With most markets having closed at noon (CST) today ahead of the New Year’s Eve celebration in the US, we’re able to take a sneak peak at the 2010 performance of 40 different futures markets via our favorite quote site: Finviz.com. Their list is a nice cross section of markets including stocks (5), energy (3), energy (5), meats (3), grains (8), softs (6), bonds (2), and currencies (8), and shows you markets ahead for the day/week/year in greenish tones (the more they are up, the more green they are, and markets down in varying red tones depending on degree. 
You will see there is a lot of green on the board for 2010, with the following highlights (Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results):
- 85% of markets (34 out of 40) positive for the year
- 4 markets with gains of over 75% (Palladium +95.6%, Cotton +92.3%, Silver +83.5%, and Coffee +76.6%)
- 16 markets with gains of over 25% (including Gold +29.5%, Russell 2000 +26.3%, Wheat +46.4%)
- 22 markets (55%) are closing at or near (w/in 1%) their 2010 high
- Just 3 markets with losses over -5% (Euro -6.6%, Cocoa -7.6%, and Natural Gas -20%)
Now, it would be easy to say this is all a result of the Fed’s printing presses and their desire to create inflation in order to protect against deflation, and there may be a lot of that going on… but at the same time these gains happened with the US Dollar strengthening in 2010 (+1.2%), so there appears to be more to the story (Chinese demand, droughts in Russia/India/Georgia, etc.)
What will this list look like at the end of 2011 is the million dollar question (or billion if you’re name is Paulson). Managed Futures would like to see more of the same to start out the year, to be sure; as these gains have (generally speaking) left them long across the board and are to thank for systematic multi-market program’s rebound in the 3rd and 4th quarter of the year. After that, it’s anyone’s guess, but if history has taught us anything – it is that markets can’t go up forever.
From all of us at Attain, all the best for a happy, healthy, and prosperous New Year !