stocks that followed the 'Great Recession' and global financial crisis turns eight years old Thursday. On Monday, March 9, 2009, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index closed at 676, having touched 666 the prior Friday, and then reversed higher. 
 
 By the standard custom for classifying bull and bear markets, this rebound became a new bull market once it gained 20 percent – just two weeks later. And those unwritten rules say that this bull market remains in force unless and until the S&P declines at least 20 percent from a high. 
 
 That has not happened since March 2009, which is why this 250-percent advance is still generally considered one, long bull market – the second-longest ever, in fact. 
 
 Yet plenty of professional investors and longtime students of the market argue that dating the bull market to the initial snap-back rally from a 12-year low overlooks some of the setbacks since then and perhaps overstates the bull's age. 
 
 Here are some alternative start dates commonly cited by those who think the bull market truly got rolling well after the tumultuous swings around the financial-crisis climax: 
 
 Source: CNBC 
 
 September 2011: In a sort of financial-crisis aftershock, stress in European debt markets, surging oil prices and a U.S. debt-ceiling standoff struck a still-fragile economic recovery and dragged the S&P 500 down 19.4 percent from May to September that year. The decline exceeded 20 percent on an intraday basis and most global indexes suffered declines of at least that much. 
 
 The record keepers file this under the heading of "severe market correction," but to many it was close enough to consider the recovery from the September 2011 akin to a new, or renewed, bull market. 
 
 March 2013: In some respects, this equity advance didn't begin to behave as a real bull market until late 2012. Treasury yields had bottomed in mid-2012, and riskier assets benefited from the unclenching of tensions that this represented. Risk spreads on speculative high-yield debt began collapsing, and for the first time in this economic cycle, the price-earnings multiple on stocks began expanding. 
 
 By early 2013, with Washington gridlocked, the Federal Reserve looking to end quantitative easing and equities appearing cheap relative to bonds, the S&P gained upward momentum. By late March 2013, the index finally eclipsed its former all-time high from October 2007 of 1565. 
 
 
 
 Some strategists say this was the end of the "secular bear market" that had begun in the year 2000 and the start of a new "secular bull market." The term "secular" refers to a long-term structural move in asset prices. An earlier secular bear lasted from 1966 to 1982, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average was contained below the 1000 market, followed by the stupendous secular bull of 1982 to 2000. 
 
 Obviously within these periods are significant cyclical swings, often of more than 20 percent against the long-term trend. 
 
 There's no real science to defining or playing such periods. And, frankly, there have been so few that it's hard to generalize about their behavior with too much confidence. 
 
 But the idea that a push to a new all-time high touches off a decade-plus of further upward movement has some evidence behind it, and the likes of Bank of America Merrill Lynch have been using this framework since the 2013 breakout. 
 
 February 2016: The S&P 500 fell "only" about 15 percent from the summer of 2015 to the early-2016 low as oil prices collapsed and global recession and deflation fears flared. 
 
 
 
 Yet that understates the carnage beneath the surface. The small-cap Russell 2000 sank 26 percent over eight months. And Strategas Research technical strategist Chris Verrone notes that 63 percent of the stocks in the S&P 500 index fell at least 20 percent from their 52-week high. 
 
 So, bear market or not, it was a pretty good washout - one that many now argue cleansed the market of excesses, rebuilt value and reinvigorated the bull. In some ways this is akin to the Asian financial crisis of 1998, when the S&P 500 never fell by more than 20 percent but 70 percent of all stocks did. Once it bottomed, that bull market put in a ferociously lucrative final push over the next 18 months. 
 
 So how much does this matter for an investor trying to set expectations for future equity performance? 
 
 Not terribly much. Even if we say the bull is eight years old, and therefore a "mature" one, bull markets don't die of old age; they are put down by recession, financial panic or the Fed. 
 
 
 
 On the other hand, even if we decree that the bull market truly started five-and-a-half years, or four years ago, or 13 months ago, it doesn't change the fact that stock valuations are close to the top of their historical range and the eight-year returns delivered by the market are among the best ever. 
 
 Ryan Detrick of LPL Financial looked back at all eight-year periods since 1936. The past eight years' gain was only exceeded 35 times, placing the current run in the top four percent of all past periods. Most prior instances occurred in clusters in the mid-1950s, and then the late-'90s and early 2000. 
 
 The one-, five- and ten-year average and median returns following the other such periods aren't great – small losses one year out and subpar appreciation for longer periods. 
 
