So far, so good.

Well, we are up for the year, and my friends at Bespoke Investment Group LLC say that over the past 100, 50, and 20 years, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has seen positive returns in December more than any other month.

The Dow has gained an average of 1.32 percent in December over the past 100 years.

From MFS Investment Group comes the news that on third of the stocks in the Standard and Poor’s 500 index, about 164, are up at least 20 percent year-to-date through Nov. 26.

I love this kind of stuff because it doesn’t really mean anything. In December, the markets will do what they do, and we have to wait to find out what that is.

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I received several comments about my recent practice of giving what the prices of commodities that you and I use on a daily basis are doing. People apparently like hearing about it even though they don’t like what they hear.

One minute we hear that inflation is not an issue but then we look at those commodities prices and what they have done year-to-date to Nov. 26. So here goes.

Cattle is up 19 percent, coffee 47 percent, corn 27 percent, gasoline 6 percent, lumber 20 percent, heating oil 12 percent, pork bellies (bacon) 18 percent, soybeans 19 percent, and wheat 20 percent.

Now natural gas is down 25 percent but is up about 10 percent. Recently, it was down about 35 percent. And our friend gold is up 26 percent.

I get these prices from USA Today.

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Now let’s take a look at the stock markets. October was basically a wash, down slightly from September.

For the year, Standard and Poor’s 500 Index is up 5.9 percent, the S&P Midcap index is up a whopping 17 percent and the Russell 2000 is right behind at up 16 percent. The Wilshire 5000, which tracks most stocks traded, is up 8.6 percent. So the markets overall are doing OK.

The interest rate market is still at historic lows with consumers buying houses in for a treat. But if you are a certificate of deposit (CD) or bond buyer, there is not much good news. Money markets generally are yielding practically nothing.

A 6 month CD is about .3 percent, a one year is about .51 percent and a five year is about 1.5 percent. Thirty-year mortgages are about 4.4 percent.

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Generally foreign markets are mixed with Shanghai up 18 percent year-to-date, Stockholm 16 percent, Mexico City 14 percent and Seoul up 13 percent. On the negative side the Spanish market in Milan is down 17 percent.

The foreign markets have been all over the place this year. It will be a lot of fun going forward to try and figure out where one should be invested outside the United States. Is it China, India, South Korea?

OK, so what do I think? We all know, especially my wife, that I don’t know any more than anybody else. What I suspect is that the markets will continue to be volatile and most of the investing public does not like that.

There is an estimated $10 trillion in banks and money market funds which could work its way into the stock market but so far it does not appear that much or any of it has moved in.

The U.S. stock market has moved up about 80 percent since the bottom in early 2009, but the public is still moving money out of equities into bonds. So, the public is selling as the market goes up.

From a contrarian point of view, following the herd is just not something we want to do.

We are not going to know who was right for a while. It will be interesting to look back.

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My wife told me that since the season of “the cocktail party time” and the occasional “dinner party time” is here that I needed to watch my imbibing rate (I had to look that up) and that I need to be practicing a balanced diet.

I told her that I followed Benjamin Franklin’s rules. She looked at me with raised eyebrows with that “what are you talking about look.”

I said well, Ben Franklin said “In wine there is wisdom, in beer there is freedom and in water there is bacteria.”

And I told her that as far as a balanced diet goes, you can’t get any more balanced than me with a Bud in the right hand and a Bud in the left. It was apparent that she didn’t think I was funny.

Have a great holiday season everybody.

Howie Pentony is a client portfolio manager in Saxonburg.