Bull and bear markets: What to know about each

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The constant battle between charging bulls and growling bears.

© Bet_Noire—iStock/Getty Images

Stock market fluctuations are common, as so-called bull markets don’t run forever and so-called bear markets eventually withdraw their claws.

Major stock market indexes can rise, fall, or hold relatively steady over time as investors buy and sell based on the latest earnings reports, interest rate patterns, and geopolitical events, among other things. When indexes build an extended rally or suffer a lengthy sell-off, it’s called a “bull” or “bear” market, respectively, with bulls representing optimism and bears the opposite.

Identifying these cycles gives you a chance to sell stocks at a profit during a bullish market or buy stocks cheaper during the bearish part of the cycle. Watching these cycles is also important if you’re near or in retirement. If you’ve just retired and the market sinks 30%, it’s an unfortunate time to suddenly need cash from your investments. Identifying cycles early and taking some profit while the going is good might help you avoid that scenario.

A simple bull market definition is that prices are rising and investors expect that to continue. There’s no specific way to measure when bull markets start, but some analysts say it’s when prices of a major index like the S&P 500 (SPX) rise 20% from a recent low.

Here are some common traits of bull markets:

Generally, bull markets reflect widespread optimism about the market and future economic growth. They often occur when interest rates are relatively low, geopolitical tensions aren’t too intense, and inflation isn’t hurting peoples’ finances. A bull market doesn’t mean things go straight up or that there’s never a bad quarter, but stocks recover relatively quickly and show resilience despite bad news.

In a bull market, every downturn looks like a buying opportunity, as the saying goes.

Bull markets help investors increase their wealth, but can also lead to overconfidence and a mistaken belief that prices will never fall. Investors can sometimes also ignore when stocks get overvalued based on a company’s fundamental outlook, and pay too much for growth prospects. Sometimes the later stages of a bull market feature investors grabbing investments that later prove questionable, like the “meme” stock craze in 2020 or the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s.

During bull markets, investors are sometimes reluctant to take profits on their winners, fearing they’ll miss out on greater gains. When sentiment turns and markets become bearish, these investors may avoid selling in hopes that prices will rise—and end up losing their profits.

As an investor, it’s important to keep your emotions from taking over during a bull market. If, for instance, you have a 60% to 40% investment strategy—with stocks at 60% of your portfolio and fixed income at 40%—a long rally might take stocks to 65% or 70%. That’s a time to consider taking some profits to return your portfolio to your original investment goals. Otherwise, you could get hit harder when the bull market eventually ends.

When prices fall for an extended time and are expected to continue dropping, that’s a bear market. In these cases, the old saying is that every rally looks like a selling opportunity.

Market researchers define a bear market as when prices fall 20% from a recent high. Stock indexes such as the S&P 500 or the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) can fall into bear-market territory and individual stocks can also slip into bearish behavior.

These are common traits of bear markets, in many ways the opposite of a bull market:

Sometimes prices will rise for a while during a bear market. This is often called a relief rally or a “dead-cat bounce.” But these upswings generally don’t last, and the downward trend resumes.

As unnerving as bear markets can be, they do have positive aspects. Long-term investors can buy stocks more cheaply as prices fall and valuation metrics such as price-to-earnings ratios (P/E) contract. Bear markets often convince businesses to focus on running their operations efficiently and becoming better stewards of their capital to entice investors.

Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research, noted there were 17 bear markets between 1929 and 2022, using the standard definition of a loss of 20%. He observed:

The economy is often considered to be in a recession when GDP falls for two straight quarters, although other metrics also play a role. Since 1945, the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) identified 13 recessions, and there have been 13 bear markets, says Stovall.

Still, the SPX rose an average of 1% during recession periods since World War II. This could be because investors anticipate the start and end of recessions, causing the stock market to top out before the economy shrinks and to hit bottom before the recession ends. In other words, bear markets don’t perfectly correlate with recessions.

Bear markets associated with recessions since World War II saw the SPX lose between 7% and 57% of its value.

While the NBER recognizes recessions an average of eight months into the recession, the S&P 500 anticipated these recessions by an average of seven months, Stovall says. The shortest recession lasted three months and the longest 22 months.

Signs that the stock market might be in danger of going bear include:

Stovall says since 1945, the combination of these four factors is what typically led to bear markets.

Markets experience extended cycles where prices are generally rising or falling. Savvy investors pay close attention to bull versus bear market cycles to avoid buying stocks when they’re overpriced or selling when they’re undervalued.

Bear markets, like bull markets, require investors to check their emotions. Things may feel very bad when your portfolio drops month after month, and it takes resilience and discipline to see that as a buying opportunity. But if your research shows that a stock or sector is getting punished despite positive fundamentals, it could be time to add to your stake.