Stock Markets and the Economy
Found 234 Articles.
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Bob’s Journal for 3/28/19
Your retirement plan should assume inflation will be higher than the published numbers, whether you already are retired or still looking forward to it. The most widely cited measure of inflation is the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for all urban consumers. This measure generally has been declining since it peaked in the early 1980s. In […]
The Economy and the Stock Market – Our Three Likely Scenarios Updated
Is 2019 going to be like 2015? Or will it bring a serious bear market and perhaps a recession? In 2015, the U.S. labor market was strong, and the economy was growing. So, the Fed ended quantitative easing. As the year went on, the debt crisis in Greece roiled markets. China’s stock market took a […]
Will It Only Be a Correction or a Bear Market?
On Jan. 30, the Federal Reserve finally admitted it made a big mistake, but did the U.S. central bank take too long to realize it? The Fed tightened monetary policy aggressively in 2017 and 2018. In September 2018, it ratcheted up the rhetoric, telling investors to expect a series of interest rate increases through 2019. […]
Conquering the Key Retirement Fears: How to Make Your Retirement Happier, Healthier and Wealthier
Retirees and near-retirees, even the very wealthy, report having substantial fears about their retirement years. The concerns are both financial and non-financial. They’re also consistent, regardless of income, wealth and other factors. We’re going to discuss these key prevailing retirement fears and what you can do to overcome and conquer them in my latest Retirement […]
Update for February 7, 2019
Higher volatility and rapid changes in market momentum characterized the markets the last few months, and you should expect those trends to continue. Stock indexes steadily declined in the fourth quarter of 2018 until they hit the recent bottom on Christmas Eve. There was a modest increase alongside a lot of volatility in the last […]
Will the Fed Pause Too Late to Help the Economy?
The Fed will continue to tighten monetary policy, the economy will continue to slow and earnings growth will continue to decline. The real question is, “By how much?” I warned last spring that we were in the late stage of the economic cycle, and for several months have said we’re past peak growth. Investors began […]
The 2018 Market and Economic Review
Almost everyone’s 2018 predictions were wrong. But that’s almost always the case. We had another year of unexpected and startling changes in the economy and markets. Trends couldn’t have been much better than they were at the end of 2017. The economy was surging across the board, and U.S. stock indexes were moving steadily higher. […]
Where Will the Fed Drive the Economy Next?
The markets now seem to realize what the Fed has been up to, but the markets probably still are behind the curve. Investors as a group made two of their recurring mistakes during most of 2018. They projected that the recent past would continue indefinitely, and they focused on short-term news, or noise, instead of […]
