Memorial Day Trading – Early Retreat Leads to Mixed Trading

In the Stock Trader’s Almanac we show how the market trades around Memorial Day. In the table below we went back to 1971, the year the Uniform Monday Holiday Act took effect, moving Memorial Day and most other federal holidays to Monday.

Improved performance since 1986 is also highlighted. In what used to be the “May/June Disaster area” the S&P was down 15 of 20 Mays from 1965 to 1984. Then May was the best month from 1985 to 1997. In recent years, the Friday before Memorial has become getaway day on The Street and volume is often diminished and trading uninspired. NASDAQ exhibits a similar pattern to S&P 500 over the same time periods.