Insights

It is Thanksgiving week, so we want to review a few reasons for investors to be thankful. Yes, it has been a tough year. But things are looking better, and we expect more improvement in 2023. Gridlock Can Be Good The first reason to be thankful is stocks have continued to rally off their Oc …

On the heels of a huge month for stocks in October, the bull continued to soar in November, as the S&P 500 had its best week since June and the NASDAQ had its best week since March. Sparking much of the rally was news that inflation has likely peaked and is finally slowing. We’ll discus …

As expected, the Federal Reserve raised the federal funds rate by 0.75% to the 3.75-4% range on Wednesday. This was the fourth successive 0.75% hike. The initial market focus was on a new line inserted in the official statement, wherein the Fed nodded in the direction of decelerating the pa …

Stocks had a solid week, gaining nearly 5%. The jump was sparked by rumors on Friday that the Federal Reserve will raise rates by 75 basis points in November and then consider smaller hikes going forward. The market has priced in an extremely hawkish Fed, and any slight tilt to a more dovis …

We’ll get to the disappointing inflation data next, but Thursday morning had a pure panic feel to it — potentially the washout that is needed for lows to form.

October is known as a bear market killer, as many bear markets have ended during this month. Some of the most famous were the 1974 and 2002 bears, which both ended within the first two weeks of October. Those bears were down more than 48% and 49%, respectively, when the ultimate lows took p …

October Is Misunderstood Good riddance to September, as both stocks and bonds had another rough month. When it was all said and done, the S&P 500 fell 9.3% for the worst September since 2008 and one of the worst ever. For the quarter, the S&P 500 lost 5.3%. That was the third consec …

Stocks had another rough week. The S&P 500 flirted with the June lows and swung back into bear market territory. Investors are worried about inflation, the Fed, the economy, the Russia-Ukraine war, among other market challenges.

The popular Green Day song titled “Wake Me Up When September Ends” feels quite appropriate given the recent market volatility. In fact, the S&P 500 has now dropped at least 3% for three of the past four weeks. As we’ve noted in this commentary, stocks tend to be quite volatile and poten …

It’s hard to believe, but we are less than two months away from midterm elections in early November. Given all the well-known worries this year — from inflation to the war in Ukraine, the economy to the bear market — most investors haven’t started to think about midterms quite yet. But we e …