Weekly Commentary

Last week’s market activity took an even darker turn, with the S&P 500 falling for the seventh consecutive week. 1 The S&P 500 touched bear market territory, if only briefly, down 20%. 2 Bear markets are just part of the cycle and that’s the risk we accept when we need equity like returns to meet […]

It’s such a challenging time for investors with so many issues swirling around: rising interest rates, a ground war in Europe, inflation, recession fears, COVID lockdowns in China, Fed policy errors, the list goes on. The S&P 500 is down almost 16% this year. From my experience, it’s around this time in the cycle that […]

Last week’s incredible market volatility is likely to repeat in the coming weeks. The Dow Jones had a +900 point up day followed by a down day of over -1000 points. 1 This follows six consecutive weeks of negative market performance. 1 It’s clear that investors are much more focused on factors other than strong […]

The U.S. economy shrank by -1.4% in Q1 and set up the possibility for recession in 2022. Perhaps Fannie Mae was right in their latest economic report (link) in calling for a possible recession this year. 1 The gap in growth was attributed to a massive amount of imports vs. exports, a decline in government […]

Our hope was to see earnings take the day and provide a more positive backdrop to market sentiment. According to FactSet, “for Q1 2022 (with 20% of S&P 500 companies reporting actual results), 79% of S&P 500 companies have reported a positive EPS surprise and 69% of S&P 500 companies have reported a positive revenue […]

Hope is not an investment strategy and humility is at the core of managing money. A transitioning inflationary picture has been our thesis for over 18 months. It’s been a much longer process than anticipated and, along the way, we used humility to adjust portfolios. ✔  Transitioned some large cap growth to quality to capture […]

It is hard to imagine the S&P 500 is only 7.8% off its high when you consider the various factors working against investors. 1 Inflation is sitting at near-record highs on both CPI and PCE. 23 Last week, the Fed signaled a very aggressive approach to fighting inflation in their recent statement. 4 “Many participants […]

We just published our Q2 2022 Look Ahead, you can view the presentation here or watch our narrated version here. Consumer Strength is WeakeningWhile wages have been lifting dramatically since the full re-opening of the economy, the consumer is facing some challenges. Savings have been spent down and consumers are now leaning into revolving credit […]

Last week, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell signaled willingness to accelerate the pace of interest rate increases during a recent speech he gave to the National Association for Business Economics: 1 “If we conclude that it is appropriate to move more aggressively by raising the federal funds rate by more than 25 basis points at […]

When we produced our video Coexisting as Superpowers with Jude Blanchette from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in May 2021, there was simply no way to predict the level of tension that would transpire between the United States and China.   We knew the United States would resist sharing global dominance with […]