Strategists Are Capitulating on their Bearish Forecasts After Rally

Nothing much to add to the following Bloomberg report, except that the market is over-extended and participants over-bullish in the wake of a global slowdown, bubbles popping around the world, and sovereigns default...

Global Strategists Abandoning Bearish Views After Missing Rally
Feb. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Strategists at the biggest banks are capitulating on their bearish forecasts after the best start to a year for global stocks since 1994 and gains of more than 7 percent in emerging-market currencies.

Just two weeks after saying that investors should “remain cautious,” Larry Hatheway, the chief economist at UBS AG, raised his recommendations on global shares and high-yield bonds in a Jan. 23 note to customers entitled, “Wrong, but not too late.” Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc, and Benoit Anne, the global head of emerging-markets strategy at Societe Generale SA, said their estimates for developing nations were proven wrong.

The MSCI All-Country World Index climbed 5.7 percent in January, surprising strategists at Bank of America Corp., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Barclays Plc who had forecast first-half losses because of Europe’s debt crisis. JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc., which predicted the rally in stocks, say it will continue as the U.S. housing market rebounds and China eases lending restrictions to bolster economic growth.