Analyst: Richard Bernstein
The Super Bowl and the Stock Market
* It's the time of year for spurious correlations and the stock market. Yes, it is time to dust off the Super Bowl Indicator.
* Last year at this time we took an innovative twist, and wrote about the human versus animal mascot indicator as a leading indicator of the Super Bowl Indicator. We proudly took that spurious correlation to a new extreme.
* It turns out that there have been 26 Super Bowls in which teams with human mascots have competed against teams with animal mascots. The humans won in 19 of those 26 Super Bowls, or 73% of the time. This year's Super Bowl is between the Pittsburgh Steelers (human) and the Seattle Seahawks (animal). Based on the history of the human/animal indicator, there is a 73% probability that the Steelers will defeat the Seahawks.
* This is especially "insightful" information when combined with the traditional Super Bowl indicator that states the stock market goes up in a year when an NFC team wins the Super Bowl, and goes down during years when the AFC team wins. This indicator has been correct in 30 of 39 years, or 77% of the time. Fortunately, the indicator has been wrong the past 2 years when the New England Patriots won 2 Super Bowls, but the stock market rose modestly each year.
* Last year, we used both "time-tested and rigorous" indicators to construct a combined probability of 57% that the stock market would decline in 2005. The stock market appreciated only 3% during the year. We attribute that positive return to simple noise.
* Adjusting for the recent history, the combination of the Steelers being a human mascot and being an AFC team means that there is a 56% chance that the stock market declines in 2006.
* Today's speed and spread of information are causing spurious correlations to perhaps be more widely used than ever before to prove supposed financial market theories. It's a shame that investors don't view financial market analysis with as skeptical an eye as we hope everyone has viewed our human/animal/Super Bowl indicator.
* In the search for truth, however, still the most baffling question to everyone over the age of 35 regarding the Super Bowl is why does it end so late on a Sunday night?