It’s been a good year. The U.S. stock market has done well, gas prices are down at the pump, and the job market continues to improve. CEO confidence has returned, with merger and acquisition related activity finally joining stock buybacks and dividend increases as worthy uses of shareholder capital. The local builder is putting the […]
Like clockwork, earnings season has drawn to a close, creating an information vacuum for the stock market, one in which the media spends more time “making” the news than perhaps reporting it. The marginal dollar at trade – or the price maker in a high frequency dominated trading world – is one more likely to […]
I hate to blow up everyone’s inbox with a second Economic Update in just over a week, but I guess I just did. Usually, I don’t have anything intelligent to say more than once every month or so and since I’m not a journalist, I’m never forced to make stuff up just to sell papers. […]
Our last piece, Quick Thoughts, generated one of the highest open rates of any Economic Update we’ve sent, so we’ll take that as a clue and stick with the format. Before we get started, we would like to make a short comment on Robin Williams life and death. While he, quite sadly, was not the […]
I am not a particularly good salesman. From the time I first meet a prospect to when they become a full-fledged client, it can often take two years even when they initiate the first meeting. Fortunately, growing the firm isn’t one of my primary roles, a responsibility that does fall to Bill Hoover, my business […]
The stock market treaded water during the fourth quarter, awaiting final resolution of the Fiscal Cliff. On that front, there was some positive midnight news on the final day of the year as Congress struck a deal on revenues (taxes), but predictably punted the question over spending to another day. That day will likely prove […]
Many events have transpired since our mid-September update, but not much has really changed. Economic growth should remain slow for as far as the eyes can see, as each region of the world struggles with its own version of the New Normal. Capitalistic animal spirits have gone the way of the modern American male and […]
In spite of well publicized worries over a dysfunctional government, the impending fiscal cliff, and slower earnings growth, the markets did what they usually do during such periods by confounding the experts. During the third quarter, the S&P gained more than six percent. The Broadleaf Growth Equity Portfolio (BGEP) gained a solid 5.1% on considerable […]
Last Thursday evening, JP Morgan announced it lost at least $2 billion on trades related to “egregious” errors on its “synthetic” investments. The complex products that were meant to protect the bank instead blew up in their face. Perhaps if JP Morgan stuck to the business of making better loans, it wouldn’t be so enamored […]