AAII Sentiment Survey: Optimism Falls

Optimism among individual investors about the short-term outlook for stocks decreased in the latest AAII Sentiment Survey. Meanwhile, both neutral sentiment and pessimism increased.

Bullish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will rise over the next six months, decreased 6.9 percentage points to 42.2%. Bullish sentiment remains above its historical average of 37.5% for the 15th consecutive week.

Neutral sentiment, expectations that stock prices will stay essentially unchanged over the next six months, increased 2.6 percentage points to 31.1%. Despite the increase, neutral sentiment is below its historical average of 31.5% for the ninth time in 11 weeks.

Bearish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will fall over the next six months, increased 4.2 percentage points to 26.8%. Bearish sentiment is below its historical average of 31.0% for the 15th consecutive week.

The bull-bear spread (bullish minus bearish sentiment) decreased 11.1 percentage points to 15.4%. The bull-bear spread remains above its historical average of 6.5% for the 15th consecutive week.

This week’s special question asked AAII members about their perception of inflation.

Here is how they responded:

• It is slowing, but by not enough: 44.4%
• It is returning to a more acceptable pace: 40.5%
• It is still rising too quickly: 11.4%
• Not sure/no opinion: 3.1%

See more Sentiment Survey results.