Disinflation coupled with sticky wage growth is likely to result in either a second wave of inflation or layoffs and a recession. In the meantime, market expectations for sales, growth, and margins are overly optimistic and are…
The commodity complex struggled last year with the Goldman Sachs Commodity Index falling by 12% despite the relatively favorable performance of other cyclical financial assets. Several factors contributed to this weakness. In the…
The Santa Claus rally started in late October lifting the S&P 500 by 15.8%. However, there are signs that the rally is getting tired. Consider the following: The S&P 500 has been trading at around 4,750 since the…
A soft landing can be achieved but not maintained. We are cutting our tactical recommendation on stocks from overweight to neutral and scaling back our long-duration stance.
US small-cap stocks have benefitted from the recent improvement in risk sentiment. The S&P 600 is up 10% over the past month – exceeding the S&P 500’s gains by 5.4 percentage points after having underperformed…
The S&P 500 closed at a fresh year-to-date high on Friday, breaking slightly above its late-July top. The brisk rally since late-October erased all the losses of the prior three months. However, the sector performance has…
It’s no secret that a handful of mega caps have been driving markets in 2023, masking a somewhat lackluster year for equities. In fact, on an equal-weighted basis, markets gave up nearly all their YTD gains by the end of…
Our political forecasting scored wins in 2023 but we failed to capitalize on it adequately in our trade recommendations.
The spectacular rally in the cocoa price has taken it to its highest level in 44 years. The proximate cause is lower crop yields in Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire, the world’s two largest cocoa producers. Frequent extreme…