Episode summary
Market Patterns Work and Jeffrey Hirsch Explains Why | The Real Eisman Playbook Ep 56
The Real Eisman Playbook
· · Hosts: Steve Eisman · Guests: Jeffrey Hirsch
Summary
Jeffrey Hirsch argued that the Stock Traders Almanac is really a behavioral finance book: markets repeat because people and institutions repeat. He described how the Almanac tracks recurring calendar effects across daily, monthly, seasonal, quarterly, and four-year political cycles, and said the strongest patterns often come from institutional flows, window dressing, retirement-plan contributions, and year-end positioning rather than from prediction in the abstract.
A major theme was the midterm-election cycle. Hirsch said the midterm year is a “bottom pickers paradise,” with weakness often concentrated in Q2 and Q3, followed by strength into the pre-election year. He also defended the “best six months” strategy, saying the raw version is to buy at the end of October and sell at the end of April, with the pattern supported by institutional behavior and a technical overlay.
He also walked through patterns that still work and ones that have faded. Hirsch said the January barometer and Santa Claus rally remain useful, while the old September reverse barometer no longer does. He was skeptical of Bitcoin’s seasonal behavior and said it has not delivered the way the thesis suggests. He also tied the longer-term “super boom” idea to war, inflation, and major technology shifts, arguing that AI could be the next productivity driver.
Key takeaways
- Hirsch said the Almanac’s edge comes from tracking repeated human behavior, not from forecasting every event.
- He called the midterm year a “bottom pickers paradise,” with market weakness often centered in Q2 and Q3 before a pre-election-year rally.
- He defended the best six months strategy as buying around October 30-31 and selling around April 30, with institutional flows helping explain it.
- Hirsch said the January barometer and Santa Claus rally still matter, but the old September reverse barometer has stopped working.
- He was bearish on Bitcoin’s seasonal setup, saying it has not behaved as expected in the fourth quarter.
- He still believes the super boom framework holds, with AI potentially acting as the next major technology accelerator.
Notable quotes
“the the real behavioral finance book. This is how people behave on a regular basis. how institutions behave on a regular basis”
“the mid midterm year the bottom pickers paradise”
“the granddaddy of all the seasonal patterns is the best six month switching strategy”
“Bitcoin is for boomers, which you could not have a bigger put down”
How the episode opens
Hi, this is Steve Eisman and this is another episode of the Real Eyesman Playbook and today we're going to interview Jeffrey Hirs who is the author of the stock traders almanac. This is going to be a fun interview. The stock traders almanac is about patterns, charts, graphs, and we're going to go through a whole bunch of different charts and graphs and talk about the patterns of the way people trade on a monthly basis, daily basis, annual basis, and I think you'll you'll find this interview a lot of fun.
And at the end, I'll come back to talk about lessons learned. Hi, this is Steve Eisman and welcome to another episode of The Real Eisman Playbook. You know, sometimes I think about how to categorize the guests that we have on our show.
There's one way to categorize it would be two types of guests. Time-sp specific and not time-sp specific. So, we often have guests, stock analysts, talking about what's going on in earnings season.
We have guests talking about what's going on politically. We had a guest two weeks ago talking a few weeks ago talking about what's going on in the war. That's time specific.
But then we have often authors of books where it wouldn't matter what time of year we we would show this interview because it would be good at any time. And today is one of those interviews. Today my guest is Jeffrey Hirs who is the author of the annual book Stock Traders Almanac.
Here's my copy the 2026 version. Jeffrey, welcome to the realizement playbook.
Great to be with you, Steve. — So, give us a little history of this book. Sure. — And then we'll move on from there. — Well, my illustrious father, who uh Steve Forbes called the legend, um was the man who started the book back in 1966, the year I was born.
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- market patterns
- stock trader almanac
- bitcoin seasonality
- january effect
- private credit
Watch the episode
Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
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The Real Eisman Playbook, this episode and its artwork belong to Steve Eisman. Octagon is not affiliated with the show; this page is an independent summary.
