Last Week: It was the worst week for the equity market since early February, with the S&P 500 declining 4.1%, erasing over half the gains for the year. Only a relief rally of over 1% in the last hour of trading Friday allowed the index to break a six-day losing...
Last Week: Despite enthusiasm on Monday morning over the new U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (take note that the word “Trade” disappeared from the agreement formally known as NAFTA), as the week progressed the trade and interest rate headwinds once again intensified. On...
Last Week: The two major near-term headwinds were lightly blowing in the face of investors, with the implementation of tariffs on Monday by the U.S. and China, followed by the Federal Reserve rate hike on Wednesday. Both events were widely expected, and the damage was...
Last Week: Curiouser and curiouser. How does this market keep setting new highs? During this past week, decliners and new lows outnumbered advancers and new highs, yet the S&P 500 notched a 0.85% gain and the DJIA surged 2.25% to finally reach new record. The...
Last Week: Once again, the market floated higher, with the S&P 500 gaining 1.16%, as the sweet vapors of good economic news filled the air. The September University of Michigan sentiment index rose to its second highest level since 2014, and Index of Business...
Last Week: If the proof of the pudding is really in the eating, then the current economic policy recipe seems to be valid as the US numbers remained terrific with very strong manufacturing and non-manufacturing ISMs, and jobless claims this week were 203,000, the...
Last Week: Another record high for the stock market, with the S&P 500 gaining 0.93% and the Russell 2000 0.87%. There wasn’t much news, fake or otherwise, driving the action, and volume was light in the pre-holiday week trading. One might say the song remains the...
Last Week: Stocks hit new highs, with the S&P 500 gaining 0.86% to finally close above its January 26th top, while small stocks fared even better, as the Russell 2000 surged 1.93%. The often-cited adage is that the stock market climbs the wall of worry. I would...
Last Week: To the casual observer, it was a quiet week, with the S&P 500 posting a modest 0.59% gain, while the U.S. Dollar and bond markets were largely unchanged. On the other hand, there was tremendous daily volatility in the overall market, as well as...
Last Week: The S&P 500 slipped 0.25%, the yield on the Ten-Year Treasury slid 10 basis points to 2.85%, while the U.S Dollar strengthened over 1% to a new 2018 high. The chart below shows the link between the strength in the dollar and the S&P this year,...