Permabulls Are Living In a Fantasy World

01/04/16 11:54AM EST

Permabulls Are Living In a Fantasy World - 8 ball bubble 12.11.2015

After (wildly) missing the mark in 2015, Wall Street consensus is calling for a 7% gain in the S&P 500 for 2016.

We'd take the other side of that trade.  

Meanwhile, as the first trading day of the year begins, Old Wall's bullish cabal isn't getting much help from global equity markets.

(Today's performance [in dollar terms] is highlighted in the image below)

Permabulls Are Living In a Fantasy World - wei ytd

Global markets took a beating after China's lackluster manufacturing data and the US's own (recessionary) ISM number.

Permabulls Are Living In a Fantasy World - ism recession tracker 

For 2016, Wall Street equity strategists had been forecasting profitable year for U.S. stocks, with an S&P 500 target of 2,200. Funny enough, they were a bit more circumspect this go-around. Last week, we noted that many big bank strategists had pegged their 2016 S&P 500 price target to a number now below their 2015 prediction.  

Weird, right?

We've been warning you for a while now about the coming pullback in equity markets. Here's Hedgeye CEO Keith McCullough, in a video from a month ago, summing up that risk in one word.

https://youtu.be/EVggwfW5sFk

Globally, stocks are down today precisely because investors are coming to grips with our #LateCycle and #GrowthSlowing Macro themes.

https://twitter.com/HedgeyeDDale/status/684033392288075776

Remember too, that our Macro team called the highs before the August cliff-dive in the S&P 500 contrary to Wall Street storytelling.

... And here's how it all played out in the real world during 2015.

https://twitter.com/KeithMcCullough/status/683644297334362112

Today's selloff was not a good start for Old Wall permabulls. Here's a decent New Year's resolution for investors still recovering Old Wall forecasting hangovers.

https://twitter.com/KeithMcCullough/status/682655175207743488

Or celebrate the New Year by joining us.

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