Market Measures - March 15, 2021 - All Time Highs and High IV
From first glance, it may seem strange that the VIX is staying elevated through recent all time highs, but was very low though the all time highs from 2013 and 2020.
However, we have seen this phenomenon before in the late 90s...and both times of high VIX/high S&P price can be attributed to the simple fact that price moves in these periods tend to be more volatile than average.
Since VIX measures the expectation of future price volatility, it makes sense that the VIX would stay high as long as price movies continue to be larger than normal.