Stocks usually bottom before everything else

Earnings, employment, and the economy lag

From a new column I wrote for Yahoo Finance on Tuesday (link):

…stock prices mostly reflect expectations for the future, and not so much what’s happening now or what’s happened in the past.

This is relevant today as the S&P 500 has rallied sharply from its Oct. 12 low, and yet  corporate earnings are deteriorating, economic growth is slowing, and unemploy…