Posts by Mike Verity

Stocks are meandering between red and green this morning. Financial and energy sectors are the worst-performing. WTI crude oil is down under $69/barrel after OPEC modestly trimmed its 2025 outlook for global oil demand. Banks got hit after a profit warning from JP Morgan (see below). Capital markets are highly reactive in front of the…

Stocks dropped and bonds rallied this morning in response to ADP’s monthly jobs report (see below). The VIX Index ticked up to 21 and gold rallied about .6%. Oddly, traders seem to be brushing aside a couple of better than expected business activity reports (see below). My guess is that stocks reverse and close flat…

The S&P 500 is down about 2% over the last couple of trading sessions on rising recession fears. High-fliers are taking a much bigger hit as speculators and traders pull in their horns. For example, Nvidia (NVDA) is down 9%. The VIX fear gauge ticked up to 20, but that’s rather modest compared to its…

In a widely followed press conference last week, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said the “time has come” to begin easing monetary policy. This is as close as he has come to declaring victory over post-Covid inflation, and it signals that the Fed will begin cutting interest rates very soon. Whereas short-term interest rates are…

A debate continues to rage among investors about the health of the US consumer. This week we got second quarter earnings announcements from Target (TGT), Wal-Mart (WMT), and TJX Companies (TJX). Results suggest that consumers are still out there spending, but growth rates have slowed and they’re looking for deals. Target reported its first positive…

The US stock market is rebounding decisively from a roughly -10% correction. The event unfolded quietly at first during the last half of July, then crescendioed rather loudly in the first few days of August. We saw the VIX Index, which measures fear among options traders, briefly skyrocket above 60, the highest since 2020. Volatility…

Stocks are mixed this morning as individual stocks react to earnings announcements. The Dow and S&P 500 are currently flat. About 100 of the S&P 500 companies have reported second quarter results, and 80% have exceeded earnings (that is, profit) expectations. So far, companies in Healthcare and Financial sectors have the highest beat rates, suggesting…

Stocks opened mixed this morning on the heels of a very important inflation report (see below). At the moment, the S&P 500 is down .8%, the Dow is up 50 points and the Nasdaq is down 1.7%. The bond market is rallying in reaction to the same report. The iShares Core US Aggregate Bond ETF…

Stocks closed mostly in the green today, and the bond market rallied in reaction to a slew of not-so-great economic data. The Dow fell 24 points, while the S&P 500 climbed .5% and the Nasdaq rose .9%. On the bond side, iShares’ Core Aggregate Bond ETF (AGG) rallied .5%. Long-term Treasuries were up over 1%.…