Reversal of Fortune: Markets Go From Worst to First in April

Happy May Day!

It’s hard to believe that summer’s heat (and Hurricane season) is almost here. As the calendar turns to another month it’s often quite interesting to take a look back at the month that was... to see which trends may be in for a switch.

One phrase comes to mind that perfectly sums up April’s market action: reversal of fortune! From November through March U.S. stocks (and most global equity markets) suffered a string of five-straight monthly declines. That’s a very rare occurrence that has only been seen on a handful of occasions in the past 40 years.

Sure enough, April saw a sharp reversal of the five-month downtrend. The Dow Jones Industrial Average had fallen over 11% at the March low. But the Dow got up off the mat in April to post a 4.5% gain. The Dow wasn’t alone. In fact, international stock markets pulled off much more dramatic reversals.

Japan is perhaps the most striking turnaround. I’ve been bullish on Japan since last year... and had been proven dead wrong through March. But Japan rallied strongly last month – soaring 11% in April alone – it’s biggest single-month gain since 1995! That’s 13 years ago.

In spite of this rally, Japan remains one of the world’s most undervalued major markets, but now it looks like global investors are catching on.

Honk Kong, another one of my favorite overseas markets, also pulled off a major turnaround in April.

After a drubbing of -18% in the first quarter of 2008, the Hang Seng Index jumped 13% last month.

Taiwan, another favorite, rose 4% in April. Mainland China too bounced back 6.3% last month. But Shanghai shares still have lots of “heavy lifting” ahead – as they’re still down 30% year to date.

Perhaps the biggest surprise was commodities. Gold and crude oil rallied pretty much in tandem through the end of 2007 and early 2008. Oil was up another 12% in April – adding to gains of nearly 20% year to date.

The yellow metal however declined nearly 6% last month. That’s gold’s second consecutive monthly decline; perhaps this precious metal will go for five in a row too!

Of course last month’s market action could prove very fleeting indeed. And I doubt that the ultimate “bottom” of this bear market has yet been reached. However, with such broad-based strength in equity markets around the world, we may be in for a decent rally that has some legs.

Yesterday, the Fed cut rates again as I expected to 2%. The financial media seems convinced that the Fed intends to “pause” sometime soon. That has helped the beleaguered U.S. dollar (talk about a bear market!) to stabilize somewhat.

If the buck can stage a more convincing reversal of fortune at this point, I would expect commodities to correct further, while global stocks (particularly emerging markets) should continue to get a boost. Stay tuned...