Morning Briefing
January 9, 2024 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, Short Term |
Earnings season for the fourth quarter of 2023 begins on Friday, January 12 with reports from the big banks JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Wells Fargo (WFC), Citigroup (C), and Bank of America (BAC). Which means that earnings season is going start off with a dull thud. More than 70% of the Standard & Poor’s 500 companies that are scheduled to report earnings for the fourth quarter over the next few weeks are banks and the banking segment of the the financial sector in the index is projected by Wall Street analysts to show a 21% year over year decline in earnings
January 5, 2024 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
The U.S. economy added 216,000 jobs in December, up from 173,000 the previous month. That was a bg surprise to Wall Street. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg had expected had added 175,000 jobs . The unemployment rate held steady at 3.7% for the month from November, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Economists had expected the unemployment rate to tick higher to 3.8%. The the BLS revised previous reports of job gain donward for December and November. Looking solely at these headline numbers, you’d conclude that the labor market is running hotter than expected/hoped by investors and that this report lowered the odds that the Federal Reserve would begin cutting interest rates as early at its March 20 meeting. And that fears that the Fed would delay interest rate cuts would hurt stocks. That isn’t exactly what happened today
January 4, 2024 | ASML, Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, Top 50 Stocks |
You may have noticed that shares of chip equipment maker ASML Holding have been in retreat lately. The shares are down from a $757 close on December 29 to $700 today, January 4. That’s at 7.5% drop. So what’s up?
January 3, 2024 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, Short Term |
Wall Street strategists began the year calling for a pull back in U.S. stocks after the huge year-end rally of 2023. So far that call is right on. NASDAQ 100 stocks fell 1.1% today Wednesday, January 3, to extend their losing streak to four sys, the longest in more than two moths. The Standard & Poor’s 50 ended the y down 0.80% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down 076%. The NASDAQ Composite lost 1.18% on the day. The Russell 2000 small-cap index dropped 3.3%. The CBOE S&P 500 Volatility Index (VXI) gained 644% to a still very low “fear” rating of 14.05. But what’s the cause and what’s the effect?
December 28, 2023 | Daily JAM, Jubak Picks, Mid Term, Morning Briefing, Special Reports, Top 50 Stocks, Volatility |
GREATER Growth Stock Pick #8: BYD (BYDDF). I know; I know. What’s a Chinese stock doing on this list? It’s here because BYD, not Tesla (TSLA) is the big growth story in electric vehicles and not just for this month–but for years. And because I can see two catalysts that are about to power this stock higher. Morningstar calculates that BYD is 20% undervalued right now. Because this is a China stock we’ll need to take a deep look at valuation later in this post. But first, the growth story.
December 27, 2023 | CMI, Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, Top 50 Stocks |
Here’s what an investor should watch after Cummins’ huge $2 billion Clean Air Act settlement.
December 26, 2023 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
Stocks continued on an upward path in a classic Santa Claus rally. Wall Street kicked off the final week of 2023 with gains in stocks, extending a rally that put the market on the brink of a record. Today, December 26, the Standard & Poor’s 500 traded about 0.5% away from its all-time high of 4,796.56. The so-called Santa Claus rally, which typically encompasses the last five trading sessions of the year and the first two of the new one, has a strong record of gains. Since 1969, the S&P 500 has averaged a gain of 1.3% over the seven-day period, according to the Stock Trader’s Almanac.
December 20, 2023 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
Bond traders and investors kept the bond rally going today December 20. The yield on the 10-year Treasury dropped another 8 basis points to 3.85% today. The yield on the 2-year note fell 4 basis points to 4.40%. The drop in yields came as a result of gains in bond prices. On the other hand, the major stock indexes had a big down day. The Standard & Poor’s 500 fell 1.47% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average ended the day down 1.27%. The small-cap Russell 2000 dropped 1.86%. The NASDAQ Composite and the NASDAQ 100 soared 1.50% and 1.53%, respectively.. The differing results don’t reflect a divergence of views on interest rates–both bond and stock markets see the Federal Reserve cutting interest rates in 2024. The difference does, however, reflect differing views on valuation
December 19, 2023 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
FactSet calculates that Wall Street analysts expect the S&P 500 to report earnings growth of 0.6% in calendar 2023. That’s way below the trailing 10-year average (annual) earnings growth rate of 8.4% for 2021 through 2022. So far on a quarterly basis, 2023 has shaped up this way: earnings declines of 1.7% and 4.1% for the S&P 500 in the first nd second quarters of 2023, respectively. And earnings growth of 4.9% for the third quarter. FactSet calculates that analysts expect the stocks in the index to report an earnings growth of 2.4% for Q4 2023.
December 15, 2023 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
In its December revision of its Dot Plot projections for interest rates in 2024, the median projection by the U.S. central bank’s staff and policy makers estimated three interest rate cuts by the end of 2024. The market, which had been hoping for exactly this news, cheered, and stocks moved to record or near record highs. And in reaction to the Fed’s news, Wall Street moved its forecasts to match the new projection. Barclays, for example, is calling for three cuts in 2024 and JPMorgan Chase moved its forecast for the start of cuts to June. But, on Wall Street nothing exceeds like excess so projections are pushing beyond the Fed’s median view.
December 13, 2023 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
Today, the Federal Reserve caught up with the financial markets. The Fed’s Open Market Committee kept interest rates steady at a benchmark 5.25% to 5.50%, as expected. And the Fed’s Dot Plot projections showed that the median projection expects three interest rate cuts in 2024. That’s a huge shift from the September Dot Plot and moves the Fed toward the current Wall Street hope for 4 cuts or more in 2024. The Dot Plot also projects that the unemployment rate would rise slightly next year, to 4.1%, from a recent 3.7% rate, and that inflation would continue to improve in 2024 but not reach the Fed’s 2% target. Stocks soared on the confirmation of the consensus hope. At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 512.3 points, or 1.4%, to a record high of 37,090.24. The S&P 500 index climbed 1.37%, and the Nasdaq 1.38%.
December 12, 2023 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
If you follow the headline numbers (what’s known as All Urban Consumers) for the Consumer Price Index (CPI), you’d say, “See inflation continues to fall; the Federal Reserve will cut rates quickly in 2024.” But you’d be following the wrong CPI number.