 Granted, those averages are heavily undercut by the Tech Bubble readings. But taken together, they suggest that no matter when you say the bull market began, it's certainly not over but it's probably not early. ||||| NEW YORK — President Donald Trump is learning a basic and painful lesson of Wall Street: Stocks also go down. 
 
 A global market sell-off accelerated Monday with the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunging nearly 1,600 points at one point in roller-coaster afternoon trading. After a volatile session, the Dow ended down 1,175 points, or 4.6%, at 24,346. 
 
 Story Continued Below 
 
 It was the largest ever single-day point drop for the Dow and it rattled both Wall Street and Washington, abruptly ending a remarkable period of placid markets where it often seemed the only direction was up. A young generation of Wall Street traders has never seen the kind of whipsaw action that seized markets Monday. 
 
 While the point drop was the largest, Monday’s decline did not rival some of the bloodiest days in Wall Street history given how fast the Dow has raced ahead in recent years. On Oct. 19, 1987, the notorious “Black Monday,” the blue chip average gave up nearly 23 percent of its value. On Sept. 29, 2008, in the depths of the financial crisis, the Dow sank nearly 7 percent. 
 
 But it was still a large and shocking decline. It arrived amid growing concern that an economy juiced by a massive corporate tax cut, and already at full employment, could overheat and require forceful action from a new and untested Federal Reserve chairman — installed by Trump — to cool things down. 
 
 On top of concerns about rising inflation, the tax cuts are already increasing the federal government’s need to borrow and accelerating the date by which Congress must raise the federal debt limit. And as of Monday, there was still no plan in Washington to raise the limit and avoid a catastrophic default. 
 
 The result is that a president who tossed aside traditional presidential caution in cheerleading the stock market now stands poised to take the blame for any correction. 
 
 “This is a risk that the president clearly set himself up for,” said Charles Gabriel of Capital Alpha Partners, a Washington research firm. “Until now, Trump’s had kind of a free ride in this market and taken so much credit for it, even though so much of it was due to easy-money policies from Janet Yellen and the Fed. Now she’s out the door and volatility is back.” 
 
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 Jerome Powell, the new Fed chair installed by Trump and sworn in Monday, is not expected to deviate sharply from Yellen’s gentle approach to raising interest rates. But he is a lesser-known figure on Wall Street. 
 
 And if the recent jump in hourly wages gets pushed up even more by corporations handing out bonuses and pay bumps in the wake of the tax bill, the Fed may be forced to move faster to fight inflation — offsetting the economic benefits of the tax cuts. 
 
 Interest rates are already rising as the government discloses it will have to ramp up borrowing in 2018 to make up for revenue lost to the tax-cut bill. Higher rates on government bonds make stocks look less appealing. They also can make it harder for businesses and consumers to borrow and spend, possibly slowing the economy. 
 
 On top of all this, stocks blew past traditional valuations as they raced ahead in 2017 and early 2018. A widely followed ratio designed by economists Robert Shiller and John Campbell that compares stock prices to corporate earnings hit 34 this year. The historic median for the ratio is 16. 
 
 This could have served as a warning to Trump not to associate himself too closely with a rally that looked tenuous to many Wall Street analysts. Instead, Trump bragged about the gains at every opportunity on Twitter and even in his State of the Union address. 
 
 “The stock market has smashed one record after another, gaining $8 trillion in value,” Trump said in his address to Congress. 
 
 Last week’s decline alone wiped out nearly $1 trillion in that value, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices. 
 
 Trump has regularly boasted on Twitter that the stock market rise, which actually began in 2009 at the end of the last recession, is the direct result of his policies on taxes and regulation. 
 
 “Business is looking better than ever with business enthusiasm at record levels. Stock Market at an all-time high. That doesn't just happen!” he tweeted last August. 
 
 Other senior administration officials such as Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn have also tied the market’s gains directly to Trump policy moves. 
 
 The latest declines left a White House that has basked in the glow of the market rally scrambling to explain away the massive decline and calm frayed investor nerves. 
 
 “The President’s focus is on our long-term economic fundamentals, which remain exceptionally strong, with strengthening U.S. economic growth, historically low unemployment, and increasing wages for American workers," White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said in a statement. "The President’s tax cuts and regulatory reforms will further enhance the U.S. economy and continue to increase prosperity for the American people.” 
 
