A Weekly Record of How Many Stocks Rose, How Many Fell, and What the Averages Did Not Say
Vol. I · No. 34August 21, 2026
The Trend of the Market
S. & P. 500 Loses 1.4 Per Cent on the Week—Cumulative Advance-Decline Line 2,431 Issues Below August Peak—The Week’s Count Narrow
By the Editor
The S. & P. 500 finished the week at 7,674.37, down 1.43 per cent, 1.4 per cent below its high for the year of 7,785.76, set Aug. 14. The cumulative advance-decline line made its peak on August 14 at 9,774. In the one week since, it has given back 2,431 issues, and it now stands at 7,343.
The week’s own count was narrow: 4,278 issues advanced and 6,709 declined. Breadth confirmed the week’s decline.
New Lows
New lows outnumbered new highs. This week the exchanges recorded 207 new highs against 853 new lows. The ten-week average of issues advancing is 51.0 per cent, down from 53.9 a week ago.
Market Charts
The Price of the Market Against the Count of the Market
— Weekly, January 2, 2026 – August 21, 2026 —
Fig. 1.—S. & P. 500 weekly close, drawn as an open ribbon (above), and the cumulative advance-decline line for all U.S. exchanges (below), with readings under zero on the stippled ground, January 2, 2026 to August 21, 2026. Since August 14 the index has lost 1.4 per cent while the line has fallen 2,431 issues.
Per Cent of Issues Advancing
Fig. 2.—Weekly share of issues that advanced, measured from 50 per cent. Hatched bars mark up weeks for the average stock, open bars on the stippled ground mark down weeks. The heavy line is the ten-week average.
New Highs Less New Lows
Fig. 3.—Weekly new 52-week highs minus new lows, all exchanges. The heavy line is the four-week average.
MARKET STATISTICS
S. & P. 500
Advances & Declines
New
Close
Change
Net
Cumulative
Pct. Adv.
Highs
Lows
Tone
The last eight weeks. Tone compares the week’s breadth with the week’s price move. Back numbers for all 34 weeks since January 2, 2026 are on file.
From the Editor
Why We Call It the Count of the Market
A Note on Col. Leonard P. Ayres, 1879–1946, and the Daily Tally He Began
Leonard Ayres served as chief statistician of the Army in the First World War. He later became vice president and economist of the Cleveland Trust Company, where he wrote its monthly Business Bulletin. With his assistant, James F. Hughes, he kept a daily tally of how many stocks rose and how many fell. He called it the count of the market.
“I think this will make an interesting stock market statistic.”AYRES TO HUGHES, AS HUGHES RECALLED IT IN 1951
The average tells you how far the market moved. The count tells you how many stocks went along. This publication keeps that count every week, in the manner Ayres began it.