A New Year but Unresolved Questions Remain
January 7, 2025 by Brent Schutte, CFA®
Brent Schutte, CFA, is chief investment officer of the Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Company.
The new year typically brings with it a host of market predictions for the coming 12 months, including educated predictions of the closing levels of the major indices at year-end. The forecasts can make for interesting reading but often fall short in predictive value. Last year was no different, with Wall Street analysts at the beginning of the year forecasting an average price target for the S&P 500 of 4,800 by the end of the year (for context, the index opened the year at 4,769). Instead, the index closed out 2024 at 5,881, surpassing even the high end of the range of predictions made by the most optimistic analysts. Perhaps reflecting how badly many of the forecasts underestimated the upside for the markets, some of the projections we’ve seen for the year ahead are more bullish, coming in at an average of 6,600, or a roughly 12 percent gain.
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