A Finsec View – Elephants in finance, Meme stocks (again), The Line, Vale Phil & More
12th August 2022 Have we seen the bottom of the market? That's the question day traders and equity managers worldwide are asking after an unexpectedly robust start to the year's second half. In the US, the S&P 500 (tracking the market's biggest stocks) is up around 6.95 per cent over the past month. Locally, the S&P 200 is up around 6.4 per cent over the month. Adding to the good news was last night's US inflation figures showing headline inflation has fallen by 0.5%. Of [...]
Weekly Market Update – 5th August 2022
Investment markets and key developments over the past week The rebound in share markets continued over the last week, helped by good earnings data and relief that increased China/US tensions resulting from US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan did not spill over into a more serious conflict (at least not yet). Despite a slight set back on Friday, as strong US payrolls data were seen as keeping the US Federal Reserve (Fed) hawkish for now, for the week US shares rose 0.4%, Eurozone shares [...]
Weekly Market Update – 29th July 2022
Investment markets and key developments over the past weekThe bounce back in shares continued over the last week on hopes that slowing growth will see central banks ease up on the pace of monetary tightening helped along by mostly good earnings results. However, while US and European shares rose, Japanese and Chinese shares fell. The positive global lead along with a less bad than feared CPI result reducing the risk of a further step up in RBA rate hikes pushed the Australian share market higher, with gains [...]
A Finsec View – Lowe’s charts, The great reallocation, Stumbling towards retirement, Megatrends and More
29th July 2022 Has there ever been more general public interest in inflation? It's even reached the unusual point where the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, has waded in, warning the Reserve Bank against "overreach". Typically, Prime Ministers are expected to be on their 'best behaviour' when it comes to influencing the independence of the Central Bank. It certainly highlights how difficult it is for Central Banks right now. Their ability to raise cash rates is significantly different from pre-GFC and even pre-Covid due to the extraordinary [...]
Weekly Market Update – 22nd July 2022
Investment markets & key developments Global sharemarkets rallied again this week with US equities up 2.5%, Australia 2.4%, Europe 3.4%, Japan 4.2% while Chinese stocks are down by 0.2%. Positive gains in most sharemarkets after weeks of declines are leading to questions about whether we have seen the low in markets. Views have not changed – the risk is of more downside to equities until there are clearer signs that inflation has peaked (which means central banks can pause on rate hikes) and until economic [...]
Weekly Market Update – 15th July 2022
Investment markets and key developments over the past week Share markets mostly fell over the last week on fears that still rising inflation will trigger faster rate hikes and recession. While US and European shares both bounced on Friday as US rate hike fears abated a bit, for the week they fell 0.9% and 1.1% respectively. The fall in Eurozone shares was magnified by the risk of a permanent shutdown of Russian gas flowing through the Nordstream 1 pipeline to Germany following a maintenance shutdown and [...]
A Finsec View – Reaching for resilience, Hyperloops, The oldest of them all, Mungar musings & more
15th July 2022 One of the tribulations of checking the junk folder of your emails is seeing how people are trying to scam you. Scammers typically sell things that are highly desirable but require hard work and patience. Want to lose weight? Forget going to the gym and adjusting your diet - drink this miracle water! Want to become rich? You can work hard and be sensible with your money, or you can make millions by taking up this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! Fitness and wealth (amongst [...]
Weekly Market Update – 8th July 2022
Investment markets and key developments over the past week Share markets mostly rose over the last week on hopes that central banks will be able to tame inflation without causing a recession. However, it was messy with Eurozone shares - where the risk of recession is greatest - first making a new bear market low earlier in the week. Australian shares followed the global lead higher with very strong gains in IT, consumer discretionary, health and property stocks. Bond yields generally rose except in Australia. Oil [...]