What a difference a couple of months make. Individual investors have re-embraced stocks and are more confident that markets will rise than they have been all year, according to Investopedia’s latest survey of newsletter readers. This coincides with the beginning of a new bull market and a rally across most sectors of the S&P 500, w𓂃hich is sitting at a 9-month ꦉhigh. 

According to the survey results, 23% of respondents believe the S&P 500 will deliver returns of 5% or more over the next six months—a 10 percentage point increase from early May. Only 18% expect the market to fall 10% or more by the end of the year. That’s the lowest level of pessimism among respondents in 2023, and only one third indicate that they are investing less now due to concerns about their portfolios.🔯 

What Are Investors Worried About Now?

While respondents are still concerned about inflation, a potential 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:recession, and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:high interest rates, their levels of pessimism have significantly retreated in the past two months. With a potential debt ceiling crisis now off the table, and no recent bank failures, investors' main concerns are centered around inflation, which has been 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:slowly receding, a recession, U.S. relations with Chinꦦa, and persistently high interest rates, in that order. While 69% of respondents still believe the U🅰.S. will enter a recession this year, that’s a 12% drop from our survey results in early May. 

What’s Bubbling?

With the strong rally in tech-related stocks, and especially anything around A.I., it’s not a surprise that 48% of respondents believe 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:A.I. related stocks are in a bubble right now, followed by mega-cap tech and housing stocks. All of those sectors and theme🎀s have outperformed the broader market by significant margins so far this year.

What Would You Do With An Extra $10,000?

It’s one of the most popular questions on Investopedia, which is why we always include it in our bi-monthly surveys. We weren’t surprised that our readers chose individual stocks again as their top way to spend $10,000. In late April and early May, 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:certificates of deposit (CDs) top𓃲ped the list for the first time since we began this survey in 2020. But the nascent bull market has brought respondents back to stocks again in another sign of market confidence. 

Retail Investors’ Top Stocks

Our readers are pretty consistent when it comes to stock picking, and their top ten selections for their portfolios have remained fairly consistent over the years. They like mega-cap tech and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:consumer discretionary stocks, although AT&T and Pfizer are back in their top ten, while Exxon-Mobil fell several places, and Netflix and Disney are notably absent.