Daily Comment
Daily Comment (February 15, 2017)
by Bill O’Grady, Kaisa Stucke, and Thomas Wash [Posted: 9:30 AM EST] We continue to watch the drama in Washington. What we find most interesting is that equity markets continue to churn higher despite the turmoil. We believe there are two reasons for the continued strength. First, earnings are continuing to edge higher and thus prices… Read More »
Daily Comment (February 14, 2017)
by Bill O’Grady, Kaisa Stucke, and Thomas Wash [Posted: 9:30 AM EST] Happy Valentine’s Day! For a mostly quiet market day there is a lot of news to digest. Let’s get started! Flynn out: Yesterday, when Kellyanne Conway suggested that National Security Director Flynn had the full support of the president, we suspected he was doomed. … Read More »
Daily Comment (February 13, 2017)
by Bill O’Grady, Kaisa Stucke, and Thomas Wash [Posted: 9:30 AM EST] On Friday, Fed Governor Tarullo announced his retirement. Although his term ran until 2020, there was growing speculation he would leave. He has undertaken the role of lead regulator, a position that Dodd-Frank created but was never filled. It was expected that President Trump… Read More »
Daily Comment (February 10, 2017)
by Bill O’Grady, Kaisa Stucke, and Thomas Wash [Posted: 9:30 AM EST] Yesterday’s market action was a good example of what we expect to see at least through the summer. As we have noted since the election, President Trump needs to manage two constituencies, the right-wing populists (RWP) and right-wing establishment (RWE). Although there is some… Read More »
Daily Comment (February 9, 2017)
by Bill O’Grady, Kaisa Stucke, and Thomas Wash [Posted: 9:30 AM EST] One of the political factors we watch with a new president is the management of political capital. Political capital is essentially the goodwill, the mandate, which comes from winning an election. Although not a hard and fast figure, it does appear to exist, can… Read More »
Daily Comment (February 8, 2017)
by Bill O’Grady, Kaisa Stucke, and Thomas Wash [Posted: 9:30 AM EST] Although U.S. equity markets have been generally moving sideways for the past couple of weeks, there have been some interesting developments. Here are a few items of note: Greece should leave the Eurozone: In its latest report on Greece, the IMF displayed this sobering… Read More »
Daily Comment (February 7, 2017)
by Bill O’Grady, Kaisa Stucke, and Thomas Wash [Posted: 9:30 AM EST] We are seeing the dollar rise this morning along with U.S. equity futures. There isn’t a lot of news to indicate a reason for the rise in the greenback. Perhaps the best explanation is that the drop we have seen in the dollar over… Read More »
Daily Comment (February 6, 2017)
by Bill O’Grady, Kaisa Stucke, and Thomas Wash [Posted: 9:30 AM EST] It was a mostly quiet weekend, at least quiet based on the standards of the new administration. Super Bowl weekend has become something of a national holiday in the U.S. and last night’s game was one for the ages. So, even with injunctions and… Read More »
Daily Comment (February 3, 2017)
by Bill O’Grady, Kaisa Stucke, and Thomas Wash [Posted: 9:30 AM EST] It’s employment Friday! We have a plethora of charts below but, in short, the report was rather mixed. The payroll survey was surprisingly robust, rising 227k compared to expectations of +180k. Wages were soft, with yearly average earnings rising 2.5%, less than the 2.7%… Read More »