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The Gambler's Fallacy

BY JEFF PIETSCH | MARCH 17, 2010 | 1:08 PM | 0 COMMENTS

It's more of a mathematical curiosity than anything else, but check out the odds of 14 successive up-days below, the record for which looks to get set by the SPY today. If that's not a pot of leprechaun gold for the bulls on this St. Pat's day, I don't know what is!

What really stood out to me in this quick study, is the dramatic bullish bias shown this last year with over 60% of days ending higher as compared to 53% since the SPY's inception seventeen years ago in 1993.

This strong bullish bias significantly increases the odds of successive runs over a "fair" 50/50 flip of the coin.  However, what are the independent odds of another up-day tomorrow?  Well—coins don't have any memory—do traders?

Note: Observations are non-overlapping.



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