The best way to get a 5% yield–my choices and their pluses and minuses
Remember the good ol’ days when Treasuries paid 0% or so and you had to give a bank your toaster to open an account, paying 0.01%? Right now you can find a CD paying 5%–and it doesn’t require locking up your money until the sun goes super-nova...
Fed quick out of the blocks after today’s CPI inflation report: Higher interest rates may be needed
You might even think they knew what was coming. (Which of course the Federal Reserve does.) The pixels weren’t even dry on this morning’s CPI inflation report–6.4% year over year, a 10 basis point drop from December, but a 0.5% month-to-month...
Year-over-year inflation rate drops again, but month-to-month rate shows increase
If you remember your college (or high school if you were precocious) calculus, what we’re worrying about now isn’t the rate of inflation, or even the change in the rate of inflation, but the change in the change of the rate of inflation. Or, in other...
Please Watch My New YouTube Video: 6% Is Coming
Today I posted my two-hundred-and-thirty-sixth YouTube video: 6% Is Coming This week’s Trend of the Week is: 6% is Coming. This song lyric keeps playing in my head: “They laughed at Christopher Columbus when he said the world was round.” I’ve...
Please Watch My New YouTube Video: Why March 22 Is the Next Big Date
Today I posted my two-hundred-and-thirty-fourth YouTube video: Why March 22 Is the Next Big Date Today’s topic is: Why March 22 Is the Next Big Date. March 22 is the date of the Fed’s next meeting. And it’s the first time we’ll get projections...
You heard what you wanted to hear in Powell’s Fed talk today
On the one hand, stock markets heard Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell reiterate his comments of last week that “disinflation” had become visible. (Disinflation is a slowing in the inflation rate.) At the close today the Standard & Poor’s 500...
Stocks fall as Wall Street tries to figure out what January’s huge job gain means
Do the huge January job gains mean that the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates to a higher peak? That was the worry today and it was enough to send the Standard & Poor’s 500 0.61% lower at the close and to knock a solid 1% off the NASDAQ Composite....
Fed raises interest rates by 25 basis points as expected; market convinces itself that the Fed is talking “Pause soon”
The Federal Reserve raised short-term interest rates Wednesday by 25 basis points, as expected. That brings the Fed’s benchmark interest rate to a range of 4.50% to 4.75%, the highest level since October 2007. After a pullback on the news and the Fed’s...
Please Watch My YouTube Video: Now It’s May for the Fed’s Pause
Today I posted my two-hundred-and-thirty-first YouTube video: Now It’s May for the Fed’s Pause Today’s topic is: Now It’s May for the Fed’s Pause. There wasn’t a lot of suspense about today’s Fed meeting. The CME FedWatch...
Sell any post-Fed rally–stocks are way ahead of themselves on the Fed, interest rates, and inflation
Here’s what I expect on Wednesday. The Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee will announce a 25 basis-point interest rate increase. In his post-meeting press conference Fed chair Jerome Powell will try to talk the financial markets out of their...
Economy down but stocks up? Remember that the economy doesn’t equal the stock market
This may seem perplexing: Alphabet (AKA Google) announced that it would cut 12,000 jobs just days after Microsoft (MSFT) said it would cut 10,000 jobs. And stocks, especially technology stocks, rallied. The Standard & Poor’s 500 closed up 1.89% today and...
Stocks rise as investors decide slowing wage gains outweigh higher than expected job growth
At the close today, the Standard & Poor’s 500 was up 2.28% to 38905. The Dow Jones Industrial Average had added 2.12%. The NASDAQ Composite was higher by 2.56% and the NASDAQ 100 was ahead 2.78%. All this on the heels of a December jobs report from the...
Friday jobs report coming up
It’s deja vu all over again as New York stock markets reopen for trading tomorrow. We ended 2022 waiting for the monthly jobs report from the Labor Department to tell us when slower job growth would signal the potential end to the Federal Reserve’s cycle...
How sticky will inflation prove to be in 2023? Lessons from Christmas shopping say, Stickier than the market now expects (and the Fed hopes)
The big investing and economic question for 2023 is How hard will it be to push inflation down to something near the Federal Reserve’s 2% target? The answer will determine (at least until rising unemployment gets the Fed to blink in the second half of 2023) how...