 Stocks are still far higher than they were when Trump took office, but the return of sharp volatility — and the possibility of further declines — has now put Trump in the uncomfortable position of being directly associated with daily market moves. 
 
 “Presidents historically haven’t commented on the stock market anywhere near as much as President Trump has,” said Ed Yardeni, market analyst at Yardeni Research Inc. “I think Barack Obama said something in 2009 about how he thought stock prices seemed low, and that was about it. So he obviously likes to take credit for the positives. Now what does he say when the market suddenly goes down?” 
 
 Dow Jones erases its gains for the year in the largest single-day point drop 
 
 So far, Trump has not weighed in publicly on the market declines. A White House official sent a statement to CNBC on Monday expressing concern over the drop. “We're always concerned when the market loses any value, but we're also confident in the economy's fundamentals,” the statement said. 
 
 Both the U.S. and global economies are in fact on stronger ground than they have been in years, leading many Wall Street analysts to suggest that the current bout of selling represents something of a healthy correction to stock market valuations and not the beginning of a bear market. 
 
 Unemployment in the U.S. is low, corporate profits are strong, and growth in the first quarter is currently running as fast as 5.2 percent, according to the most recent estimate from the Atlanta Fed. Europe and Japan are also growing, a kind of synchronized global expansion not seen in recent years. 
 
 “Corrections of 5% to 15% occur on average once a calendar year,” Jason Pride, director of investment strategy at Glenmede, wrote in a client note Monday. “Further, history has shown the market capable of making it through such corrections and going on to positive returns for the full year period, particularly in cases of ongoing expansions.” 
 
 The market may indeed quickly reverse course in the coming days and go on to move higher over the course of the year, allowing to Trump to start bragging again and possibly aiding Republicans in their efforts to tout the tax-cut bill and limit potential losses in the midterm elections. 
 
 But significant risks lie ahead in Washington. The biggest is whether Powell and the Fed can navigate a difficult path between allowing the economy to thrive and wages to rise without letting potentially crushing inflation take hold. And if Powell and his colleagues decide they need to pump the brakes hard, that could leave them in direct conflict with a president not shy about criticizing people he himself put into office. 
 
 And it could leave Trump with regret about jettisoning a Fed chair whom Wall Street came to love. “For the past four years, Yellen was the fairy godmother of the bull market,” said Yardeni. “And now that she’s gone, maybe we don’t get the fairy dust anymore.” ||||| LISTEN TO ARTICLE 5:18 SHARE THIS ARTICLE Share Tweet Post Email 
 
 You’ve probably heard: it’s the longest bull market ever. You’ve probably also heard: no it isn’t. What’s the story? 
 
 According to a loose consensus, bull markets are rallies that go beyond 20 percent and are never interrupted by a 20 percent fall. In many corners of Wall Street, that means the S&P 500 rally that began in March 2009 will surpass all that went before it on Wednesday. 
 
 Here’s the issue: the definitions aren’t chiseled in stone. They’re not laws of nature -- it’s not even totally clear where they come from. The 20 percent threshold strikes people as arbitrary, spurious, an invention. Pundits disagree on everything from the role of psychology in defining market eras to how strict you should be about the parameters for past ones. 
 
 Several objections pertain to measurement. One is how to date the rally this one supposedly supplants -- the dot-com bubble. Traditionally, statisticians have placed the start of the tech rally in October 1990, the bottom of a slide in the S&P 500 that got very close to 20 percent but not all the way. If you refuse to call that 19.92 percent drop a 20 percent drop, the advance gets longer, and today’s would need a thousand more days to exceed it. 
 
 “If you round the data, you’re going to get a certain number of bull markets. If you don’t round, you’re going to get a different number,” Justin Walters, co-founder of Bespoke Investment Group LLC, said by phone. “If you want to do that, that’s fine, but it’s not using the standard 20 percent definition.” 
 
 When a tradition coalesces on Wall Street, it’s hard to dislodge. The best argument for considering 1990 a break in a bull run is probably that much of the old guard considers it so. Different researchers give different verdicts -- sometimes at the same shop. For better or worse, those eight 100ths of a point have been glossed over by history, leaving the 1990s run to begin in 1990. 
 
 Another analytical point: Who cares? Equities have been in good shape for years -- maybe leave it at that. The stock market isn’t a geometry project, skeptics note, it’s a tool for capital formation, something people depend on for retirement. What difference does it make if the chart hews to a pattern in which declines of 20.1 percent matter and 19.9 percent don’t? 
 
