why not sell in may and go away 
the only drawback of historical patterns is that they don t reliably predict the future that s especially true of well known historical patterns if enough people were to become convinced the sell in may and go away pattern is here to stay it would in fact promptly start to go away early bird sellers would all try to sell in april and bid against each other to buy the stocks back ahead of the pack in october the seasonal tendency s averages also conceal big fluctuations from year to year of course in any given year the influence of seasonality is swamped by a variety of other often more pressing considerations selling in may would have done anyone following that adage no good in 2020 as the s p 500 slumped 34 over five weeks in february and march as the covid 19 pandemic struck only to return 12 4 from may to october in fact in the decade through 2020 the unfashionable summer half of the market year averaged a solid if unspectacular return of 3 8 with no significant decline since 2011 according to lpl research 4 sell in may has also been off the mark in early 2022 with the s p 500 down 8 8 in april and 13 3 since the start of the year in summary while the historical pattern is undeniable its predictive power is questionable and the opportunity costs incurred potentially significant alternatives to sell in may and go away instead of acting on the saying literally investors who believe the pattern will continue could rotate from the higher risk market sectors to those that tend to outperform in periods of market weakness for example a custom index representing the strategy of rotating between healthcare and consumer staples stocks held from may to october and more economically sensitive market sectors from november to april would have significantly outperformed the s p 500 in both periods between 1990 and 2021 according to pacer etfs sponsor of an exchange traded fund attempting to execute this seasonal rotation as an investment strategy 5 the pacer cfra stovall equal weight seasonal rotation etf szne had about 80 million in assets and was down more than 12 in 2022 as of april 29 67for many retail investors with long term goals a buy and hold strategy hanging on to equities year round year after year unless there s a change in fundamentals remains the best course 