Another year turns over, and with it comes a zodiac sign that carries more cultural baggage than most.

A few years ago I started these looks at the new year using the East Asian zodiac. Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and China all share the same basic zodiac, though out of the four Japan long ago shifted the start of the zodiac year to the Western New Year with Jan 1st as the beginning, whereas Korea, Taiwan, and China keep the Lunar New Year as the start. Otherwise, they are more or less the same.

So let’s continue that trend this year.

2026 is the year of the Fire Horse (丙午).

The Fire Horse

The Asian zodiac isn’t just the twelve animals and the 12-year cycle that most people know about, but also five elements, giving us a super cycle of 60 years. That means the last fire horse was in 1966.

If you know even a little about Japanese folklore (or read my post on it a few days ago), you already know the reputation. Fire Horse years are said to produce people (especially women) who are too strong-willed, too independent, too difficult to live with. The superstition is old, persistent, and  powerful enough to shape real-world behavior.

In 1966, this old superstition hit with a vengeance. Japan saw a dramatic drop in birthrates. People delayed having children. Hospitals noticed it. Demographers still talk about it.

Will we see the same this year? I’d guess not — people are far less superstitious than they were 60 years ago — but time will tell!

Let’s look at major events of the last fire horse.

• Cultural Revolution in China (officially launched): Mao Zedong formally kicked off the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. Oh man, that’s a doozie.
• Black Power Movement Gains Prominence: In the U.S., the phrase “Black Power” entered mainstream discourse. Stokely Carmichael popularized the term, signaling a shift from purely integration-focused civil rights strategies toward a more assertive demand for autonomy and self-definition.
• Vietnam War Intensifies: 1966 marked a major escalation. U.S. troop levels surged past 380,000. Bombing campaigns intensified. Anti-war protests grew louder, especially among younger Americans. The war was no longer distant background noise; it was a defining presence of the decade.
• Space Race Momentum: Both the U.S. and the Soviet Union pushed forward aggressively. The Soviets launched Luna 9 and achieved the first soft landing on the Moon. The U.S. followed with Surveyor 1. The race to space was no longer theoretical; it was visible, televised, and symbolic of global rivalry.
• Slightly less dramatic (though soccer fans may disagree), England Wins the World Cup: England’s 1966 World Cup victory became a national myth-making event.

1966 was not a good year for the stock market. It, in fact, marked the end of a 20-year post-war bull market.

From the end of World War II through the mid–1960s, the U.S. market had risen steadily. Not spectacularly, but reliably. By 1966, many investors had come to believe that stocks only went up over time — a familiar-sounding mindset, especially after the incredible bull run of 2025, in which the bubble the market is in became obvious to almost everyone.

Anyway, in 1966, that illusion broke.

• The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell about 25% from its February 1966 peak to its October low.
• It wasn’t a sudden crash like 1929, but a slow, grinding decline that wore investors down.
• Trading volume dried up. Confidence faded. People quietly exited the market rather than panicking.

At the time, a 25% decline felt severe. Inflation was rising, interest rates were climbing, and corporate profits were under pressure. Most strikingly: The Dow would not decisively break above its 1966 high again until 1982. That’s sixteen years of sideways movement — a lost generation for passive equity investors.

Yicks! Let’s hope the Fire Horse doesn’t bring that back with it!

All these things might point more to disillusionment than anything, which does align with the fire horse superstition.

What to Expect for 2026

So much for the last Fire Horse. What does that leave us with now?

As mentioned above, the Horse is associated with movement, independence, and momentum in the Asian zodiac. It’s a sign tied to travel, change, and restlessness. When we add fire — an element linked to intensity, passion, and volatility — the Fire Horse takes those traits and dials them up. Energy becomes sharper. Movement becomes harder to control. Strength becomes… complicated. Hmm. BTC moon? Or BTC flame-out?

For general luck, Fire Horse years are traditionally seen as high-risk, high-reward periods. They’re not especially favored for slow, cautious planning or careful consensus-building. Instead, they’re associated with decisive action, sudden turns, and outcomes that arrive faster than expected, for better or worse.

More broadly, Fire Horse years are often said to coincide with social tension and structural shifts, rather than clean breakthroughs. The Horse runs, the Fire spreads, and things don’t always stop where you expect them to. As shown above, the last Fire Horse year gave us plenty of disruption — some loud, some quiet, some only fully understood decades later.

Will that particular pattern repeat itself again this year? Or have we finally outgrown the old rhythms?

We’ll find out soon enough

Fortunes

Anyone born in a year of the horse, which is every 12 years prior to this one (so 2014, 2002, etc) will have good luck. The year of your animal year is often seen as a year of opportunity, or at least heightened significance.

Traditionally, the Horse is said to get on well with the Tiger and the Dog. Why? Well, the Horse and Tiger are both associated with energy, confidence, and a tendency to move first and think later. The Tiger brings courage and presence; the Horse brings speed and momentum. Together, that’s a lot of forward motion. The Dog, meanwhile, is valued for loyalty and a strong sense of fairness, traits that are said to steady the Horse’s more restless nature. So if you were born in a Tiger or Dog year, you might expect a bit of extra tailwind.

When we add fire into the mix, signs associated with intensity and action tend to resonate more strongly. The Snake is sometimes mentioned here; fire feeding intuition and strategy rather than raw motion. That one at least makes a little sense. I won’t pretend I fully understand the internal logic, but there it is.

The hour of the horse is 11 am to 1 pm, right around midday, when the sun is high and things are most active. So if you’re a Horse, that window might be considered especially lucky this year. Or at the very least, it’s a good time to get something done before the afternoon slump sets in.

How much luck and in what parts of life? I haven’t the foggiest. I just look into this stuff for fun during my reading of Japan and haiku history; I don’t get far enough into it to know all the details though. I know the professional Asian astrologers require a birth chart for personalized readings. Month, day, and hours all have different zodiac animals associated with them, after all, and you need to know your animal element for a more precise fortune. I know there is something about a inner or secret animal too, but I’ve not read enough to know exactly what that is.

Anyway, there is all the general info I know or have written down in my notes over the years. Hope you find it interesting. Most of the finer details are beyond my knowledge, so we’ll just end things here. I don’t know of any Asian zodiac experts on Hive, but if you do, feel free to leave their info in the comments.

Good luck this year!

[Paging @meesterboom since he showed some interest in this topic before and @azicon since he seems to enjoy my Japan info dump posts.]

❦

David is an American teacher and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku. He blogs here and at laspina.org. Write him on Bluesky. 【Support @dbooster with Hive SBI】