The new issue of TIME Magazine has what appears to be a bullish cover. However, the feature actually argues that the recovery of the past five years has been a sham and that we're vulnerable to another crash.
Stock market watchers like to say that a mainstream magazine cover about Wall Street and the stock market is a contrarian indicator. In other words, you should do the opposite of what it seems the magazine is telling you to do.
Unfortunately, the actual data doesn't seem to support that belief.
Market historian Laszlo Birinyi reviewed past TIME covers.
"Over the last 65 years TIME Magazine has featured the picture of a bull on its cover multiple times," wrote Birinyi. "According to market lore, this event is generally regarded as negative for the market. However, analyzing the Birinyi Clippings database, we've gone back and pulled the historical TIME
From Birinyi:
