U.S. and Global Stocks “Fear? What fear?” U.S. markets have brushed off coronavirus fears and continue to move to new highs. The available data from China and elsewhere suggest that although Covid-19 (the virus’ new official designation) is more worrisome than SARS and MERS, and could yet be disruptive, it Read more
The U.S. With most U.S. markets making new all-time highs, or (as in the case of the Russell 2000) breaking out to new recent highs, we remain fundamentally bullish, and fully aware that a modest correction of 1–5% may occur at any time. In keeping with our overarching strategic view, Read more
The U.S. As earnings season progresses, most companies are beating estimates, and sequentially, earnings are coming in on average slightly up. So far, earnings support our view that the U.S. economy is bottoming and preparing to exit the third slowdown of the post-2009 expansion. We note that the U.S. seems Read more
Last week we mentioned the “election” of a new President of the European Commission (EC), Ursula von der Leyen. We say “election” in quotation marks to remind readers that the European Commission, the primary legislative organ of the European Union, is not comprised of popularly elected members. Von der Leyen Read more
The U.S. The U.S. market got a modest boost from the announcement of a trade truce with China, in which China agreed to boost some U.S. agricultural imports, and the U.S. suspended a tariff hike on $250 billion worth of Chinese imports. According to the announcement, the initial deal will Read more
The Eurozone manufacturers’ PMI, a monthly survey of purchasing managers’ views about current trends in manufacturing, fell to 45.6 in September, down from 47 in August. Anything below 50 is contractionary, and the September reading is the lowest in almost seven years. Germany’s manufacturing PMI fell to 41.4 in September, Read more
The Norwegian sovereign wealth fund (formally, the Government Pension Fund of Norway) was established in 1990 to invest the surplus revenues of the Norwegian petroleum industry. With over $1 trillion in assets, heavily allocated towards equities, it currently owns about 1.3% of global stocks. The Fund has undergone a number Read more
Market Summary The U.S. As expected, the U.S. Federal Reserve cut the benchmark fed funds rate by 0.25% on Wednesday, as expected, and also ended the runoff of its portfolio of bonds a month early. Fed Chair Powell said, “The outlook for the U.S. economy remains favorable and this Read more
The U.S. Earnings season in the U.S. is in full swing. While earnings growth has stalled after the tax-break driven pace of growth that was enjoyed in 2018, it remains broadly within the trend of growth that has followed the 2008/2009 financial crisis. Source: Bloomberg, LLP Of course, there Read more
Europe Caves on Russia… Again True to form, the Council of Europe has fallen into appeasement of the illiberal regime that lies on the European Union’s eastern flank. Russia had been suspended from the continent’s human rights watchdog council in 2014 as a result of its annexation of Crimea in Read more
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