New heights of the stock market

"The stock market has just finished the best 1st quarter in 14 years."

Yesterday such headlines appeared all over the internet. The Dow is up 8% and S&P 500 increased by 12%. Nasdaq composite index is up 19%, best start from 1991. While Nasdaq performance can be partly explained by Apple's stock price growth, what pushes other indexes to new heights? That's a good question. Is it a sign of the final end of recession? Or is it just the result of central banks' support, and the markets will fall back when it'll be removed? Nobody knows for sure.

There are many different opinions represented in Chicago Sun-Times article:

Dow ends best 1st quarter since 1998; Nasdaq up 19 percent


In my humble opinion, there are many signs that recession is finally over, both fundamental and technical ones. While the support of central banks is important, and the problems of housing market in US or of the debt markets in Europe can definitely slow down the rise, the new bullish market is not far away from now. However, it seems unlikely that the Dow can reach its all-time high of 14,164.53 till the end of this year, as Robert Doll, the chief equity investment manager at BlackRock, and some others reckon. The time for this hasn't come yet. I would be only glad to be wrong about my last statement, though.