GOLDMAN SACHS: Here's how to clean up in the market through the end of the year
The average year-end forecast across 20 Wall Street strategists calls for the S&P 500 to remain largely unchanged from current levels after rising roughly 8% in the first half of the year.
And even the most bullish strategist, Jonathan Golub from RBC Capital Markets, has a year-end price target of 2,600, which would mark a gain of just 7% for the benchmark over the next six months.
Even volatility, which spiked more than 30% on Thursday, has been too suppressed to create as many investment opportunities as traders would like. Despite the surge this past week, the CBOE Volatility Index, or VIX, still sits about 30% below its bull market average.
What's more, economic growth in the US is the worst since 2011, at least according to one measure. The Citigroup Economic Surprise Index, which measures the extent to which data exceeds expectations, has been in negative territory since the end of April and sits at the lowest in six years.
But fear not, says Goldman Sachs. There are still ways to make healthy profits trading stocks, even in a lukewarm economic environment.
And the firm is putting its money where its mouth is. On Wednesday, Goldman raised its year-end S&P 500 price target to 2,400 from 2,300, right in line with consensus.
Here are four ways the firm says investors can reap profits from the stock market over the remainder of 2017. Note that these are not intended to be mutually exclusive. In a perfect world, a trader would be able to check all the boxes at once.