Last Week: Enthusiasm over progress on trade negotiations early in the week, gave way to concerns over a myriad of geopolitical concerns (Turkey, Italy, Iran, Spain, Venezuela, Brazil, North Korea), leaving the equity markets fractionally higher by the close on Friday. Crude prices declined almost 5%, after producers said they’re looking to boost output as the global glut seems to have been cleared and prices have rebounded. Shares of Energy companies [...]
Last Week: The Ten-Year Treasury yield moved comfortably over 3%, rising 10 basis points to levels not seen since 2011, without any reaction from the stock market, as the S&P 500 declined a modest 0.54%. Smaller stocks continued their recent outperformance, with the Russell 2000 gaining 1.23% to a new all-time high. It’s not clear whether progress is being made on the trade issues, but the recent interpretation of the tea [...]
Last Week: Following up on the theme from our last blog, the TIDE rolled in for four of the five trading days, and the S&P 500 finishing 2.4% higher. On the positive side, the trade talks moved towards deal making, as speculation grew that the Chinese are prepared to commit to import more U.S. goods. Additionally, the inflation numbers came in slightly below consensus, although raw materials, labor costs, and transportation [...]
Last Week: We are coining a new acronym, “TIDE” (Trade, Inflation, Debt, Earnings), to describe the movement in the market. Trade continued to be a powerful force, triggering a steep sell-off on Thursday as the delegation to China made little progress. Inflation concerns abated on Friday, as wage growth moderated in April, leading to a handsome rally that erased the losses from earlier in the week. In terms of earnings, the [...]
Last Week: Tuesday was a tough day, with the S&P 500 sliding 1.3% and the yield on the Ten-Year Treasury topping 3% inter-day. The rest of the week, the stock market made up those losses to finish unchanged, and the Ten-Year Treasury also finished where it started, at 2.95%. Earnings reports continued to exceed expectations, with the composite growth rate for the quarter now at 23.2%, and with all eleven sectors [...]