The S&P 500: Up 3.4% Since Jan. 2

The Standard & Poor’s 500 index is having a good year, as we all know. The index is up 6.1% and so far managing to prove the naysayers wrong.

But if there’s something sobering about 2013′s gains, it’s this:

(Click image for larger version.)

That graph is from a Big Picture post yesterday asking whether we’re heading for a correction (answer: Quite possibly, but it may not be too painful.) It’s striking to see how much of this year’s gains came on Jan. 2 — take that one day out and we’re up 3.4% this year. That’s not bad, but it’s nothing to get too excited about. And that relatively shallow rise makes it more noteworthy when we then see index lose 1% or more in a day.