Many like to follow the latest investment newsletter survey results from Investor's Intelligence (click here for more info on their services), and the most recent update is interesting.

The percentage of bears in the survey has been exceptionally low for several weeks now, as we've discussed on the site.  That didn't change this week (the scale in the chart below is inverted).

What has changed is the percentage of bulls.  Despite a choppy market that lost a couple of percent last week, the bulls moved from 54% to 56% of the total.  For the first time since the bull market began, it reached what we would consider to be extreme territory.

It's also the largest percentage of bulls since December 2007 when the S&P 500 was about 260 points higher than it was on Friday.

As most newsletter writers know, it's deadly to be bearish during a bull market - which is why we saw the percentage of bears decline so quickly and to such an extreme.

But it's another matter to be outright bullish, especially after a 70%+ rally.  The fact that we're seeing that this week, after such a huge rally, and after a down week in the major averages, is notable and another reason to expect stocks to have more trouble making an immediate about-face to regain and sustain new highs.

Jason Goepfert