No Man’s Land – Patience Required
While the media credited Russian troops seen leaving the border with Ukraine as cause for stocks to rally, the stock market was in a position where it was SUPPOSED to rally as I wrote the other day. Right now, they are somewhat in no man’s land and I do not have strong conviction as to what is coming in the very short-term. We have higher lows and lower highs which eventually will lead to a big move. Right now, we […]
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Date: February 16, 2022
Markets “SHOULD” Rally – Junk a Big Concern
Greetings from the Sunshine State! I flew a new airline out of New Haven called Avelo. It felt like a cross between Southwest and People’s Express for those who remember those crazy years. I truly hope it makes it and continues to garner attention because CT desperately needs another airport between Hartford, RI and NY. I was planning on writing this on the way down, but the startup airline doesn’t have WiFi yet. What a truly great Super Bowl to […]
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Date: February 15, 2022
Frustration – Sometimes You’re The Bug; Sometimes You’re The Windshield
In my 2022 Fearless Forecast, I wrote about three key words for 2022, patience, frustration and quality. While the year is only 6 weeks old, I think those three words have resonated strongly and we are a long way from being over. Thursday was a super frustrating day for me. Early in the morning, indications were for a flat market open pending the big inflation number at 8:30am. After a big up day on Wednesday, that was okay by me […]
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Date: February 11, 2022
People Partying Again – A Look Into My Notebook
It sure seems like the hangover from the stock market decline that bottomed on January 24th has passed. People feel better and I am going to go out on a limb and say that we will see this reflected in next week’s sentiment surveys which are being taken this week. February 2nd is the highest level since the January market low, but investors certainly are happier today than then. In fact, we are now seeing the S&P 400 and Russell […]
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Date: February 9, 2022
Stronger Jobs Report – Will Stocks Join Party?
Let’s start with Friday’s employment report where 467,000 new jobs were created versus the 200,000 forecast. Unemployment ticked up .1% to 4%. My initial thought was WOW! Finally, a beat and not bad in absolute terms. I didn’t really care about the uptick in the rate. Maybe the job market was correcting and the structural issues were going away. That would be such welcomed news. I didn’t give it much more thought until I read a piece over the weekend […]
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Date: February 7, 2022
Textbook Rally – Is It Over?
Between a crazy earnings season and a steady stream of economic data, it’s like a constant strobe light show, or as someone else tweeted, like being a dog on a squirrel farm. As you know, I thought 2021 would close with very strong economic data that would weaken in 2022. Q4 GDP came in super powerful at +6.9% which was more than a full point ahead of estimates. It is almost impossible for politicians and others to argue that the […]
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Date: February 3, 2022
***Q4 Client Report***
And just like that, 2021 is over. A year that began with so much hope and positivity with COVID vaccines and therapeutics ends with more of a whimper than a bang on the health front. However, the exact opposite happened on the financial market front where equities and other “risk on” assets closed at or near all-time highs. The fourth quarter of 2021 was relatively quiet, or as quiet as anyone could expect with a global pandemic nearing the beginning […]
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Date: February 1, 2022
Here’s The Bounce
What a nice turnaround on Friday! One person I read attributed it to “everyone” not working because of the impending blizzard on Saturday. That was a new one for me after 32 years in the business. In the summer, those same people blame The Hamptons for August declines. Now we’re crediting Mother Nature with rallies. Oh boy. Anyway, I have often written that Friday bottoms are not to be trusted and that they’re rare. However, can we really say Friday […]
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Date: January 31, 2022
Stock Market Struggling to Find a Low
This past Monday we saw the first sign of panic and despair in the stock market. It was enough to see a massive intra-day reversal. In the old days, you know, like before Q4 2018, we used to call Monday the internal or momentum low. That’s the low where the majority of stocks are at their worst. In 2008 that low was in October, even though we didn’t see the final price bottom until March 2009. Look at the two […]
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Date: January 28, 2022
Fed Announcement Day – Let the Fireworks Continue!
Sorry for the delay in getting this published. We lost power in the office and that set everything back. I did enjoy zipping home to work from there for an hour and eating Costco mini chocolate chips cookies! Fed Chair Jay Powell and the FOMC conclude their first two-day meeting of 2022 today with a statement at 2pm and press conference to follow. It is no secret that the Fed’s taper plan should conclude in March and that interest rates […]
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Date: January 26, 2022
