The bad call was the header of my last week’s post, “The wrong kind of stocks are leading the stock market to records.” What kind of stocks might those have been? They were defensive stocks … healthcare, utilities, REITs. Why was this bad? It was a sign the smart money was fearful. And that’s not…
Tag: business
A Lethal Combo: PMI at a 10-year low + Slowing Job Growth — NOT!
Flash! Dow looses 800 points in 2 Days Here we go again, more selling based on market news items reported without contextual backup. Purchasing Manager’s Index (PMI) for September Worst in a Decade 50.2% was the expected reading. 47.8% was the actual number. Any reading below 50 is considered to be indicative of a slowing…
“Ladies and gentlemen we have a ‘Black Swan'” — Revisited
Election 2016 a major negative surprise for investors? Initially, I thought it would be. Early the morning of the day after I posted, Ladies and gentlemen we have a Black Swan (11/9/2016). I mean based on the polling, which turned out to be dead wrong, there looked to be little chance that we’d ever see…
“The president is the Yankees and Powell is the Toledo Mud Hens.”
Thus spake Jim Cramer … Wednesday morning June 19. Previously in the “Squawk on the Street” segment he opined, “Powell is living in a conventional world,” not the World of Trump. Powell’s conventional world is a place where you try to get the near-impossible (monetary policy) right. It is a world that involves meticulously working…
Pre-emptive Fed Strikes + Having It Both Ways
Dumb and Dumber Just when you thought media/pundit commentary on the market and the economy couldn’t get anymore inane and stupid, they surprise you by plumbing a new depth. This article from CNBC, “These charts show how Fed Chair Jerome Powell is the most important thing to the market now,” is a solid gold example. Of…
“The Trade War Will Make Stocks Scary. 5 Reasons Not To Panic.” Barron’s
Giving Credit Where Credit Is Due I spend a lot of time on this blog bashing the media for fear-mongering, pandering to mankind’s propensity to run its mind to the dark side. You know … if it bleeds it leads. The tendency for them is to inundate us with stories, lacking in perspective, that lead…
‘The only reason to keep the stock market open is to see how foolish people can be.’ anon.
Actually, I think this is a Warren Buffett quote but I could not document it. Buffett believes that when you buy something you should be willing to hold it even if the market were to be closed for the next ten years. He subscribes to the idea that day-to-day fluctuation in prices are based on…
File this one under, “You Have To Be Kidding Me!”
The Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 162.77 points today. Because the financial media feels compelled to explain every jiggle in the market the folks at CNBC proclaimed the “Dow drops more than 150 points after Fed’s Powell dashes rate cut hopes.” They went on to say that on one word uttered by Chairman Powell when talking…
The “Christmas Eve Massacre” and where we stand now
First and Foremost … By early October, 2018, the S&P 500 had more than quadrupled off its 666, 2009 secular bear market low (up over 300%). This was capped off by a spectacular 24 month run that saw the S&P 500 increase more than 50% to a new all-time-high of 2951.81 (10/3/18). I would say a correction of…
A Look Into The Belly Of The Bear
Irrational Pessimism Before moving on to a more complete discussion of ‘the belly of the bear’, I thought a real-time view of ‘irrational pessimism’ might be in order. I have one and it is a doozy. Now a ‘doozy’, loosely defined, is “something unique.” Unfortunately, or fortunately for those left with money to buy, there…