Goldman’s Scott Rubner is worried. About two things.

First, he’s worried he might not be bullish enough into year-end. Second, he’s worried stocks might have a “spooky” few weeks amid seasonal challenges ahead of Halloween.

On several occasions of late, Rubner said he sees SPX 6000 by New Year’s. That’s hardly infeasible. In fact, it’s more likely than not. Which explains why Scott suspects he might be under-appreciating the upside.

“Q4 seasonals start to bounce on October 27,” Rubner said, in his latest, pointing to the visuals below.

The Nasdaq 100 chart (on the right) only goes back to 1985 for obvious reasons. The SPX figure, on the left, incorporates nearly a century of data. As you can see, October 27 is the day it turns.

Scott doesn’t take these seasonals lightly, and much as it pains me to say this as someone who adheres to a pretty austere definition of the term “fundamentals,” you probably shouldn’t take them lightly either. Not investment advice, but: The seasonals do matter. From a flow of funds perspective and also because if everyone thinks they matter, they do.

“I am bullish on US equities for a year-end rally starting on October 28,” Rubner said. “I am worried that my 6K target is too low.”

As for the near-term, he’s cautious for a number of reasons, not least of which is crowded positioning. “Everyone is in the pool,” he wrote, noting that systematic exposure’s rebuilt and institutional investors “have been forced in.”

The figures above give you a sense of exposure and positioning. Systematics aren’t “maxed out” (although vol control considered on its own might be), but you can see the above-mentioned rebuild off the August drawdown lows (blue line in the figure on the left).

Beyond that, Rubner said hedge funds may “need to take down exposure given elevated election volatility,” and then there’s the mutual fund year-end issue.

The figure below, from Goldman, tells you pretty much everything you need to know: A quarter of mutual fund AUM is staring down the calendar barrel.

“October mutual fund year-end is on Halloween,” Rubner wrote, before putting some numbers to it: “$1.853 trillion worth of assets and 756 mutual funds report their year-end on 10/31/24.”

And then there’s the earnings blackout, which is ongoing. This is an under-appreciated fact: The biggest source of demand for US equities is corporations themselves. There’s a lot I could say about that, but this isn’t the place for a political diatribe. The blackout window lasts until October 25. Once that lifts, the corporate bid’s back in play.

The bottom line from Rubner: Over the next few weeks, there’s “a supply-demand mismatch, and skew is to the downside,” but looking out to year-end, he sees blue sky to 6000 SPX — and perhaps beyond.