As of this writing, the equity markets are on a three-day losing streak, caused by less optimism on the “trade war” file. And, while there were some positives in recently released economic data, most major economic indicators continue to show business contraction. The equity market has been driven by “the economy is strong” narrative, FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), momentum, and the injection of huge amounts of liquidity by the Fed (QE4). Unfortunately, …Read More
Tag Archives: bond market
Look For The Preponderance Of The Evidence, Don’t Rely On One Factor
The headline on my LinkedIn page on Friday (October 4th) read: “Jobless rate reaches half-century low, HP plans to cut up to 9,000 jobs…” Is this good news about jobs, or bad? I’ve learned many times over the years to rely on the preponderance of the evidence, and not on any single indicator. The jobs numbers, themselves indicate that the economy is still expanding. But, the lower level of job creation, along with …Read More
The New Mercantilism Rates Race to the Bottom Currencies Depreciate
During the recent period of world growth, where nearly every country’s exports were rising, there was little incentive for governments to manipulate economic policies to foster even more economic growth. Getting back to “normal” seemed to be the universally adopted mantra, and that implied rising rates and tighter monetary policies. However, today, when world trade is contracting (some of which may be due to “trade wars,” but much of which is due …Read More
What Investors Believe: Central Banks Have Their Backs
In a world of fragile economic growth where the odds of recession have been on the rise, investors are now convinced that central banks (CBs), led by the Fed, have their backs, as they see the CBs as “buyers of last resort.” Note that the Fed, whose legislative mandates are low unemployment and stable prices, has morphed into the role of equity market savior beginning in the Greenspan era and rolling …Read More
Key Indicators Have Peaked; Markets Hope for Soft Landing
The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), a private sector company, is the entity responsible for officially labeling recession start and end dates. As a rule of thumb, the financial markets use two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth as the marker. But, that is not the way the NBER sees it. According to their website, the NBER defines a recession as: “a significant decline in economic activity … lasting more than …Read More
How Will Markets React to Growth Deceleration?
Economic fundamentals were ignored as if they were merely background noise as markets attempted once more in early August to breach their record high levels put in late last January. The common theme in the business media is that, due to great corporate earnings (24%+ in Q2), the equity markets are cheap. Never mind that a good part of that earnings growth was due to one-time tax reduction (in fact, …Read More
