Vanguard founder Jack Bogle has been around the block. The 88-year-old investing titan, who is basically the father of passive investing, says this renewed regime of volatility in stocks is uncanny.
How uncanny? He’s never seen anything like it in his 66-year career. Here’s what he had to say during a CNBC interview on Thursday:
Bogle is referring notably to the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +0.99% which erased a 510-point decline on Wednesday to end up by 1%, or about 240 points, with the S&P 500 index SPX, +0.69% and the Nasdaq Composite Index COMP, +0.49% also producing stunning intraday turnarounds as fears of a trade clash between the U.S. and China receded in dramatic fashion.
Read: Stocks post first 3-day gain in a month as trade fears take a back seat
Lately, the market has been prone to white-knuckle swings after a yearlong period of quiet in which a popular measure of volatility, the Cboe Volatility Index VIX, +6.81% hovered at half its historic average of 20, until it abruptly jolted up 118% — its sharpest rise on record — in February, capsizing a number of dubious and popular wagers on Wall Street.
MarketWatch’s Ryan Vlastelica writes that the S&P 500 has already tripled the number of 1% swings seen over all of last year.
For just the first quarter, the S&P had 23 days with a 1% move. According to Nicholas Colas, co-founder of DataTrek Research, the historical average — going back to 1958 — is for 13 such sessions over that period.
Check out the Bogle interview on CNBC below: