How Much More Does The Bear Market Have To Go?

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/29/2012 17:07 -0400

• Bear Market
• Central Banks
• PE Multiple

The secular bear market that the US has been caught in for a better part of the last decade will end. Eventually. The only question is when. Last week we reported that the bulk of market gains year to date, has been driven exclusively by PE multiple expansion, which is to be expected: EPS forecasts for the end of 2012 are now the lowest they have been since the beginning of the year. Yet while such sharp, sudden and short and bear-market rallies, exclusively on the back of the global central banks, are to be expected, the bigger question is how much more of a secular decline in PE multiples is to be expected before the bear market ends and a new bull market can begin. As the following chart from Crestmont Research shows there is quite a bit more to go, even with Fed assistance (or rather, because of it, and its forced rejection of reaching a fair clearing price sooner rather than later), before the bear market is officially over. Just over 50% more. To the downside.
How the Bear Market declines have looked in perspective, and where we ultimately have to go before all the artifical supports are cleared out:


And the Bull Markets preceding them...

h/t Things That Make you go Hmmm