Bullish on Brady: If the Buccaneers win Super Bowl LV, the SBI says the stock market should win in 2021.
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For over 50 years, the Super Bowl Mark has been a Groundhog Day of sports prognostication. If you believe that a big rodent can predict the end of winter, why not assume that the Super Bowl winner is predicting next year’s stock market performance? Amadan? Not as much as you might think – the Mark has been right 74% of the time, or 40 of the last 54 years. Those are higher than you can bet on tossing the coin.
The principle behind the Super Bowl Signal is simple: If the NFC beats the AFC in the Super Bowl, the market will be higher in the coming year. (Meaning if Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers can bother slightly-favored Patrick Mahomes and Kansas City Chiefs, they expect a bull market.) There is one notable exception, however – AFC teams such as the Pittsburgh Steelers, one of the former original NFL clubs. the two leagues merged in 1970, counted as an NFC team.
The theory was first identified in 1978 before last New York Times sports commentator Leonard Koppett, who understood that the relationship between the Super Bowl winner and stock market performance meant “nothing at all. He apologized for the adoption and persistence of the Super Bowl Indicator in mainstream culture as a “shame on rational thinking.” And before 2001, during a multi-year losing streak, Koppett declared it “dead as a doorway.”
SBI MVP: Legendary sports writer Leonard Koppett discovered the relationship between a Super Bowl winner and the stock market performance of the late 1970s – something he knew meant “nothing at all. ”
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But investors and sellers missed that memo. Among those who picked up the robe that Koppett never wanted was Robert Stovall, a former Wall Street analyst and strategic investor. After Koppett’s death in 2003, Stovall became a goalkeeper on the Super Bowl Indicator, often writing about his certainty with a wink and a nod in investment articles.
Then in 2015, when he turned 90, Stovall passed it on to his son, Sam, the chief investment strategist at CFRA Research. The youngest Stovall, who describes himself as the “keeper of the superstitions,” now records the Super Bowl result and market performance 12 months later in an Excel spreadsheet. It crushes the numbers and updates the numbers at the Super Bowl Indicator.
Super Bowl Signal (1967-1980): The beginning of winning
To be clear, Stovall will no take the theory seriously.
“I don’t think anyone in their right mind would use the Super Bowl Indicator to start investing,” he said.
In addition to the good junk, the SBI has also climbed a five-year loss. So if the Token has been wrong since 2015 – is the theory dead?
Guardians of the Reputation: “It doesn’t pay to be a bear,” the late SBI curator Robert Stovall taught his son, Sam.
COURTESY OF SAM STOVALL
“Well, it means,” says Sam Stovall, “that it is a good example of an unreasonable relationship. ”
He says that although science is not behind the SBI, Stovall’s father always told him “it doesn’t pay to be a bear.” Americans are optimistic about nature, Robert Stovall told his son, and if an analyst is bearish and wrong, they get rid of them. If they are bearish and right, they hate it. In other words, Stovall is rooting for Tom Brady and the Buccaneers, an NFC team, this year.
“I believe in turning back to the average,” he says. “The summary you give to a time-tested strategy is the day it starts working again.”
Super Bowl Mark (1981-2000): The Years of the Dynasty
Of course, sports investors may not be investors and the Super Bowl is, in fact, one of the busiest working days of the year. Bettors were paying around $ 6.8 billion on Super Bowl LIV, when the San Francisco 49ers lost to the Kansas City Chiefs, according to the American Gaming Association. However, you would be stressed to find a gambler who really pays attention to the SBI.
Professional sports referee Rufus Peabody says the Super Bowl Signal is reminiscent of Redskins Rule. The theory goes like this: if the Washington Football Team (the former Redskins) wins their last home game, the governor wins the lead. From 1940 to 2000, the mutual understanding came to a head. However, starting in 2004 the theory turned and now if Washington wins their last home game, the opponent he has a right to win. (This version has worked with Obama, Trump and Biden.)
“This shows that if you are looking for relationships, you can find them,” Peabody said. “But it doesn’t mean it’s worth it – it’s not worth anything. The Redskin Rule, the Super Bowl Signal applies to two unrelated things. There is no way one thing overcomes the other. ”
As a professional salesperson, Peabody says it’s easy to be randomly harassed. “People tend to see patterns when they’re not there,” he said.
Super Bowl Signal (2001-2020): Better luck next year
Recognizing a pattern is just why most people don’t get better at gambling, add Ed Miller, a poker player who founded his own company that sells odds to sports books. Instead of focusing on the basics of a game like poker, gamblers can be caught with superstitions or tokens that have nothing to do with the outcome.
Miller says that while a professional salesperson should not, or would not, pay attention to something as silly as the Super Bowl Indicator, it is still open – minded around angles.
“I saw things in sports betting I didn’t say anything at first,” Miller said. “When someone gives me an angle, I don’t judge immediately. ”
And it’s clear that Sam Stovall is in on his own joke. He says he enjoys encouraging the SBI – as he did in an investment memo on Feb. 1 – to show that Wall Street can have a sense of humor. But, deep down, wearing the Super Bowl Indicator is kind of reminiscent of his father, who died in December at the age of 95.
“I keep records on Super Bowl theory just because it’s good to keep my father’s legacy alive,” says Stovall. “I’m doing it for him. Another thing, why would you bother to keep tabs on a sign that has no purpose and hasn’t worked in the last five years? ”