The market’s record year may have more room to run, with sentiment buoyed by recent outperformance and historical trends.

Stocks have notched all-time highs following President-elect Donald Trump’s victory earlier this month, as Wall Street remains optimistic over the incoming administration’s economic agenda despite looming tariff risks.

“Tariff threats may trigger near-term market volatility, but the fundamental backdrop remains supportive,” UBS Global Wealth Management’s Mark Haefele wrote in a note to clients on Wednesday.

This year, the S&P 500 (^GSPC) has notched more than 50 all-time closing highs, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) and Nasdaq 100 (^NDX) are not far behind.

Looking ahead, strategists suggest the market’s bull year could end on a positive note.

“At this point, you can’t deny that everything looks positive,” Michele Schneider, chief strategist for MargetGuage.com told me on Yahoo Finance’s Morning Brief, adding that investors should “stay with the momentum and stay with the trend.”

Using history as a guide, the odds are for that trend to be on the upswing. According to CFRA’s Sam Stovall, December is the S&P 500’s most consistent month of gains, with the greatest frequency of advances (batting average). It also has the lowest volatility — nearly 40% below the average for the other months since World War II.

During the month, the S&P MidCap 400 and SmallCap 600 indexes have outperformed other areas of the market, followed closely by the Utilities (XLU), Industrials (XLI), Materials (XLB), and Financials (XLF) sectors.

What sets this year apart is the election adding to the bullish sentiment. December historically ranks as the S&P 500’s second-best month of the year during election years, with an average return of 1.3% since 1950, according to analysis from Carson Group’s Ryan Detrick.

His analysis also found that strong year-to-date performance often increases the chances that investors will chase the market into year-end. Of the past 10 times the S&P entered December up more than 20%, the month of December recorded an average gain of 2.4%.

Looking further ahead, the potential for a Santa Claus rally — which is when stocks climb higher in the final five trading days of the year plus the first two trading days of the New Year — could further boost returns.

Stock Trader’s Almanac editor in chief Jeff Hirsch, who explains that Thanksgiving kicks off a run of solid bullish seasonal patterns for the market, recently wrote that he has “combined these seasonal occurrences into a single trade: Buy the Tuesday before Thanksgiving and hold until the 2nd trading day of the New Year. Since 1950, S&P 500 has been up 79.73% of the time from the Tuesday before Thanksgiving to the 2nd trading day of the year with an average gain of 2.58%.”

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The number of candidates completing chartered financial analyst exams is in stubborn decline as demand slides for a qualification once seen as essential for the profession.

The latest available results for CFA Institute, which oversees the tests, show 116,727 people sat all three levels of the exam in the first eight months of the year, down 2,735 on the same period in 2023.

Last year there were 163,000 exam registrations, 40 per cent down from the peak of 270,456 in 2019.

Margaret Franklin, chief executive at the CFA Institute, which oversees the qualification, said a downturn in growth from China was partly to blame.

Chinese and Indian candidates have boomed in number over the past decade as graduates overseas seek international investment qualifications that could lead to jobs with US and European investment companies. India’s exam registrations have doubled since 2014 to 31,600.

China’s growth rate “has slowed down, but it was hyperbolic before that,” she told the Financial Times, adding that “the CFA programme is still really highly regarded” in the country.

Candidates from India have taken up some of the slack, although she anticipates that growth from the South Indian nation will moderate.

The pandemic negatively affected the number of people attempting to qualify, especially among those under the strict lockdown regime in China. The CFA Institute has shifted to online testing but the new system took time to establish.

After a sharp dip in registrations during the pandemic, exam result numbers have shown no recovery. Pass rates overall have recovered to 46 per cent, having dipped to 22 per cent in 2021.

Whether the CFA makes a difference on the job front is what matters for candidates, some of whom see it as useful but not necessary.

“You’re not going to hire or not hire someone on the basis of having a CFA,” said Elise Badoy, head of Emea equity research at Citi. However, she said the qualification “helps for younger analysts”, and that for the first three or four years of their career “it’s definitely a positive thing”.

The slowdown comes at a time when structural changes in the asset management industry, such as the shift towards passive investment and private capital, threaten the relevance of holding a CFA.

CFA Institute has introduced new products like investment certifications in areas such as ESG and climate change. Candidates can now focus on course areas other than general portfolio management, such as private markets and wealth management. Case studies within the exam include the cryptocurrency sector.

“We are diversifying, trying to find the things that meet the needs of people in all stages of their career,” Franklin said.

To encourage more applicants, candidates for the Level I CFA exam can now be up to two years away from completing their undergraduate degree, up from one year previously. Franklin believes the CFA offers a “more meritocratic, less selective” qualification than a more expensive MBA from universities.

While she believes the worst of the pandemic effect has passed, the organisation has had to adapt to the slowdown.

“Do I think we are going to have the same hyper growth? No. Hyper growth in the business isn’t there any more.”

Genesis Hinckley, aka Genuinely Genesis, is a motivational speaker and financial content creator with the goal of making her followers “rich in both your wallet and mind.”

“Poor people work for money, rich people make their money work for them,” she said in a recent reel post on Instagram. “If you grew up poor or in a middle class family, it’s likely you don’t know these things about rich people. I have lived in both scenarios, and I want you to break through that financial barrier.”

Read More: How Middle-Class Earners Are Quietly Becoming Millionaires and How You Can, Too

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To help people move from poor or middle class to rich, Hinckley shared four “rich people secrets.“

Trending Now: Suze Orman’s Secret to a Wealthy Retirement–Have You Made This Money Move?

Hinckley acknowledges that becoming rich isn’t easy, but you have to “choose your hard.”

“It’s hard to be fat, it’s hard to be fit; it’s hard to be poor, it’s hard to be rich; it’s hard to not get what you want; it’s hard to get what you want,” she said. “You can live your life always blaming the external, but at the end of the day, you do have a choice.”

Discover Next: How To Become Rich: 9 Fastest Ways, According To Experts

Hinckley said that it’s difficult to become rich if an unexpected expense will put you into debt. That’s why it’s important to always have three to six months’ worth of living expenses accessible in a savings account.

“It is not your daily cup of coffee that is making you broke,” she said. “Actually, it’s that one-off thing that happens that you were not financially prepared for. Your car breaks down, your bathroom’s flooded, you need a new dryer. An emergency fund will protect you and shield you from the ‘what ifs.’”

You can’t build wealth while you’re still saddled with high-interest debt, so Hinckley recommends making it a priority to pay this off.

“This prevents you from going under,” she said. “If you’re living paycheck-to-paycheck, constantly trying to figure out, ‘How am I going to get out of this?,’ the only way is to live below your means and get rid of all of your consumer debt.”

Once you’ve built your emergency fund and paid off your high-interest debt, you’re ready to start building wealth. The best way to do this is to invest, Hinckley said.

“Invest your money depending on what feels comfortable for you,” she said. “This is when you’ll finally have the freedom to put your money toward assets. And if you do this very thing, you will not be living off Social Security when you retire.”

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