While major Wall Street banks have yet to come out and formally project a contraction in the S&P 500 in 2022, they are beginning to sour on the markets, Bloomberg reports.

It is no wonder, since the S&P 500 has increased by more than 100% from March 2020, when the coronavirus pandemic first hit.

Bank of America, Credit Suisse, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley now predict stocks will struggle for the rest of the year. Collectively, however, they are still saying that the S&P 500, now trading just above 4,000, will reach 4,875 by year-end, according to Bloomberg analysis of their reports.

That means stocks in the benchmark index would need to rise 21% between now and the end of the year.

But Bank of America strategist Stephen Suttmeier says that in an analysis of market data going back to 1928, when the S&P 500 is down through April, it has historically struggled for the rest of the year.

Goldman Sachs analysts, led by David Kostin, cautioned in a recent client note: "The best-case scenario for the economy — and, eventually, for equity prices — probably involves a continued period of constrained equity market returns. Swings will remain large, until the path of inflation is clarified."