I think the two-word phrase that captures 2016 for the bears is: “disappointingly brief.” Disappointing because all attempts to drive the market lower are aborted. Brief because the attempts to do so often last only a day, or a tiny bit more. 2009-2016 has been awful for the bears, but 2016 has simply been awful in a different way.
Let’s take a look at how the bulls seems to have finally clinched real power: first, the Dow Jones Composite has had its channel violated. Before we all kill ourselves, I just want to point out that this same channel was violated to the downside briefly (see both tinted areas), so it’s not a totally lost cause.