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Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell seems to have been inspired by his viewing of the Dr. Seuss’ movie The Grinch this December. As Christmas was approaching, Chairman Powell, the Grinch himself, and his other Federal Reserve (The Fed) cronies were busy discussing raising rates and normalizing the balance sheet. The Fed —this group of Grinches—seemed resolute in […]

The past six months was a period of extremes for financial markets around the globe. U.S. stocks ended 2018 in the red, as they experienced their worst year since 2008. Negative volatility was also felt globally and across most other asset classes as bonds and commodities suffered similarly. Financial asset weakness was primarily caused by rising […]

Macro Overview A change in the Federal Reserve’s stance on the direction of interest rates helped buoy equity and bond prices higher in March, allowing U.S. equity indices to post the strongest first quarter in nearly ten years. The Federal Reserve scaled back its growth expectations for the U.S. economy and announced that it would […]

Some investors put all their money in one boat, the stock market. They ride the ups and downs of the market, moving things around as needed and generally trying to stay abreast of the constantly changing circumstances of business and the financial markets. If they’re smart, lucky, and/or have knowledgeable advisers, they get a decent […]

Macro Overview U.S. equities continued to defy negative sentiment and sanguine market readings as tepid economic data advanced stocks higher in February. Equities posted their best first two months of the year since 1991, rebounding from the volatile fourth quarter of 2018. Gross domestic product (GDP), the primary measure of U.S. economic growth, expanded at […]

Macro Overview A resilient U.S. economy drove equity markets to the best January in 30 years, propelling stock indices to new year gains which had not been seen since January 1989. Job and wage growth skirted the government shutdown as the number of employed increased in January along with rising wages. The unemployment rate ticked […]

The Federal Reserve is having its Hotel California moment. The Fed began quantitative easing in 2008 with a balance sheet of $800 billion, growing to $4.5 trillion. Even with quantitative tightening, the balance sheet will not be reduced back to normal levels below $1 trillion. The Fed has paused on raising rates due to a slower economy in […]

Investors got a big lump of coal in their stockings this Christmas. For equity investors, the decline in prices that started the first week of October reached a crescendo on December 24th, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average suffered the worst Christmas Eve decline in its history, with the Average declining more than 1300 points (5.8%) […]