Fear & Greed Index
The CNN Fear & Greed Index is a composite sentiment indicator scored 0-100 that aggregates seven distinct market signals into a single emotional read of the US equity market. Released by CNN Business and refreshed throughout the trading day.
The seven components
1. Stock price momentum — S&P 500 vs its 125-day moving average 2. Stock price strength — the count of NYSE stocks hitting 52-week highs vs lows 3. Stock price breadth — McClellan Volume Summation Index 4. Put/Call ratio — options market positioning 5. Junk bond demand — yield spread between junk and investment-grade bonds 6. Market volatility — VIX vs its 50-day moving average 7. Safe haven demand — relative performance of stocks vs Treasuries over 20 days
Reading the score
- 0-25 Extreme Fear: historically associated with intermediate bottoms; contrarian buying signal
- 25-45 Fear: defensive positioning, risk off
- 45-55 Neutral: balanced sentiment
- 55-75 Greed: risk-on positioning, momentum buying
- 75-100 Extreme Greed: historically associated with intermediate tops; contrarian selling signal
The index is most useful at the extremes — readings above 80 or below 20 have shown statistically meaningful contrarian signal value across multiple cycles.
How Top Tier Newswire surfaces it
The live Fear & Greed gauge sits at the top of every screen in the terminal, refreshing every five minutes — so you read the room before you read the headlines. Free users see the same gauge; only the deeper components and historical chart are Pro-gated.