One Sector Is Propping Up the US Stock Market

Jon Market Commentary

US stock benchmarks hit new all-time highs this month, and despite rich valuations, buyers think they’ll go higher still.
One reason for this exuberance is the growing dominance of passively indexed ETFs.
Rather than go to the trouble of picking individual stocks, people dump their cash into index ETFs. The ETF sponsor then buys every stock in the index – even the ugly ones.
Profit growth seems to justify this, even in the broad indexes. In its June 16 bulletin, FactSet Research estimated that combined profits in the S&P 500 companies will rise 6.5% in this year’s second quarter.
So, ‘combined profits’ means some companies (and sectors) performed better than average, some worse, right?
Actually, no.
What we really have is one sector growing profits at a gangbuster rate. The others, not so much.
Break down that 6.5% profit growth by sector, and you get this:

This post was published at Mauldin Economics on JUNE 27, 2017.