Economic Insights

We have all heard the adage, “the stock market is a discounting mechanism”. Stocks tell a story of the future long before the facts confirm it. Most growth stocks peaked in late 2021 and have experienced significant drawdowns ever since.

While many commentators argued the dollar would go bust due to the excessive debt levels in the U.S., such has hardly been the case. In 2022, as the U.S. economy is the “cleanest shirt in the dirty laundry,” the dollar rose sharply.

There is no right or wrong way to build an investment portfolio. Rather than spreading money across style boxes simply using backward looking performance data, which is a typical approach, we think there's a more thoughtful strategy that can add attractive diversification benefits and enhance returns over time. Loosely, this strategy is named, "thematic investing."

The latest rate hike announcement by the Fed sent stocks tumbling to the year’s lows. While last week’s market action was brutal, the good news is the markets are set up for a rather significant short squeeze higher.

There are always some hindsight-based methods of predicting bear markets and taking full risk-off positioning. Sometimes they work perfectly. While other times they create a ton of capital gains and tax liabilities only to realize the exit level should have been where the cost averaging strategy began.

Asset bubbles have been prevalent throughout history. Whether it was the “Tulip bubble” in the 1600s, the South Sea bubble of the 1700s, or the Dot.com bubble of 2000, they were all a result of excessive investor speculation.

The August CPI report that came out last Tuesday was the catalyst for a sharp market reversal. The headline number was a benign 0.1%, helped by falling gasoline prices. But the “core” number (ex food and energy) came in at 0.6%.

The August CPI report that came out last Tuesday was the catalyst for a sharp market reversal. The headline number was a benign 0.1%, helped by falling gasoline prices. But the “core” number (ex food and energy) came in at 0.6%.