Last Week: Concerns that the porridge was getting too cold appear to have been unwarranted. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite hit record highs as strong earnings reports and economic reports fueled investor enthusiasm. Earnings season is about half way over and so far, 80% of companies have reported results that exceeded expectations. The expected decline in S&P 500 first quarter earnings is now down to 2.3% from 3.9% the [...]
Last Week: The headline in “The Trader” section of Barron’s was “The Market Did Nearly Nothing This Week”, as the S&P 500 dipped 0.1% in holiday-shortened trading. What little action there was in the market was focused on the IPOs of “Unicorns” (companies with private market valuations over a $1 billion). It seems like an incredible leap of faith to assign multi-billion-dollar valuations on those high-growth money-losing companies. I must have [...]
Last Week: The market treaded water until Friday morning, when a flurry of positive news stories invigorated Wall Street. Strong Chinese exports and money supply growth, record earnings form JPMorgan, a well-received DIS streaming analyst meeting, and a big $50B oil merger all contributed to the bullish mood. Earlier in the week trading volume was at its lowest level of 2019, as Sports betting provided more excitement than the stock market [...]
The first quarter of 2019 started strong for both the stock and bond markets. Large cap U.S. stocks, measured by the S&P 500 index, were up 13.6% for the quarter, offsetting much of their decline in the previous quarter, while small cap stocks, measured by the Russell 2000, rose 14.6% for the quarter. Foreign stocks again trailed the US indexes - the FTSE Developed all cap ex-US index (Europe, UK, Australia [...]
Last Week: The porridge heated up enough to nourish the Goldilocks rally for another week. Stronger than expected economic data from China on Monday and a solid U.S. jobs report on Friday were the bookends to continued perceived progress on the trade front during the week. The S&P 500 gained 2.06% to close at 2892, which is less than 2% short of its all-time high set in September. Although trading volume [...]
Last Week: The previous Friday the market had dropped sharply as the Ten-Year Treasury rate reach a yield less than the Three-Month Treasury rate, stoking recessionary concerns and triggering sell programs. By Monday afternoon, those concerns were old news, and the focus returned to the dovish pivot by the Fed and the prospects for an impending trade deal with China. Following meetings late in the week, U.S. officials said China had [...]