Scoping the Market
At Accendo Markets we believe in looking beyond anecdotal evidence and examining actual market data to determine how the UK 100 performs during the summer, and if investors can use those statistics to identify suitable investment opportunities.
Whether the “Sell in May” saying has any basis in fact or not, the most useful approach for investors is to get actionable intelligence for actual performance of UK 100 stocks so that they can make informed decisions. In the end, the purpose of this report is not to support or disprove old sayings, rather to empower investors and give them the research tools that will enable them to successfully trade in any seasonal period.
With that in mind, we have examined price performance data for the summer period for each member of the UK 100 , from the benchmark index’s birth in 1994 through to September 2017.
To stay true to the “Sell in May, Go Away, Come back on St Leger’s Day” saying, we have selected a precise Target Period spanning April 30 through to the second Saturday in September of each year, 1994-2017
Data was collected on May 2, 2018, using Alpha Terminal platform, using historical data from the London Stock Exchange (LSE).
The following metrics have been derived from gathered price data:
- Year-to-date (2018 YTD %) performance of the stock
- Best performance (%) during Target Period
- Worst performance (%) during Target Period
- Average performance (%) during Target Period
- Number of Years during Target Period when performance was positive or negative
- Proportion of years (%) during Target Period when performance was positive or negative
