Unchanged and Uninspired There was certainly a lack of consistent direction and movement magnitude across major indices last week. The indexes certainly had mixed results, with the Nasdaq Composite shedding -0.6%, the S&P 500 rising 0.7%, and the Russell 2000...
Inflation Cooling, Earnings Warming, and Sentiment Heating Up There are hundreds of songs that relate life’s “ups and downs” to the weather. Our favorites cover the spectrum from Bob Dylan’s “Hurricane” to the Allman Brothers Band’s “Blue Skies”. Similarly, the...
Fireworks and Fed Chirps Unlike Joey Chestnut’s win (he consumed 62 hot dogs en route to his 16th Nathan’s Famous competition win on Fourth of July), the stock market posted a modest loss during the holiday-shortened trading week, as traders digested conflicting...
Which Camp? The stock market had a strong finish in its final trading week of the first half of the year, with gains of 2.4%, 2.3%, and 3.7% for the S&P 500, Nasdaq Composite, and Russell 2000 respectively. While the Tech sector remained strong, with Apple Inc...
Stalled Out The stock market rally stalled during holiday shortened trading, as the indices suffered their worst weekly losses since the collapse of the Silicon Valley Bank in March. Further evidence of a slowing economy combined with the continuous “further...
Eleven Straight Months The new bull market got a nice boost from the inflation data with CPI only +0.1% for the month and PPI decelerating even more dramatically to measure only +1.1% for the 12 months ended in May. Producer prices have now been cooling for eleven...
A New Bull A funny thing happened on our way to the recession; a new bull market developed. It took 248 trading days for the S&P 500 to rise 20% from its bottom, marking the longest bear market since 1948, but on Thursday that threshold was reached, and the new...
On Hold Chicken Little flew the coop as investors concluded that the sky was not actually falling following the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averted a U.S. default combined with the mounting evidence that future interest rate hikes are on hold. The next...
Closing In Artificial intelligence and questionable intelligence dictated the action in the financial markets. Early in the week stocks drifted lower as debt ceiling talks progressed without resolution and the Fed minutes showed uncertainty about future monetary...
No Fresh Drama The equity markets moved higher, with the usual suspects (Apple and its fellow tech giants) continuing to lead the charge, but with the rally broadening out as other stocks joined the party. The Nasdaq Composite gained 3%, the S&P 500 rose 1.6%, and...
Last Week: Negative Spin Don’t worry, be happyIn every life we have some troubleBut when you worry, you make it doubleDon’t worry, be happyDon’t worry, be happy now Bobby McFerrin penned those lyrics back in 1988. Today’s grandstanding politicians and attention...
Another Rate Hike Uncertainty remained in fashion on Wall Street, with a mixture of comforting and disquieting headlines. On the one hand corporate earnings reports and the economic data releases were encouraging; on the other hand, there were fear mongering short...
Aftershock The market suffered from an SVB aftershock early in the week, as banking concerns resurfaced after First Republic Bank (FRC) revealed a continued deposit outflow. First Republic, the 14th largest bank in the U.S., relied on wealthy customers with large...
Watch the replay of Eric’s April 20th small cap segment on TD Ameritrade Network here. Stalemate April trading remained somewhat calm and quiet, with the S&P 500 slipping 0.1%, the Nasdaq sliding 0.4%, and the Russell 2000 gaining 0.6%. It has been one of the...
A Case for the Consumer Last week, the equity markets rose supported by mounting evidence of disinflation and solid results from JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM) and other large banks. The gains were muted by the release of the Fed’s March FOMC minutes on Wednesday and...
Modest Rebound Trading got off to a crude start Monday as oil prices surged following news of a production cut led by Saudi Arabia. Regional banks got hit on Tuesday as analysts cut price targets on the group, in an excellent example of closing the barn door after the...
Volte Face It was all good news for the equity markets starting with the FDIC backed acquisition of SVB by First Citizens Bancshares on Monday and ending with a tame inflation report on Friday. Every sector of the market rallied with advancing issues outnumbering...
For the three-month period, the S&P 500 Total Return Index increased 7.5% while the Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate Intermediate Bond Index rose 2.4%. After a difficult 2022, most financial markets recovered in the first three months of 2023. It might be more accurate to...
Monetary Phenomenon Bankers around the world stole the headlines and fortunately not their depositors’ money. The new breed of bankers is quite different than those envisioned in the song “A British Bank” from Mary Poppins: “They must feel the thrill of totting up a...
Confidence Restored “If I had ever been here before I would probably know just what to do…” The lyrics from the CSNY song “Déjà Vu” – which was released exactly 53 years to the day from the onset of the SVB collapse – provide our rationale that the mistakes that...
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