Note: This will be my last full commentary for 2022. I will spend the month of December on research for next year, visiting with family and taking some much needed time off. I will still be watching markets, as will all the other members of the Alhambra team and if something happens which requires me […]
When we think about the challenges facing an investor today, the big problems, the things we worry about that could cause a lot more harm than some interest rate hikes, are mostly outside the United States. China is prominent this weekend because of demonstrations against their zero-COVID policies. The Chinese people appear to be pretty […]
Stocks had a rip snorter of a rally last week and a lot of people are pondering the question in the title over this long weekend. The S&P 500 was down 20.9% from intraday high (4818.62, January 4th) to intraday low (3810.32, May 20th). From that intraday low the market has risen 9.1% in just […]
Crude oil prices rose over 25% last week and as I sit down to write this evening the overnight futures are up another 8% to around $125. Almost every other commodity on the planet rose in prices last week too, as did the dollar. Those two factors – rising dollar and rising commodity prices – […]
As I write this the S&P 500 futures are down over 80 points, apparently in response to some rather harsh comments from Vladimir Putin concerning Ukraine. Russia recognized the independence of Donetsk and Luhansk, two breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine that border Russia, and is apparently deploying troops in these regions. This is seen by […]
What is the consensus about the economy today? Will 2022 growth be better or worse than 2021? Actually, that probably isn’t the right question because the economy slowed significantly in the second half of 2021. The real question is whether growth will improve from that reduced pace. The Atlanta Fed GDPNow tracker now has Q4 […]
The headlines last Friday were ominous: Inflation Hits Highest Level in Nearly 40 Years Inflation is Painfully High… Groceries and Christmas Presents Are Going To Cost More Inflation is Soaring.. America’s Inflation Burst This morning on Face The Nation, Mohamed El-Erian, former Harvard endowment manager, former bond king apprentice, economist, and the man who seems […]
Here we go again. Or maybe, more accurately here we go still. COVID has reared its ugly head again, this time in the form of a new variant called Omicron. The name surprised some folks because the next letter in the Greek alphabet was Nu but the WHO thought that sounded too much like “new” […]
Consumer sentiment hit a decade low last month, falling 6 points from an already low level. The culprit? Inflation, which we learned last week hit a 3 decade high in October. And if the founder of the University of Michigan consumer sentiment survey is right, the next thing we’ll see is an economic slowdown. George […]
A couple of weeks ago the 10 year Treasury note yield rose 16 basis points in the course of 5 trading days. That move was driven by near term inflation fears as I discussed last week. Long term inflation expectations were and are well behaved. I wrote nearly 2000 words last week about that change […]
