32 Reasons Stocks Will Jump This Year

6. Americans' average hourly earnings will continue to rise well above the rate of inflation as measured by the consumer price index. U.S. AHE rose 4.2% year over year in December, substantially above the 3.2% year-over-year average for the last 20 years. Throughout the 1990s' economic expansion, AHE exceeded current annual rates of 4.2% during only four months.

7. Measures of inflation will continue to decelerate throughout most of the year, as commodities decline and global growth decelerates from current levels, with CPI averaging around 2.0%. This would be meaningfully below the 20-year average annual rise in CPI of 3.1%. The CPI rose 1.3%, 2.0% and 2.5% year over year during the last three months of the year. The CPI has been lower than current rates during only four other periods since the mid-1960s.

8. Consumers' irrational pessimism will lift. I'll go so far as to say that both main gauges -- the Conference Board's measure and the University of Michigan's Consumer Sentiment Survey -- of their sentiment will make new cycle highs, moving to levels normally associated with healthy economic expansions. While overall U.S. public sentiment is still depressed given the macro backdrop, I see some signs that pessimism is lifting a bit (anecdotal evidence and subindices of the confidence readings). This should make the many bears very nervous, because keeping the public excessively pessimistic on U.S. stocks has been one of their main weapons.