Turbocharged The stock market provided additional reasons for investors to be thankful, as the rally continued for the fourth straight week. The S&P 500 tacked on 1%, the Nasdaq gained 0.9%, the Russell 2000 added 0.5%, and all the sectors except Oil & Gas...
- Archive posts -
Chicago
Goldilocks at the Thanksgiving Table
Wild Ride We would like to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving. At North Star, we are deeply thankful for our wonderful clients that we have the pleasure and honor of serving. We are also thankful for the potential return to the “not too hot and not too cold”...
Fed Seesaw
Laundry List There has been a laundry list of factors that have heavily influenced the trends in the financial markets over the past few years. Topping that list would be the COVID-19 pandemic and related supply-chain disruptions, closely followed by the increasingly...
It’s a Profit Deal
North Star's Premise Proven Investors finally got a taste of money, tasting much sweeter than wine, as rising corporate earnings and declining interest rates gave the markets a kiss. The bond market benefitted from slightly soft employment data, particularly...
Higher Than Necessary
The blog post discusses the recent market correction, with the S&P 500 dropping 10% from its 52-week high, led by losses in various sectors. Despite strong earnings results, concerns arise regarding personal spending relying on savings, and the potential for accelerating earnings growth remains a bullish case for equities. Rising gold prices are attributed to geopolitical turmoil and an increase in U.S. Treasury debt offerings. The post anticipates a volatile week ahead with a focus on the Federal Reserve’s policy, employment data, and corporate earnings, all while acknowledging the ongoing impact of global geopolitical events on investor sentiment.
Dark Clouds
Margin Call Stocks staged a modest rally on Monday, only to see mounting losses Tuesday through Friday, adding up to the worst week in a month for the market. The S&P skidded 2.4%, the Nasdaq Composite dropped 3.2%, and the Russell 2000 slid 2.3%, with declining...
Dark Days Drive Markets
Depressed Levels The market action was primarily driven by the horrific events in the Israel-Hamas war, with a mixed performance from stocks while investors sought safe-haven assets such as U.S. Treasury bonds and gold. Defense and Energy sector shares rallied,...
What We See
Balanced Signals The concept of bistable perception, in which observers perceive the same information in two different ways, might help explain the current state of the financial markets as well as the political landscape. We will leave the unstable domestic politics...
Market Bends as September Ends
A Dedication to Mickey Lefton “As my memory restsBut never forgets what I lostWake me up when September ends.” Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong penned those lyrics inspired by the grief he felt over the death of his father when he was a young boy....
Not Connecting the Dots
Congrats Fed, You Are Winning Whereas we would prefer to be discussing the resilient economy, with full employment and supply chain disruptions finally alleviating, instead, once again, it was Chairman Powell and the Fed dominating the narrative. Spoiler alert:...
Friday Strike Out
Bears Took Over Through Thursday’s close, the financial markets displayed solid resilience despite the looming threat of an autoworkers strike and a slightly hot producer price index (PPI) reading. Surging energy prices were responsible for a monthly rise of 0.7% in...
Oily Apple Cart Slips and Tips
Disruptive Outcomes The markets responded negatively both to the good news of resilient U.S. economic data and to the unsettling geopolitical news. On the domestic front, the Services PMI® registered at 54.5 percent, a 1.8-percentage point increase compared to the...
Taking It Easy
Slow Ride The simple yet classic lyrics from Foghat’s “Slow Ride” tune encapsulate the lukewarm economic news last week that buoyed equity markets: (1) job openings at the lowest level since March 2021; (2) a decline in consumer confidence; (3) tame inflation...
Chips and the Chairman
TINA Years Are Through Nvidia Inc (NVDA) had terrific earnings, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell’s remarks in Jackson Hole were unremarkable, and the market yawned. Semiconductor and other AI stocks rallied early in the week, but sold off following Nvidia’s...
More or Less Messy
Positive Light Stocks and bonds fell for the week as a combination of strong U.S. economic data and challenges in China unnerved the financial markets. The healthy domestic economic data drove interest rates higher, though bond prices stabilized on Friday. The...
Bad Moody
A Day Late & a Dollar Short The financial markets were in a “blue Moody” with stocks suffering early in the week following the rating agency’s downgrade on 10 regional banks, and bond prices slumping on Friday in response to a stronger-than-expected...
Something is Rotten at Fitchmark
Wild Ride It was a volatile week that finished with equity market index losses after Fitch downgraded its U.S. credit rating below the top AAA level; this launched U.S. Treasury yields on a wild ride that somewhat ironically narrowed the 10-year versus 2-year...
Market Likes the End of Hikes
Monetary Policy and Midpoints The stock market continued to move higher, fueled by economic data that clearly contradicted the doomsday narrative promoted by the inflation and recession fear mongers. The Fed still raised interest rates by another 25 basis points on...
Bulls on Wall Street Score (But Not in Chicago)
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...
Bull Stampede
Wild Rush The 2023 bull stampede on Wall Street continued as the economic data and corporate earnings reports declawed those grumpy bears. All the major market averages finished higher, with the Nasdaq Composite climbing 4.3% to rack up a fourth straight week of...
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