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 [...]
Last Week: The last six months have certainly been “interesting”. A dramatic rally in January and February recovered about most of the horrific losses of October- December, followed by a brief nasty sell-off to kick off March which quickly reversed into a Mad March bounce which lasted until Friday’s swoon, which left the S&P 500 down 0.8% for the week. Whereas the market was responding to policy issues (monetary and trade) [...]
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: Rising interest rates, rising corporate profits, and company specific news, were the three main drivers in the market, which finished modestly positive as the S&P 500 posted a 0.52% gain. The Ten-Year Treasury yield jumped 12 basis points to 2.95%, its highest level in four years. We are not short-term traders at North Star, but I think we are in the danger zone, since much of the volume comes [...]
Last Week: The short story is that the S&P 500 gained 1.99%, as easing trade tensions with China, strength in the Energy sector, and the outset of a very strong earnings season provided the backdrop. The long story is that each day exhibited volatile swings, with the market gapping up on the opening Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, and gapping down on the opening Wednesday and Friday. The pockets of turbulence came [...]
Last Week: It was a turbulent week in what is developing into a volatile year in the stock market. In fact, we have already had more than three times as many days of 1% or more changes in the S&P 500 this year than we had in all of 2017. Additionally, all the major indices are in the red year to date, with the S&P 500 now down 2.59% after declining [...]
Last Week: A rally on Thursday capped off a volatile holiday-shortened week, and left the equity indices in the green, with the S&P 500 posting a 2.03% gain. Technology stocks drove most of the swings, as the debate raged between the the sector sell-off being “overdue” or “overdone”. Facebook attracted most of the media attention, as the company came under fierce attacks for their data practices. Nevertheless, the Company’s shares managed [...]
Last Week: It was quite stormy in Washington and on Wall Street, as it was the worst week for the stock market since January 2016, with the S&P 500 declining almost 6%. Early in the week it was the technology stocks that fared the worst, with the disclosure that Facebook had failed to protect customer data leading to a sharp decline in its shares, followed by earnings from Oracle that were [...]
Last Week: The glass was half-empty, as the rally that was ignited by the previous week’s release of the February Jobs report proved to be short lived, and the S&P 500 declined Monday through Thursday before bouncing on Friday to finish the week down 1.2%. A couple of weak economic reports, most notable a surprising decline in retail sales weighed on the equity markets but did help drive the yield on [...]
Last Week: Like following a well-written television series, one needs to watch all the previous episodes to appreciate the nuances of the plot twists in “Trumpworld” (no disrespect intended, the POTUS would probably like the title anyway). In August, rumors of Gary Cohn’s resignation roiled the markets. In February, an unexpectedly strong jobs report triggered a 10.8% “correction” in stock prices and pushed interest rates to a four-year high. Last week, [...]