You might be shocked by how many stocks are in a bear market right now

The S&P 500's proximity to its record closing high tells only part of the story. Beneath the surface of the headline index, a meaningfully large share of individual stocks are trading in bear-market territory — conventionally defined as a decline of 20% or more from a recent peak. That divergence is the key detail: index-level strength can mask widespread weakness in the average constituent.

This gap matters because indices are weighted by market capitalization, so the largest companies can lift the headline number even while many smaller constituents struggle. For investors, it is a reminder that "the market" is not a single, uniform entity — breadth measures, such as the share of stocks above key moving averages or in drawdown, offer a different lens than the index alone.

What to watch: whether breadth improves or deteriorates in the sessions ahead. Narrow leadership can persist, but historically, sustained index gains have tended to rest on broader participation. Monitoring breadth alongside the headline index gives a fuller picture of underlying market health.