April
Brian Trumbore
President/Editor, StocksandNews.com

Note: The following will be of interest to traders only, I suspect, but it's also an excuse to remark that my time constraints are such that once I start looking at something I almost always need to just go ahead and run with it.

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According to the 2007 Stock Trader's Almanac, April remains the best month in terms of return for the Dow Jones Industrial Average, 1950-2006, with an average gain of 1.8%. Both Nov. and Dec. have had avg. gains over the same period of 1.7%.

[In terms of the S&P 500, April is the 4th best month, up 1.3%, with Nov. (1.8%), Dec. (1.7%) and Jan. (1.4%) ahead of it.]

But in looking at the Stock Trader's Almanac, the editors note April is "prone to weakness after mid-month tax deadline."

Is it really? I thought I'd go to my stat sheets and check it out for myself. Since I have the daily closing prices for the S&P 500 going back to 1997 at my fingertips, you be the judge.

1997?+33.4 [Total return on S&P 500 for the year]

3/31?757?S&P 500
4/15?754
4/30?801

1998?+28.6

3/31?1101
4/15?1119
4/30?1111

1999?+21.0

3/31?1286
4/15?1322
4/30?1335

2000?-9.1

3/31?1498
4/14?1356
4/28?1452

2001?-11.9

3/30?1160
4/12?1183
4/30?1249

2002?-22.1

3/28?1147
4/15?1102
4/30?1076

2003?+28.7

3/31?848
4/15?890
4/30?916

2004?+10.9

3/31?1126
4/15?1128
4/30?1107

2005?+4.9

3/31?1180
4/15?1142
4/30?1156

2006?+15.8

3/31?1294
4/13?1289
4/28?1310

So what to make of it? I wouldn't let April 15 influence your market decisions. Of course you should be aware that by end of April you may want to keep the old saw in mind, 'sell in May and go away'; May marking the beginning of the worst six months of the year for stock performance.

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One other item, totally unrelated to the above, having to do with Nobel Prize winners. For starters, I jot down notes on post-its to remind myself of various potential topics for my columns and every time there is a discussion of competitiveness and the United States, I mean to look up the number of Nobel Prizes that America has garnered vs. others.

Let me tell you, it's not easy getting this information and I found it is riddled with inaccuracies. The Nobel Prize folks themselves also don't break down the winners by country, for whatever reason, on their own site.

Anyway, I stumbled on one that listed the top ten countries for science (physics, chemistry and medicine) for the period 1901- 2003. While I realize you can imagine the answer already, it helps prove a point.

U.S. [137]
Germany [49]
U.K. [47]
France [18]
Netherlands [11]
Russia [11]
Switzerland [10]
Japan [8]
Sweden [8]
Canada [6]

Yes, all are what would be considered northern countries. Now discuss amongst yourselves.

Wall Street History returns next week.

Brian Trumbore