By now, the world and his pet rabbit is aware of the 'odd' ramp in US equity markets as the European Close looms each day. Today - once again - was no exception, so we thought it worth quantifying this magical - and now self-fulfilling 'pattern'. In the last 4 months, if you bought the S&P 500 at 1100ET and sold at 1130ET, you would have won 55 times (garnering 129 points of profits) and lost 31 times (losing 70 points) for a total profit of over 59 points. This compares to the 53 point gain in the S&P 500 if you had just 'buy-and-hold'-ed over that period... and a quick glance at the chart tells you all you need to know about volatility...
