S&P 1500 Stocks Distance From 52 Week Highs

Even though it is officially still not in a recession, Warren Buffett made headlines this morning when he said that by any common sense measure, the US economy is in a recession.  On a similar line of reasoning, even though we have yet to hit the official threshold for a bear market, for all intents and purposes, the average stock is already well into bear market territory.  In the chart to the right we summarize how much the average stock is currently trading below its 52-week high.  As shown, no matter what its market cap, stocks are currently trading more than 20% below their 52-week high.  Small caps are currently faring the worst with an average decline of more than 35%, while large caps are down a relatively 'modest' 25.1%.

On a sector basis, the results are just as downbeat.  We all know the consumer is having trouble, but the stocks of the Consumer Discretionary sector are practically past life support with an average decline of 43.4% from their 52-week highs.  With commodities hitting all-time highs, one would think that Materials stocks would be doing well, but as of today's close, the average stock in that sector is now down 29%. The sectors that have held up the best are Energy (-14.6%) and Utilities (-11.4%), as these sectors still have yet to reach average decline levels of more than 20%.

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