Bear markets are characterized by very sharp rallies that can fade relatively quickly.
Basically the market in the US began to decline a long time ago if you look at the average stocks in the US. It is down over the last 12 months by 26 percent from their highs, the average stock but the indices held up very well until the end of December because the indices do not reflect what is happening in the market.
For example, you have an index, you have 500 stocks, if three stocks are very strong, they can push up the index while 497 stocks go down. So we have to look at the market beneath the surface and beneath the surface there was already a bear market in the US for a long time, for a year or more but there are some stocks and maybe another 20 shares such as Facebook, Amazon, Google that were driving and keeping the index up.
The interventions by the Central Banks have a numerous unintended consequences - they lead to rise in stock prices. But for many people, this is not favorable because particularly in real estate, the affordability becomes an issue, they don’t have the money to buy expensive homes and so the home ownership rate in the US has been way down.
