In August, back when the market began its latest acrobatic stunts, I contacted the panelists from the Star Tribune's Investor Roundtable to see if they wished to revise the Standard and Poor's 500 prediction they gave me back in December. Of the five strategists that I spoke with for my column, only one - David Joy, strategist for Amerprise Financial - admitted that he thought global econoic growth would be more robust than it's been and "it would take a heoric effort for the S&P 500 to reach 1345 by year-end."

The S&P is at currently trading in the 1,185 point range, lower than when the market strategists shared their predictions in December, and down 13 percent from 1,363 the S&P hit in May, its peak for the year.

I started to think about my stable of market prognosticators as I was reading Paul Sullivan's Wealth Matters column in the New York Times this weekend. None of the strategists he checks in with quarterly would wager a guess about where the S&P 500 would end up by year-end, only saying that they figure it will be higher than where it is now.

After a year like this, I wonder if I'll have a mutiny of money managers on my hands in December, unwilling to share their guess for how the market will perform in 2012!

Here were the predictions for the 2010 Investor Roundable participants, from highest to lowest. Not a single marketwatcher thought the S&P 500 would end the year lower than it started. At this point, it needs to climb around 7 percent by year-end to reach 1271.87, where the market started this year.

  • 1,426 James Paulsen, chief investment strategist, Wells Capital Management
  • 1,425 Marcus Winbush, partner and co-portfolio manager, Breneman Winbush and Associates
  • 1,410 Doug Ramsey, director of research, the Leuthold Group (recently promoted to Chief Investment Officer)
  • 1,395 Beth Lilly, small-cap mutual fund manager, Gabelli Woodland Funds
  • 1,380 Phil Dow, director of equity strategy, RBC Wealth Management
  • 1,375 David Chalupnik, head of equities, First American Funds (now Nuveen Asset Management)
  • 1,350 Roger Sit, CEO and global chief investment officer, Sit Mutual Funds
  • 1,345 David Joy, chief market strategist, Columbia Management (now strategist for Ameriprise Financial)
  • 1,325 Brian Belski, chief investment strategist, Oppenheimer Asset Management
  • 1,300 Erica Bergsland, vice president and director, research and trading, Advantus Capital Management
  • 1,300 Russell Swansen, chief investment officer, Thrivent Financial for Lutherans