Stealthy Bears You’ve no doubt read that we are experiencing the second-longest bull market since World War II, which started in March of 2009 and has continued without a bear market (defined as a decline of 20%) since. But is that true? Several recent articles have pointed out that we did, indeed, experience a “stealth” […]
Crypto-Crash Chances are, if you remember the dot-com crash, it is not fondly. The Nasdaq Composite Index fell a total of 78% peak-to-trough, as companies like Pets.com cratered into oblivion. Today’s cryptocurrency investors are experiencing similar pain, and there’s no clear end in sight. Bitcoin is down 55% this year, and the decline is now […]
2018 Second Quarter Market Report The U.S. equity markets suffered a small setback in the first quarter, but the second quarter brought us back into positive territory. The Wilshire 5000 Total Market Index—the broadest measure of U.S. stocks—finished the quarter up 3.83% and is now in positive territory for the first half of the year, […]
Healthy Earnings – For Now Professional investors are constantly trying to figure out whether the U.S. economy is healthy or sliding toward a recession. The most important tea leaves they read are actual corporate earnings vs. the earnings estimates provided by Wall Street analysts. Surprises on the upside are generally considered to be positive signs, […]
2018 First Quarter Market Report Is the bull market finally over? For the first time in nine calendar quarters, the U.S. investment markets delivered a negative overall return. It was only a slight decline, but the decline reminds us that markets can and do go down from time to time. After starting the year strong, […]
Currencies and Protectionism There is no question, if the Trump Administration’s steel and aluminum tariffs lead to carefully-targeted tit-for-tat retaliations against American products around the world, the resulting trade war scenario would be terrible for the global economy. Many analysts have dismissed this escalating protectionist future as unlikely, saying that cooler heads are likely […]
Cause for Alarm? Quietly, without a lot of fanfare, the U.S. national debt moved past $20 trillion last September 8. On March 15, it exceeded $21 trillion. The next time the debt ceiling will come up for a vote is March 1, 2019, at which point the total could be another $2-3 […]
The History of Bond Rates—Past as Prologue? Although stocks get the most attention, bonds are significant contributors, both to your total return on your portfolio, and also to the prices of every other investment. Bonds compete with stocks and real estate for investment dollars; when their yields are high, it causes a shift in demand […]
Sunny Weather Forecast Economists and traders pay a lot of attention to something that probably doesn’t keep you up at night: the FOMC Minutes, or, in English, the summary of the discussion among decision-makers on the Federal Reserve Board, known as the Federal Open Market Committee. What do they discuss? The health of the U.S. […]
Perspective on Today’s Market Events It looks like the U.S. stock market will finally get something that happens, on average, about once a year: a 10+% percent drop—the definition of a market correction. The last time this happened was a whopper—the Great Recession drop that caused U.S. stocks to drop more than 50%–so most people […]
