Last week, we wrote that commodity markets were signaling that “This Is Not a Drill,” and discussed events driving energy and industrial and precious metals. We deliberately didn’t discuss soft commodities — i.e., foods. Below are some thoughts about foods, food inflation, fertilizers, the potential consequences for food and beverage Read more
Agustin Carstens, the General Manager of the Bank of International Settlements (BIS), spoke in Geneva a week ago — offering some soul-searching reflection on how the world’s financial authorities got the inflation story so terribly wrong. (The Bank of International Settlements is essentially “the central bank of central banks.”) We Read more
We say it often and we will say it again: earnings are the mother’s milk of stock prices. On a market-wide basis, a flat or declining earnings trend almost invariably accompanies a flat or declining trend in stock prices. This doesn’t mean that investors should go completely to cash (particularly Read more
Many thanks to those who joined us on our periodic conference call on March 24. We will be editing the call into bite-sized thematic sections and providing the links to you in coming days, to watch or rewatch. If you would like a copy of the slide deck that accompanied Read more
The tumult of countervailing forces at work in the global economy, and besetting investors, increases in strength day by day. Last week we wrote extensively on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and its implications for a host of global financial and commodity markets. The invasion itself surprised many seasoned analysts who Read more
There are years when nothing happens and years in which centuries happen. Carlos Fuentes We’ve seen a whirlwind of events in the past week. Here are some thoughts on the most important themes. Ukraine and the Fed Unfolding events in Ukraine of course represent a humanitarian catastrophe — and we Read more
The broad markets have registered significant, but constrained, volatility thus far in 2022, with the S&P 500 down about 8% from last year’s highs as of this writing, and the NASDAQ 100 down about 14%. Those figures mask a different, deeper, and more systemically important reality that mark the current Read more
Interest Rates, Inflation, and the Fed’s Coming Gut Check This morning’s CPI print hit 7.5% year-over-year, up 0.6% from the previous print, and slightly worse than expected. Some (not us) had believed that December’s number would be a peak; it was not. Given trajectories of energy and housing costs, February Read more
This past weekend we were invited to present our views on the current investment landscape to the local chapter of the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII). As our title indicates, there are many macro factors at work, all of them of fundamental interest to investors. How do we rank Read more
Another month, another blistering inflation report; the consumer price index rose at a 7% annual rate in December. Of course, as our regular readers have heard us say often, the methodology used to calculate that rate has changed often over the decades — invariably in a way that understates the Read more
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