Bullish Post-Election; But Obstacles Remain

Bullish Post-Election; But Obstacles Remain We’ve held a positive outlook on the equity markets leading into the election, and recent developments have only strengthened our conviction. Here’s why we’re optimistic about continued growth in the U.S. Equity market: Strong Earnings Outlook: Corporate earnings for 2024 are solid, and forecasts for the remainder of this year […]
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The Verdict

The Verdict Last week we mentioned the Wall Street adage ‘buy the rumor, sell the news’ and wondered how markets would react to the first rate cut. The answer still isn’t clear. On Wednesday, the market swung wildly right after the 50 bps rate cut was announced. That is typical right after a Fed announcement, […]
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Going Down

Going Down Next week is the big Fed rate cut decision, so this was the last week of data to influence that decision. In our view, the data this week was not bad enough to call for a 50 basis point cut (bps are basis points and a basis point is 1/100 of a percent) […]
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Turning Point

Turning Point In Friday’s speech at the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium, Fed Chair Powell confirmed what the stock market has been anticipating – it is time to adjust monetary policy, that is, lower interest rates. By the time the first cut is made in September, it will have been almost a year since the Fed […]
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Flip the Script

Flip the Script In the words of Ron Burgundy (“Anchorman”): “Boy, that escalated quickly. I mean that really got out of hand fast.” The soft-landing theme was fun while it lasted, but that script got flipped in a hurry by a series of weaker than expected economic data. The ISM (Institute fro Supply Management) manufacturing […]
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Extremes

Extremes The Billy Joel channel is back on Sirius XM this month (channel 79, if you care) and it has become my go to channel in the car. Thursday, on my way home, they played “I go to Extremes” and I couldn’t help but think about the stock market. Markets tend to go to extremes, […]
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All Roads Lead to Rome

All Roads Lead to Rome The Fed came out with their new ‘dot plot’ this week and based on the results, you’d think the economy is just rolling along. But initial unemployment claims were telling another story as initial claims hit 242,000last week, well above the 225,000 estimate, and is now trending upward once again. […]
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