In recent weeks, scores of marquee fund managers -- including BlackRock's Bob Doll -- have come out with bold predictions about a continuing surge in the price of large-cap stocks. Now, Laszlo Birinyi offers the boldest call of them all.
Laszlo Birinyi, one of the first money managers to advise buying U.S. stocks before they bottomed in March 2009, said the average length and size of bull markets suggests the Standard & Poor's 500 Index will rally to 2,854 on Sept. 4, 2013.
The forecast represents a gain of 124 percent from yesterday's close of 1,271.87 and 322 percent from the 12-year low reached almost 22 months ago.
Birinyi said that given how long the advances that began in 1962, 1982, 1990 and 2002 lasted, the current rally should continue another 32 months. Historical precedent shows that gains are largest in the first and last quarters of bull markets, according to research conducted by Westport, Connecticut-based Birinyi Associates Inc. The first of this increase ended in April 2010, and the final quarter may start in July 2012, he said in a report e-mailed to clients today.
“When we were up in the beginning more than 70 percent, that made us very comfortable in suggesting this was a market of duration, and we concluded that this was going to be a long-term secular bull market,” Birinyi said in a telephone interview.
The market is “following the classical pattern of run-ups, consolidation, people getting bored, and so you're in for a very long period of rising prices,” he said.
Birinyi, who analyzes historical charts and patterns to make forecasts, said in December that the S&P 500 will climb to 1,333 this year, joining money manager Leon Cooperman in citing higher earnings and valuations below historic levels. Earnings should advance 14 percent this year after they beat estimates in the three quarters reported so far for 2010, according to analyst estimates compiled by Bloomberg.
His 2011 forecast compares with the 1,371 average of 11 strategists surveyed by Bloomberg News. The S&P 500 fell 0.3 percent to 1,268.42 at 11:03 a.m. New York time today, after advancing 13 percent in 2010.
Biriny's growth portfolio returned about 25 percent in 2010, while the conservative group was up about 21 percent, both beating the S&P 500's performance, according to his January Reminiscences Newsletter. Investors should look for stocks that aren't correlated to the broader market and buy names based on individual cases instead of buying companies based on market value or dividend yield, Birinyi said, using those themes as examples.
“Earnings, for all the concern, had some great, great numbers that were not expected, and fundamentals are still positive,” he said. “The real point is there's going to be down days in the market, but people should realize that on a historical basis, this market has a long way to go.”
