Happy New Year.

The start of a new year is an exciting time, but it can also bring about anxiety. It’s easy to get your mind wrapped up around what kind of changes to expect in 2025, especially with a new incoming administration. Until you know what those changes are, you can’t make any decisions.

In the last newsletter, we promised to update you on the Santa Claus Rally. It looks like Santa didn’t show up on Wall St. this year, and that may have roused some worries. But Santa’s no-show doesn’t necessarily mean you should expect a bear market in 2025. There’s still the January Barometer, another of Yale Hirsch’s discoveries, which states that, as the S&P 500 goes in January, so goes the year. And Friday’s turnaround price action injected hope that January could still end up being a positive month for the stock market.

The S&P 500 is holding the support of its November lows (see this chart), which is encouraging. Let’s hope it continues that way and ends the month with a gain.

On Friday, many stocks saw significant gains, especially in the Technology and Consumer Discretionary sectors. But a handful of stocks, like US Steel and alcoholic beverage companies, saw significant down moves. In the SCTR Reports panel on Your Dashboard, if you select “US Industries” followed by “Low 10", you’ll see that the Dow Jones US Steel Index ($DJUSST) and the Dow Jones US Distillers & Vintners Index ($DJUSVN) made it to this list. Pull up the charts of these indexes. You’ll see that this wasn’t a one-day down move. The downward move started earlier. If you regularly view your StockCharts Dashboard panels, you would have noticed that something was stirring in these industries.

As we press on into the new year, consider learning about the unique tools available in StockCharts and becoming a more empowered investor. You’ll find detailed instructions on all the tools in our Support Center.