Weekly Commentary

  The US economy is strengthening by most economic accounts (see our post from last week). It’s no wonder we hear lots of news about the Fed raising rates in September with almost certainty of seeing at least a rate increase in 2015. The probability of a rate increase by year end is 72% according […]

  Is the US Economy about to launch into a phase of consumption driven by confidence, wages, and income? Let’s take a very quick look and contemplate how likely we are to achieve lift off. The US Economy added 215,000 more jobs in June, according the latest report from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics.(i) […]

  After spending 30 years as a professional investor on behalf of others, I’ve grown accustomed to the rhythms of the market. More important, I’ve grown more attuned to the rhythms of our clients and investors. Right around this time of a long run bull market when earnings are evasive and markets have been trending […]

  This week we finally witnessed the equity markets owning up to a well known reality; earnings matter! We’ve been warning for several months that second quarter earnings for the broad market (S&P 500) were expected to decline. As of June 30, according to FactSet, earnings were expected to decline by -4.5%.(i) The “good-bad” news […]

  Spain just celebrated their Festival of San Fermin with the traditional Running of the Bulls. The single mindedness of a bull and the tremendous force with which a bull can charge, is quite a thing to witness up close. Once a bull is charging full steam ahead, getting them to change direction requires quite […]

Each quarter we prepare our near term Look Ahead. Our goal is to attempt to frame the macro-economic and asset allocation issues we face when trying to invest wisely. Below is a link to a video version of our Look Ahead for your review. Q3 2015 Look Ahead If you prefer the pdf version with […]

Cross Over Period The end of Q2 was anything but a sleeper for US and Global equities. You can see from the table below the results were a yawner for US Equites but the volatility was far from it.   Comparison of Q2 Index Price Change vs. Volatility (i)(ii)   The general theme that pervaded […]

  This past week was perhaps one of the most consequential weeks the world and especially the US has seen in quite some time. Between the Supreme Court rulings and the Senate’s passage of the fast-track legislation, which may lead to the passage of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership, it’s been a busy week. Whether you […]

  The US Consumer balance sheet is as strong as it has ever looked. With 97 trillion in assets and 14 trillion in liabilities, consumers have a very strong net worth. In fact, when you look at American’s debt service levels they are at the lowest point since the Federal Reserve began tracking this data. […]

Finally, there’s some good news from the consumer. Retail sales were up 1.2% from last month with gains in almost all sectors.[i] On a year over year basis retail sales are up 2.7% and if you exclude auto and gasoline they are up 4.3%. Perhaps we are finally seeing the consumer part ways with their […]