Market Recap   Volatility has certainly returned with a vengeance and days are either complete risk on or risk off. For example, we had a big swoon on Thursday after a poor earnings report from Facebook (now Meta Platforms, Inc.). The stock fell roughly -26%, wiping out over $250bn of market-cap in a single day. You only have to go back to 2015 to find a time when the entire company was worth what…
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  Market Recap   Another rough week for the equity markets with high profile blowups at Netflix and Peloton. Speculative growth stocks in general were mauled again, but for the first time you started to see some of the generals crack as well (Apple, Google, Amazon, etc.). Trading volume in the QQQ, an ETF that tracks the NASDAQ 100 was off the charts on Friday. It traded $50bn today alone, a new record and about…
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  Market Recap   January continues to be soft with losses across most equity and fixed income asset classes. But for the first time in a while international stocks are outpacing domestic equities, and value continues to beat growth by a decent margin.   A few economic reports of note. Retail sales came in soft – down -1.9% in December month-over-month. This was much weaker than expected, but sales are up +16.9% year-over-year, as you…
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  Market Recap   The first trading week of the year got off to a rough start. For once COVID worries seemed to moderate somewhat and concerns about inflation and what it might mean for Fed policy moved front and center. The headline numbers for the equity indexes mask some real pain under the surface. For example, cloud computing stocks were hit with a -10.8% loss and Cathy Woods’ ARKK fund was down another -10.7%…
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  Market Recap   Broad losses for the global equity markets while bonds rallied. The rally in bond prices/fall in yields played out despite a rate hike in the U.K. and a relatively hawkish Fed meeting. Over the last few months falling yields have been positive for growth stocks, but this week we saw some significant selling in the high valuation names. Broader still. the big indexes like the Dow and S&P 500 are masking…
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  Market Recap   A pretty volatile week for equities but little fundamental news to drive the action. The debate about inflation rages on and the political uncertainty about both the Build Back Better plan and the next Fed chair persist. Rumors are we will hear about the Fed choice next week. For what it’s worth, the betting markets are in Powell’s favor, but not by much.     The only major economic report this…
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    Market Recap   All the main U.S. indexes broke to new highs this week, but the rally in the Russell 2000 was particularly impressive. Conversely, the performance of emerging equities continues to underwhelm. And despite a strong jobs report and confirmation that the Fed will start tapering their bond purchases this month, longer-term bond yields declined noticeably.   There were a couple important economic reports. The first was the monthly read on the…
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  Market Recap   The equity markets were generally robust this week despite building worries about supply chains, energy shortages, and inflation. But for all the talk, long-term bond yields are still below the highs seen back in March (2-year yields have moved more). Granted, this week’s push higher could be the start of a run back towards 1.8%, but we shall see.   One area that did set a post-COIVD record were unemployment claims….
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