Does CNBC’s ratings indicate market movement?

Schaeffer’s Investment Research senior technical analyst Ryan Detrick writes about whether CNBC‘s poor ratings indicate higher stock prices.

Detrick writes, “Besides the fact that everyone hates you if you are bullish in this environment, the recent CNBC ratings are out, and they are eye-opening. In a nut shell, people simply aren’t interested in a strong bull market.

“Here are the numbers floating around on the Internet regarding CNBC’s viewership.

• Squawk Box (6-9 a.m. ET) is supposed to prime traders before the bell. The show posted its lowest-rated time block since Q4 2006.
• The Closing Bell (3-5 p.m. ET) is supposed to wrap up the day’s action. The slot posted its fifth-lowest rating in total viewers and second-lowest ratings in the key 25-54 demographic since 1997.
• Fast Money (5-6 p.m. ET) is focused almost specifically on swing trading stocks. That time slot showed the lowest rating for the 25-54 demo since 1997 — and lowest in total viewers since Fast Money launched in 2006.

“Now, could some people be finding their news online, and not watching television as much? Absolutely, that could be some of it. Is CNBC’s programming really that much worse? Of course not. In fact, in a lot of cases I think it’s more interesting than it used to be. (As a side note, I haven’t been on CNBC since March — so I’d like to think that has something to do with their declining ratings.)

“But seriously, the bigger picture is the stats above simply reinforce how disinterested the public is towards stocks, and for this very reason I expect prices to continue to move higher. Remember, markets peak at euphoria and bottom at despair. Well, we aren’t at despair anymore — but we sure aren’t anywhere near euphoria. When you see the Dow has up been nine of the past 10 months, yet we’ve had domestic equity mutual fund outflows nine of the past 10 months — that right there tells you all you need to know.”

Read more here.