With so many on Wall Street fighting over the valuation of stocks and worrying whether the market rally has gotten ahead of itself, one economist tells CNBC that prices in today's market look eerily similar to 2007.
Dan Seiver, editor of the Pad System Report and a professor of finance at San Diego State University, bases his long-term valuation model on Value Line's median appreciation potential, which he said has shown statistically to have predictive value of where the market is headed.
"Right now, that number is relatively low. It's down in the range that it was in 2007," Seiver told "Squawk on the Street" on Thursday. "That tells me that over the next few years, the returns on stocks aren't going to be particularly good and they could even be negative."
(Related: Cramer: 'Giant reset' looming for markets)
In Seiver's view, corporate earnings won't outpace GDP growth, and with overall economic activity rising only slowly, "it's a little harder to justify—particularly with interest rates rising—the current levels of the stock market, so I think it's somewhat vulnerable."
Despite improving GDP results out of countries like France and Germany, Seiver said that he thinks that it is unlikely for U.S. GDP to accelerate dramatically. "Maybe we'll get nominal GDP growth of 4 percent, I think that would be great," he said. "If corporate profits are already at a record percentage of GDP, I don't see what's going to make that percentage even higher."
(Related: Stocks tumble, scared by quick interest rate spike)
Seiver added that much of the Federal Reserve's extra liquidity has gone into assets such as stocks, but expects as the Fed eventually tightens policy, investors will pull their capital from the market. "Given that, I think that valuations are on the relatively high side right now."
"I don't see great opportunities at these levels," he added.
(Related: The really bad news behind the jobless claims drop)
—By CNBC's Paul Toscano. Follow him on Twitter @ToscanoPaul and get the latest stories from "Squawk on the Street."
