October 10, 2019 @ 7:57 pm | Breaking News |
Overnight financial markets tumbled on fears that U.S.-China talks to end their trade war were looking at failure. Today stocks are up again as hopes for a so-called “mini-deal” have advanced as China signaled that it might be open to such a limited deal,...
October 9, 2019 @ 7:53 pm | Breaking News, Jubak Top 50 Portfolio, Recent Buys, TSM |
It’s hard to get a handle on exactly how big the market called the Internet of Things will be. Bain Capital sats $520 billion by 2021. McKensey, another consulting company, says $11 trillion by 2021. The huge difference is a result of 1) what these...
October 9, 2019 @ 7:38 pm | Breaking News |
Here’s the most important point, to me, from the minutes of the Federal Reserve’s September 18 meeting released today. At the meeting the Fed lowered interest rates by 25 basis points for the second time in 2019. “Several participants suggested that the...
October 8, 2019 @ 7:57 pm | Breaking News |
Today the Trump administration put eight of China’s technology giants on a blacklist over alleged human rights violations against Muslim minorities. And China signaled that it would retaliate over the blacklist. Foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told...
October 8, 2019 @ 7:52 pm | Breaking News |
It quacks like quantitative easing. It walks like quantitative easing. But it’s not quantitative easing. According to Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell anyway. In a speech today, October 8, to the National Association for Business Economics, Powell said the...
October 7, 2019 @ 7:29 pm | Breaking News |
Busy, busy, busy. Here’s what we know to be on tap for the rest of October as of today October 7. U.S.-China trade talks are set to resume on Thursday, October 10. That means a switch from a period when both nations were issuing statements and policy steps...
October 3, 2019 @ 8:00 pm | Breaking News |
The trend in U.S. financial markets this week has pointed down on data that shows the U.S. economy is slowing. Certainly the disappointing numbers in both the manufacturing and services Purchasing Managers Indexes have supported that conclusion. That could all change...
October 2, 2019 @ 7:55 pm | Breaking News, Volatility, You May Have Missed |
Yesterday’s disappointing Purchasing Managers Index news on U.S. manufacturing has put two interest rate cuts from the Federal Reserve back on Wall Street’s expectations.(Economists had expected that the PMI number for September would show the...
October 1, 2019 @ 6:29 pm | Breaking News, Dividend Income Portfolio |
Today’s weakness in the financial sector on the news that online brokerage Charles Schwab (SCHW) will be cutting commissions on equity and ETF trades to 0% sent the financial sector down to a loss of 2.07% on the Financial Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLF). That...
October 1, 2019 @ 6:22 pm | Breaking News, Volatility, You May Have Missed |
All the major U.S. stock indexes fell today as the Institute for Supply Management’s Purchasing Managers Index for Manufacturing disappointed by sinking further into contraction territory. At 47.8 for September, the index hit a 10-year low. Economists surveyed by...
October 1, 2019 @ 6:17 pm | Breaking News, Jubak Top 50 Portfolio, TSN |
Ok, one lawsuit/investigation/class action action against a company is bad news, usually, for a stock. Two, though? Time to say, Move along. Especially when the company in question shows a remarkable ability to keep getting sued for the same practices. Back in April...
September 30, 2019 @ 7:08 pm | Breaking News |
If you were an investor during the dotcom bubble of 1999 that turned into the dotcom bust of 2000 and then into an extended and painful bear market, then you now what we’re seeing now isn’t a comparable level of distress in the underpinnings of the...
September 27, 2019 @ 7:55 pm | Breaking News |
I think I know where this is coming from but the news certainty hit the market from left field today. Bloomberg is reporting that the Trump administration is discussing ways to restrict portfolio flows into China’s stocks. Chinese companies traded in the United...
September 27, 2019 @ 7:49 pm | Breaking News |
Consumer spending on goods and services, which accounts for about two-thirds of gross domestic product, increased by just 0.1% in August from July, the smallest gain in six months, according to the Commerce Department today. Personal income was up 0.4% in August....
September 26, 2019 @ 5:32 pm | Breaking News, MCD |
We knew this one was coming, right? Today, McDonald’s (MCD) announced that it would begin a test of the PLT, the plant, lettuce and tomato burger, for 12 weeks in 28 restaurants in south-western Ontario. The move mirrors but trails (by six months) the...
