In the late 1970s, a sportswriter, Leonard Koppett commented that the stock market seemed to go up in years when an NFC team wins the Super Bowl and down when an AFC team wins.

The original idea, which didn’t work so well, was subsequently rejiggered to define the Steelers, Browns and Colts, although AFC teams, to count as in the NFC, to make the results look better.

The “indicator” became really popular in the 1990s, when a well-known Wall Street strategist began to satirize it as the kind of magical thinking that even some professional investors indulge in (think: rabbit’s feet or shamrocks)–either as a way of dealing with the enormity of being responsible for enabling clients’ dreams of sending their children to college or retiring in comfort. A less flattering take would be that it’s a way of not having to do the hard work of securities analysis.

The world, or at least part of it that appears on YouTube, apparently hasn’t gotten the joke. I’m kind of shocked to see that some people actually believe in it.

Got to do something about those Kansas City Chiefs, though. Thanks in large part to them, the “indicator” has given the wrong signal in eight of the last ten years.