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Wednesday, the Federal Reserve concluded its July meeting and raised the Fed funds rate by another 25 basis points. We are now sitting at 5.25-5.50%, which is the highest level in 22 years. Chairman Powell left additional hikes on the table during his press conference. The Fed’s actions and rhetoric continue to put pressure on… Read the full article.
I hope everyone is enjoying some summertime and got to be with family over the July 4th holiday last week. Nothing is more important. This week we got some good news on the inflation front, as both the consumer price index and producers price index came in lighter than forecast. We are also continuing to… Read the full article.
All the major stock indices continue to digest the large gains seen in May, with particular emphasis on the Nasdaq 100 and market cap weighted S&P 500. We noted two weeks ago that the leaders of this rally were overbought and ripe for a pullback and some consolidation before attempting to move higher. This remains… Read the full article.
Stocks are currently digesting the rally that we have seen over the past six weeks. This is especially true for the market cap weighted Nasdaq and S&P 500, whose performance is largely dictated by large mega cap technology stocks. As we (and others) have pointed out many times recently, those few stocks have been the… Read the full article.
During the past week we have continued to see positive expansion in market breadth. More and more sectors are participating in the rally that began a month ago and has been supported almost exclusively by a few huge tech companies. In my view, this is a very positive development and strengthens my belief that this… Read the full article.
Three good things happened last week. First, our government avoided a catastrophic debt default and passed a resolution to raise the debt ceiling. Second, we got a really solid jobs report. Hiring continued to grow unabated despite all types of threats to the economy and, importantly, wage growth slowed at the same time. This was… Read the full article.
We head into the Memorial Day weekend with no deal on the debt ceiling and another hot inflation report. The Federal Reserve’s favored measure of inflation, the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index (PCE), came in above month-over-month and annual estimates. This has resulted in a jump in probability that the Fed will hike rates again… Read the full article.
We had our quarterly workshop in Dallas last week and I want to thank our partners around the country who came down and worked with us. I can’t tell you how much these mean to me personally and to Cabana as a whole. I leave each of these with new ideas and renewed passion to… Read the full article.
Year to date, we have seen the major indices (S&P 500, Nasdaq and Dow) move higher on the back of mega cap technology stocks like Apple, Microsoft, Meta and Amazon. We know this because the aforementioned indices are market cap weighted such that the larger the company in the index, the more its performance impacts the… Read the full article.
The stock market remains rangebound and indecisive heading into the next meeting of the Federal Reserve, which begins on May 2. The policy statement and interest rate determination will occur the following afternoon. Most analysts are predicting another 25-basis point hike, bringing the Fed funds rate to 5-5.25%. It is astonishing to think only a… Read the full article.
We have spent the past couple of commentaries looking under the hood, so to speak, of the equity market in an attempt to determine if the current rally has any legs to it – or is simply the next in a series of head fakes that we have endured during the past thirteen months. … Read the full article.
Last week we did our monthly webinar for our partner advisors around the country and attempted to do a deep dive into what is going on in this crazy market. We pulled quite a few charts and took a look at what is driving the market on the up days as well as the down… Read the full article.
Stocks entered free fall over the past few trading days as a huge bank (Silicon Valley Bank) failed due to a run on deposits coupled with bond losses resulting from the pace and size of interest rate hikes over the past year. Almost immediately, two other banks suffered the same fate. The Federal Reserve and… Read the full article.
Last week we discussed the apparent failure of the S&P 500 (SPX) to hold its’ early February breakout above resistance at 4100. The reversal to lower prices came as investors realized that inflation remains an ongoing problem and rates would likely need to rise further (and perhaps faster) than expected. This same reality continues to… Read the full article.
Stocks moved lower in February as interest rates rose. This is a pattern that has been in place for over a year now – stocks fall when rates rise and vice versa. Bond yields peaked in October, leading to a rally in stocks that continued (albeit rocky) through the end of January. Since then, yields have jumped from 3.39%… Read the full article.
Over the last ten days we have seen two hot inflation data points come in. The January CPI number came in above estimates and this was followed by a higher-than-expected PPI number at the end of last week. All of this comes on the back of exceptionally strong labor market reports. It appears investors are… Read the full article.
The stock market continues to battle through resistance and hold gains realized since the beginning of the year. This is no small feat in my opinion given all that investors are dealing with. Questions abound at every turn and there are as many seemingly reasonable opinions as there are talking heads. Are we in a… Read the full article.
Last week we took a look at some potentially important positive technical changes in the broad U.S. stock market. We used the S&P 500 as a proxy and will do the same today. We also noted that the January rally in stocks was in anticipation of the Fed meeting, which concluded yesterday. I felt like… Read the full article.
Equity markets have continued to make technical progress over the past week. We find ourselves at a juncture where numerous indicators have converged. I have pulled a chart of the S&P 500 (SPY) from StockCharts.com and included it below for reference. Technical analysis is always a bit subjective, so take what I see with… Read the full article.
Stocks have now booked two straight weeks of gains to start 2023. This is a positive sign to me after what was a dismal 2022. Importantly, the benchmark S&P 500 is now back above its 50-day and 200-day simple moving average (SMA). This makes the fourth time since last spring that we have seen an… Read the full article.
