The S&P 500’s lowest correlation level in years suggests outperformers and underperformers should emerge.
Think the S&P 500’s low volatility these days means all is calm and serene? Think again—and don’t be surprised to see big outperformers and big underperformers among many stocks that make up that index.
To understand why, check out a metric known as implied correlation. The CBOE 1-Month Implied Correlation Index—essentially a sister index of the widely followed VIX volatility index—measures the extent to which the top 50 stocks in the S&P 500 are expected to move in lockstep.
- An extremely high correlation means most stocks should behave the same way at the same time—moving together almost as a unit.
- An extremely low correlation means individual stocks may be all over the place—with some soaring, others plummeting, and still others going nowhere.
Today, that correlation index has sunk to 9.1—the lowest level since 2017 (see the chart). So while the lake’s surface (the S&P 500 overall) looks placid, there’s plenty of action below the waterline at the micro level.
That could be potentially great news for stock pickers and active managers who seek to identify specific investments they believe are positioned to outperform. For example, as second-quarter earnings season kicks into high gear this week, we expect emerging themes such as artificial intelligence—and companies’ ability to incorporate it effectively into their business models—to play a significant role in separating the winners from the losers across all market sectors.
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This commentary is written by Horizon Investments’ asset management team.
Past performance is not indicative of future results.
The S&P 500 or Standard & Poor’s 500 Index is a market-capitalization-weighted index of the 500 largest U.S. publicly traded companies. The CBOE 1-Month Implied Correlation Index measures correlation market expectations by quantifying the spread between the S&P 500 index implied volatility and the average single-stock basket component implied volatility. VIX is the ticker symbol and the popular name for the Chicago Board Options Exchange’s CBOE Volatility Index, a popular measure of the stock market’s expectation of volatility based on S&P 500 index options.
It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
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