Bearish sentiment last stayed at these levels during an eight-week period between August and October 2009, when pessimism reached or exceeded 40% six times.
Against this backdrop, the big thinkers about today's media revolution tend to veer towards extremes of optimism or pessimism.
His 1922 book The Trade Cycle described the "tendency for confidence to pass into errors of optimism or pessimism, " which triggers booms and busts.
Another caveat - surveys of expectations do not all, or don't necessarily measure the absolute level of optimism or pessimism, they just measure how much those levels have changed.
Routine employment data, which underpins economic optimism or pessimism, is unlikely to reflect the full range of opportunity that the economy is creating as we move away from jobs as a primary form of engagement with work.
Whether the pessimism represents a buying opportunity or a sign to stay cautious remains to be seen.
Below is a table showing the May-through-October returns depending on whether the II sentiment survey was showing pessimism (left column) or if investors were showing optimism (right column).
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So I was surprised to see that people were pessimistic about it because pessimism implies that people may or may not want to do something to change their outlook.
As ERTS extends its climb back atop trendline support, an unwinding of pessimism in the options pits or short-selling arena, or a round of upwardly revised price targets, could help the stock resume its year-to-date rally.
Is pessimism among financial newsletter writers good or bad for stocks?
The point is not to look for the optimism case, or to look for the pessimism case: the point is to look for the truth.
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Too often people are prone to recurring bouts of optimism and pessimism that manifest themselves from time to time in the build-up or cessation of speculative excesses.
Which leads to the second reason for pessimism: Africa's families are under greater strain than Asia's or Latin America's were when their demographic transitions first began.
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