Insights

September 16, 2019
President Trump’s first two months in office dominated the news flow in the first quarter. The S&P 500 returned 6.1% for the quarter as both earnings estimates and valuations increased. As we cautioned in our last review, small cap stocks are quite expensive by historic standards and performed poorly relative to larger companies returning only 2.5% over the same period.
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September 15, 2019
2016 ended with a level of optimism that stands in stark contrast to the pessimism that marked the beginning of the year. A rocky first six weeks of 2016 saw nearly a 10% decline in the S&P 500 which was followed by a 23% rally. The index returned 3.8% this quarter to end the year up 12%.
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September 14, 2019
Despite ending the second quarter with a “yes” vote on the referendum for Great Britain to exit the European Union (“Brexit”), both U.S. and non-U.S. equities rallied sharply during the first month of the third quarter with the stocks of smaller companies significantly outperforming larger companies.
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September 13, 2019
After a tumultuous start to the year, most of the second quarter was quite calm within global markets. Great Britain’s referendum in late June to exit the European Union (known as “Brexit”) was unexpected and brought about significant volatility, sending the S&P 500 down 5% and non-U.S. stocks down 8%.
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September 12, 2019
Equity markets had record declines for the first six weeks of the year with a peak to trough loss of 10% for the S&P 500. This was fostered primarily by economic concerns and continued weakness in the price of oil. Mid way through the quarter, economic data improved and the highly negative sentiment reversed.
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September 11, 2019
2015 was appropriately described in a recent headline, “The Year Nothing Worked: Stocks, Bonds, Cash Go Nowhere.” The S&P 500 turned in the highest return of major U.S. indices with only a 1.4% return after a bumpy ride throughout the second half.
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September 10, 2019
The period between July 1 and September 30 was the worst quarter for equity markets since the debt ceiling debate in 2011 and the first negative quarterly return for the index since 2012. The S&P 500 dropped 6.4%, hurt most by energy stocks as oil prices fell over 20%.
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September 8, 2019
The second quarter of 2015 saw continued choppiness in financial markets. The S&P advanced just 0.3% during the quarter bringing the year-to-date return to 1.2%. Markets watched Federal Reserve policy closely and reacted favorably to the Fed’s decision to hold interest rates near zero after their June meeting.
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September 7, 2019
U.S. stocks and bonds ended the first quarter of 2015 little changed, leveling off after a steep rise over recent years and raising questions about the road ahead. A dramatically strengthening U.S. Dollar and falling oil prices (more on both of these topics later) contributed to the second straight quarter of earnings declines for U.S. companies.
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