With banks collapsing, inflation on the rise, and oil supply set to tighten, Wall Street seemingly isn’t filled with optimism.
According to Bank of America, traders have the most negative view of the market they have had in years with investors gravitating back to “safe” assets in the fixed-income world.
The news could bode well for bullish investors who are hoping to see Bank of America’s “sell side indicator”—which tracks how strategists at various firms are allocating assets—dip into the “buy” signal after sliding in March.
The index is currently in neutral territory, the BofA team added, but highlighted the metric has fallen by seven percentage points since peaking in 2021—now down to 52.7%.
Strategist Savita Subramanian, head of U.S. equity and quantitative strategy at Bank of America Securities, wrote in the note seen by Bloomberg: “Wall Street’s consensus equity allocation has been a reliable contrary indicator. In other words, it has been a bullish signal when Wall Street strategists were extremely bearish, and vice versa.”
Subramanian was among those who correctly called the stock slump last year, adding in February that the S&P 500 was in a short-covering rally but would sink back into a bear market for a sustained period.
Bank of America—which is also predicting a mild recession later this year—isn’t alone in its bearish outlook.
Stuart Kaiser, head of U.S. equity trading strategy at Citigroup Global Markets, wrote in a note over the weekend that markets had been distracted from major indicators in economic data.
He pointed to the fact that banking issues had not been resolved, questions over monetary policy remain unanswered, and that risk premiums “leave little room for positive surprise and lots of space for disappointment.”
Bank of America research published this week, and seen by Fortune, similarly cautions that confusion in the banking sector is far from over.
“While the peak uncertainties related to bank stress have declined, weaker demand due to lower yields and lingering uncertainties about the economic impact should persist for longer,” it said.
Among other bears expecting epic crashes is J.P. Morgan’s Marko Kolanovic, who said in January investors would be wise to stay away from U.S. stocks for at least six months, adding he was “outright negative” on the S&P 500.