CPI inflation falls more than expected today–market moves higher but not too high ahead of the Fed tomorrow
Today the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that headline CPI inflation in November climbed at a 7.1% annual rate. Month-to-month inflation rose by just 0.1% from October. Core inflation, that is inflation without energy or food prices, rose at a 6.0% annual rate...
I expect a Santa Claus rally but after that it’s coal in the stocking for the first half of 2023
I expect investors and the stock market to behave as if Wednesday’s meeting of the Federal Reserve has settled the important questions of how high (will the Fed take its benchmark Fed Funds interest rate) and how long (will the Fed continue to raise interest...
Please Watch My YouTube Video: Waiting for the Fed
Today I posted my two-hundred-and-fourteenth YouTube video: Waiting for the Fed Today’s topic: Waiting for The Fed. We are about a week out from the Fed’s December 14 meeting, where another 50 basis point increase is expected. We’re now in the...
Hot enough to make the Fed say ,”75, please”? November jobs report comes in above forecasts
Nonfarm payrolls increased by 263,000 in November, the Labor Department said today. (And the October jobs total was revised upward to a gain of 284,000.) The unemployment rate held steady at 3.7%. Average hourly wages rose 0.6% in November from October. That was the...
Fed’s preferred PCE inflation measure fell in October–but not by much
Inflation progress in October but painfully slow. PCE–personal consumption expenditure–in inflation, the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation index, rose at a 6% rate year over year rate through October. That was down from a 6.3% rate in September....
Please Watch My New YouTube Video: The Fed Is Now On Message–Ask Why
Today I posted my two-hundred-and-eleventh YouTube video: The Fed Is Now On Message–Ask Why Today’s topic: The Fed is Now On Message, Ask Why. Last week I spoke about how confusing the Fed’s messaging had been recently, but this week, everybody has...
Please Watch My New YouTube Video: Is the Fed Confusing or Just Confused?
Today I posted my two-hundred-and-ninth YouTube video: Is the Fed Confusing or Just Confused? Today’s topic: Is The Fed Confusing, or Just Confused? First, Mary Daly, president of the San Francisco Fed came out with a very mixed message about the Fed’s...
Friday’s release of November jobs report will decide if year-end rally continues
Economists surveyed by FactSet forecast that the November jobs report, set for release Friday morning, will show that the economy added 220,000 new jobs in the month. And that the unemployment rate ticked higher to 3.8% from 3.7% in October If that forecast is...
Fed talks; stocks retreat
Is the Federal Reserve now in the business of talking down stock prices whenever investors get too optimistic about interest rates? It sure looked like it today. Today, Wednesday, November 15, New York Fed President John Williams ended the day’s rally when he...
This week it’s CPI inflation time again
Another big macroeconomic report to hang over stocks, depressing volatility. After all, who wants to get out ahead of Thursday’s Consumer Price Index inflation report for October? Economists surveyed by Bloomberg project that CPI headline inflation will slip to...
Pivot hopes are back and stocks rally on stronger than expected jobs report. (Go figure!)
Economists were expecting a light October jobs report this morning with projections from economists surveyed by Bloomberg at 195,000. Instead, the Labor Department reported that the economy added 261,000 jobs in October. (And revised the September report up to 315,000...
Please Watch My New YouTube Video: Federal Reserve, Mind the Gap!
Today I posted my two-hundredth YouTube video: Federal Reserve: Mind the Gap! Today is Ground Hog Day for the Federal Reserve. The U.S. central bank will announce whether or not it sees its shadow. It’s predicted to announce a 75 basis point increase in interest...
Not what the market wanted to hear from the Fed today
At first investors and traders thought they heard the Federal Reserve signal that the central bank was thinking about a pivot to a policy of cutting interest rates. And stocks rallied. But then Fed chair Jerome Powell “clarified” the Fed’s thinking...
Rising bond yields and higher odds of bigger hikes from the Fed at December meeting cap stocks
The two-day bounce in U.S. stocks stalled today. The Standard & Poor’s 500 closed down 0.67% and the NASDAQ Composite was down 0.40%. Why? Increased sentiment that the Federal Reserve will raise its target short-term interest rate by a hefty 75 basis points...
Oh, No! economists say ahead of tomorrow’s CPI inflation number
Economists surveyed by Bloomberg are looking for core inflation, that is inflation without volatile food and energy prices, to return to a four-decade high in tomorrow’s report of CPI inflation in September. Projections are looking for a 0.4%increase n core...Jim’s Daily Email Alerts:
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