An interesting item in an AP story, confirming what those of us who have been around the market for a number of years felt - this market is unlike any we have experienced. While it uses the Dow Jones Industrial Average (which has actually lagged some of the other key indicators) due to how old the records are, the data makes a case for why anyone who expected a more typical move off the March 2009 bottom, to be left in the dust.
The 84% gain from the March 2009 low in the DJIA took only 480 days to complete.
There has been nothing like that in the '00s, the '90s, '80s, '70s, '60s, '50s, or '40s. Indeed one needs to go back to 1933 for anything of this ilk.
The only other more violent moves up in DJIA history are as follows (2 of them in the wild and wacky crashes and recoveries of the early 1930s):
-- Feb. 17, 1933, through July 18, 1933: Up 117 percent in 109 trading days.
-- July 8, 1932, through Sept. 7, 1932: Up 94 percent in 51 trading days.
-- Nov. 9, 1903, through March 9, 1905: Up 84 percent in 397 trading days.
-- March 25, 1898, through Sept. 5, 1899: Up 85 percent in 431 trading days.