September 26, 2019 @ 5:25 pm | Breaking News |
No big bad news story from China this morning, but the news trend continues to emphasize the downside. For example, this morning a U.S. official said the U.S. is unlikely to extend a waiver allowing American firms to supply China’s Huawei Technologies with technology...
September 25, 2019 @ 7:50 pm | Breaking News, Volatility, You May Have Missed |
The manufacturing sector–thanks to the U.S.-China trade war–continues to slow China’s economy. But the real problem may be an underperformance in the services sector that makes it impossible for that sector to pick up the slack. The end result is that the...
September 20, 2019 @ 7:38 pm | Breaking News, Volatility, You May Have Missed |
Today, Friday, September 20, the Federal Reserve will buy another $75 billion in the overnight repo market. That brings the total this week to $203 billion in the Fed’s effort to stabilize the short-term markets that Wall Street uses to finance its purchases of...
September 18, 2019 @ 7:42 pm | Breaking News |
If $53 billion doesn’t work, try $75 billion more. The Federal Reserve injected $75 billion into U.S. money markets today after yesterday’s injection of $53 billion didn’t solve the problem. The problem is that the big Wall Street banks are finding...
September 18, 2019 @ 7:32 pm | Breaking News |
On Tuesday the Federal Reserve bought $53.2 billion of short-term securities to stabilize the market for money market securities. A funding shortage on Monday and Tuesday had led rates on overnight general collateral repurchase agreements to climb as high as 10% and...
September 18, 2019 @ 7:25 pm | Breaking News |
Today the Federal Reserve lowered its main interest rate another 25 basis points to a range of 1.75% to 2%. To say that the Fed’s Open Market Committee was divided on the decision would be an extreme understatement: Five officials wanted to keep rates unchanged,...
September 16, 2019 @ 7:27 pm | Breaking News |
Oil prices are higher–much higher–today after a drone attack on Saudi Arabia’s Abqaiq processing center knocked out 50% of the country’s oil production. As of 1 p.m. New York time U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate was up 13.58% to $62.30 a...
September 13, 2019 @ 7:18 pm | Breaking News |
One way to understand of the recent market action–one way that makes sense to me–is to think of it as a big short squeeze. The drop in Treasury yields and the climb in Treasury prices went to far in August with Treasuries showing their biggest monthly gain...
September 12, 2019 @ 8:03 pm | Breaking News |
If it had come to a formal vote, there’s a good chance that European Central Bank President Mario Draghi would have faced defeat in his efforts to revive quantitative easing at the central bank. But the bank doesn’t usually hold a formal vote on a issue...
September 11, 2019 @ 7:54 pm | Breaking News |
The resignation/firing of John Bolton, a long-time advocate of military action against Iran, as National Security Advisor to President Donald Trump, has send oil prices tumbling today. U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate is down 2.42% to $56.01 a barrel....
September 11, 2019 @ 7:48 pm | Breaking News, Dividend Income Portfolio, PFE |
Why introduce legislation that will dead on arrival in the Republican controlled Senate? Because House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats know that controlling drug prices is extremely popular with voters. And a proposal that is a serious effort to lower drug...
September 9, 2019 @ 7:18 pm | Breaking News |
Will the European Central Bank revive its program of bond-buying when it meets on Thursday? The bank only ended this program of quantitative easing in December. The markets are currently pricing in a new program of 40 billion euros a month in bond purchases–plus...
September 9, 2019 @ 7:10 pm | Breaking News, GOLD, Jubak Picks Portfolio, Volatility, You May Have Missed |
It’s by no means a guarantee of gains, but owing shares of a company that is riding the wave of positive macro and micro trends does indeed usually result in solid profits. On the macro side, Barrick Gold has global trends pointing toward toward higher gold...
September 5, 2019 @ 6:54 pm | Breaking News |
Companies are set to borrow $74 billion in the investment-grade bond market this week. That’s the most for a week since records began in 1972. The issuers include Coca-Cola (KO), Walt Disney (DIS), and Apple (AAPL). At least another $50 billion in corporate bond...
September 4, 2019 @ 7:42 pm | Breaking News |
As of 2 p.m. New York time U.S. stocks were higher on just about no meaningful news. To me it looks like the market wants to climb in the very near term–testing technical momentum to move to 2950 on the Standard & Poor’s 500 and maybe beyond. The...