Bull/Bear Ratio

The Investors Intelligence Sentiment Survey takes it upon themselves to gather data from investors and investment professionals to ask whether they feel positive (or bullish) about the current market climate, or negative (bearish). They then calculate and publish a bull/bear ratio every week by dividing the number of bullish respondents by the number of bearish respondents. If the ratio is greater than one, you might want to take a more conservative investment stance, since there could be too many people feeling bullish, and the market may start to go down. (Yes, the market usually moves the opposite direction of popular sentiment.) A ratio of less than one might mean there are too many bears around, so the market may have hit bottom and could go up, making it a good time to invest.

Or by the time the survey is published, everyone could have changed their mind anyway. So like...why do they publish this thing anyway? Eh. Gives brokers something to talk about between teeing off and putting.