Bulls and bears both believe this could be 1999 all over again. Embrace it or dump your tech stocks?

The central debate on Wall Street is starting to sound something like this: Bears say, "It's starting to look like 1999 – sell tech stocks," while bulls counter, "It's starting to look like 1999 – buy tech." This disagreement over whether to embrace or recoil from the market's resemblance to the final frenzy of the late-'90s tech-dominated bull market grows in part from certain technical extremes being reached combined with atmospheric similarities to a former moment of all-consuming attention on a tech innovation wave. The semiconductor sector as measured by the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index has only ever been this overbought relative to its 200-day moving average twice: In early 2000 and before that in 1995. In 2000, it coincided with a generational market peak. In 1995, semis fell into their own bear marlet even as the broad indexes continued higher. The only times before last week when the S & P 500 hit a record high with so many of its stocks reaching fresh 52-week lows new lows were at or near important market tops, including near the end of the '90s bull. Bespoke Investment Group added on Monday: "Since 1996, the only other period where we saw the S & P at record highs with fewer than 60% of stocks above their 50- and 200-DMAs was from late 1998 to early 2000." Of course, that's not in itself a sell signal. Late 1998 was a fabulous time to be loaded up on tech stocks; the Nasdaq more than tripled between the autumn 1998 low and the ultimate March 2000 peak. …