 “We like records, we like round numbers, it’s a concept we like to talk about and tweet about,” Charlie Bilello, director of research at Pension Partners LLC, said by phone. “But no one in his right mind would use this as an investment strategy.” 
 
 Another objection, one pertaining to the custom of dating bull markets from trough to peak, looked less relevant Tuesday after the S&P 500 jumped above its record close from January. The concern had been that as long as the index held below its all-time high, it was impossible to say for sure that the rally was intact. Should it hold above that level at the close, the point would become moot. 
 
 Here’s a rundown of other ways that people say 3,452 days without a 20 percent decline do not a bull market make. 
 
 Where to Start? 
 
 It’s been nine years, five months and 12 days since the S&P 500 hit a 13-year low on March 9, 2009, the date considered by many to be the start of the equity recovery. Not so fast, say skeptics. According to them, a bull market begins not when the stocks reach a bottom, but after an interval of recovery --like when the market breaches its previous high. Viewed like this, the bull market started on Feb. 19, 2013, when the S&P surpassed an October 2007 high. 
 
 “I will not be popping the champagne for the bull market on Aug. 22,” said Jeffrey Hirsch, editor of the Stock Trader’s Almanac. “Everyone’s hung up on the record. It’s more nuanced than that.” 
 
 Intraday Rout 
 
 Several gripes pertains to how you calculate a 20 percent drop. Adherents of this view note that, fine, the recovery that started two months after Barack Obama took office hasn’t had a 20 percent decline when measured close to close. But it has had one when measured by the highest and lowest levels recorded during the trading day. Between May and October 2011, the S&P 500 plunged 22 percent on an intraday basis. Just because it skirted the definition based on where it landed at 4 p.m. shouldn’t matter to sensible people. 
 
 “There is a lot of sloppy data or historical revisionism or both,” said Mark Hulbert, an editor at Hulbert Financial Digest. “People just blithely assume that that bull market started on March 9, 2009. Depending on who you talk to, there have been one or two bear markets that occurred in that period.” 
 
 Global Selloff 
 
 A 20 percent selloff is painful, but investors can suffer worse fates. So goes a line of thinking that looks at the long, barren period U.S. markets went through around the time of the yuan devaluation in 2015. Even though the drop never exceeded 15 percent, the S&P 500 went through two 10 percent corrections and more than half its members sustained a 20 percent plunge. A gauge of small-cap companies retreated 27 percent between May 2015 and February 2016 while energy companies lost 30 percent in the span. 
 
 “I don’t care what a textbook says, that was a bear market,” said Michael Batnick, director of research at Ritholtz Wealth Management. “It wasn’t just that stock prices were going down, but businesses were in trouble, we had an earnings recession and energy prices were collapsing. That to me is a clear sign of a recession.”
– Thursday is a Wall Street milestone: The bull market that began on March 9, 2009, turns 8 years old, making it the second-longest such run in history. (It would need to go another year and a half or so to match the record from 1990 to 2000.) Some coverage: On this day in 2009, the S&P 500 plunged to 676. Since then, it's rallied about 250%. The Wall Street Journal has a funky graphic illustrating the near-historic run here. The Dow closed that same day at 6,547, and if you'd invested $20,000 then, it would be worth $64,000 today, notes the New Yorker. But the post has a warning: "With many investors still upbeat, stock prices could rise further for a time. Eventually, however, overvalued markets do correct and revert to levels justified by economic fundamentals." Reuters, however, suggests a bear is nowhere in sight. "The bull market is going to finish, in our view, when conditions begin to accumulate that tend to lead to a recession," says one analyst. "We just don't see that as a 2017 or 2018 event." What's unusual about the long run is what Bloomberg calls the "freakish calm" surrounding it. There's barely a whiff of volatility or investor anxiety, so much so that there's now a debate underway about whether that's healthy. One consequence of the bull run is that stocks and bonds are now quite expensive by historical standards, according to Money. It runs down that and other factoids here. The top performer in the Dow Jones Industrial Index since 2009? Home Depot, which is up more than 600%. MarketWatch looks at other winners. The star stock in the S&P has been biotech firm Incyte, notes USA Today. There's some debate on when this bull market actually began, and Michael Santoli at CNBC runs through it. Unemployment at the start of the run was 8.3%, and it's now 4.8%, per a list of key stats at Yahoo Finance.