Daily State of the Markets
Seeing Some Improvement, But...
Good Monday morning and welcome back. Global markets appear to be in sigh of relief mode this morning in response to the preliminary round of the French election. Pro-growth, pro-EU, centrist candidate Emmanuel Macron emerged as the early leader as both of France's establishment parties w…
Building Modern Portfolios - Three Ways To Generate Alpha
In case you missed the first two segments of this series, the topic at hand is how to go about developing portfolios designed to outperform in today's modern markets. More specifically, how does a manager attempt to provide outperformance in a world where trading is done at the speed of l…
Looking For The Reason
Long time readers know that when markets do something unexpected - such as breaking a 3-day losing streak with a surge of 184 Dow points - I need to know why. And while I haven't forgotten that I'm in the middle of a series on "how to outperform" when designing portfolios (with the next s…
While I Hate To Sound Like a Broken Record...
Good Monday morning and welcome back. While the bears contend that the market is ripe for a spill, so far at least, sideways appears to be the new down. For example, the S&P 500 has been moving sideways since mid-February and closed Friday just 1.68% off the March 1 all-time high. How…
Building Modern Portfolios - Step 1
A big part of my job these days is assisting financial advisors in the development of portfolios for their clients and their firms. I like to say that I have 30 years of mistakes under my belt in this business and that we will do our darndest not to repeat any of them. In short, I strive …
A More Cautious Stance Makes Sense
Good Monday morning and welcome back. Well, it's a new month and a new quarter - wow, where does the time go? As usual, let's start the week (and the month and the quarter) with a review my key market models and indicators. To review, the primary goal of this exercise (something I actuall…
Is The New Narrative All About Confidence?
Those expecting to see the stock market indices crumble in response to the GOP's failure to get their healthcare bill passed are probably disappointed with the action seen over the last two days. Remember, just about everybody in the game has been calling for a meaningful decline in stock…
What's The Narrative Now?
Prior to last week, the market narrative was based on hope. Hope that corporate tax cuts would bring cash and jobs back home and make America great again. Hope that tax reform would help the middle class. Hope that reducing regulations would help banks and other industries flourish. Hope …
Some Caution Appears Warranted
Good Monday morning and welcome back. To be sure, the healthcare bill was a fiasco for the Republicans and will perhaps sow seeds of doubt about the prospects for getting tax reform or a stimulus package done. So, with an abundance of prognostications about what the future looks like here…
Positioning In Front of Big, Bad Events
To market watchers, it is fairly clear that the fate of the current stock market trend is tied to today's House vote on the Republican's healthcare bill designed to "repeal and replace" Obamacare. And while the wranglings in D.C. are often quite complex, the bottom line for the stock mark…