TNI RESEARCH · S&P 500 DRAWDOWNS
Stock Market Corrections: 100 Years of S&P 500 Drawdown History
Explore nearly 100 years of S&P 500 corrections, bear markets, drawdowns and recoveries using daily historical closing-price data.
What Counts as a Stock Market Correction?
In this TNI study, an independent S&P 500 drawdown qualifies once the index closes at least 10% below its prior closing high. A decline reaching at least 20% is classified as a bear market. Each episode remains open until the previous closing high is recovered.
Nearly a Century of S&P 500 Drawdowns
Using this closing-price, peak-to-full-recovery methodology, TNI identified 26 independent S&P 500 drawdown episodes of 10% or more across the historical sample. Of those, 14 remained between 10% and 20%, while 12 reached the 20% bear-market threshold. 46.15% of qualifying 10%+ episodes eventually reached 20% or more.
How Often Does the S&P 500 Fall 10% or 20%?
The median interval between first reaching the 10% threshold was 2.29 years, while the average interval was 3.87 years. For 20% bear-market threshold crossings, the median interval was 5.65 years and the average was 8.42 years.
How Long Have Corrections and Recoveries Taken?
The median peak-to-trough decline lasted 179 calendar days. Among recovered episodes, the median trough-to-recovery period was 150 days, while the median total time below the previous closing high was 433 days.
Current S&P 500 Drawdown Context
As of 2026-09-15, the S&P 500 closing price was 2.73 % below its all-time closing high recorded on 2026-08-13. This current observation updates when the underlying TNI daily dataset is refreshed and the research generator is rerun.
Research Methodology
Drawdowns are calculated from daily S&P 500 closing prices. A distinct event begins at a prior closing high and qualifies when the index closes at least 10% below that peak. The event trough is the lowest closing price before the index recovers to or above the prior closing high. Events reaching at least a 20% decline are classified as bear markets. Dividends are excluded. The dataset contains 24,793 daily observations covering 1927 through 2026.