March 23, 2018 | Daily JAM, GLD, Perfect Five-ETFs, Volatility, You Might Have Missed |
When I last rebalanced my Perfect 5 Active Passive ETF Portfolio on January 16, I said that I’d rebalance it again on July 1–unless events intervened to force an unscheduled rebalancing. Well, events have indeed intervened. The S&P 500 index closed within a handful of points of the February 8 low today, March 23. If the index and the U.S. stock markets were only going to drop another few points and then hold (or even bounce on that low), I wouldn’t feel the need to rebalance. But there’s a good chance the market will fail its test of the February 8 low.
March 15, 2018 | Daily JAM, Long Term, Volatility |
If you spend a significant part of your day staring at your computer to watch the markets, you know that, perplexingly, the traditional safe havens for mitigating portfolio risk haven’t been working very well. Now Goldman Sachs has put its computers and data crunchers to work and has reached the same conclusion as the anecdotal evidence suggested. Goldman has tagged this a period of “diversification desperation.”
January 29, 2018 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, Short Term, Volatility |
Last week we saw Treasury bond prices fall and their yields rise on weakness in the U.S. dollar. Today the dollar is stronger–up 0.31% on the Dollar Spot Index–but bond prices have still stumbled and yields on the 10-year Treasury have climbed to 2.7%, the highest level since early 2014.
What seems to be driving this dynamic is fear in the bond markets of end of the week data on the jobs market.
January 24, 2018 | Daily JAM, GDXJ, GLD, Mid Term, Morning Briefing |
Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin gave the markets a green light to push the U.S. dollar lower in remarks at Davos. Currency traders, already on board the lower-dollar train, didn’t waste time before pushing the throttle. The Dollar Spot Index (DXY) is down 0.86% as of noon New York time to 89.347. Traders have been eyeing the 90 level on the index to see whether support would hold at this level or if the index would break below 90 and set up a move lower.
January 23, 2018 | Daily JAM, GDXJ, GLD, Perfect Five-ETFs, Volatility |
Gold held by ETFs that invest in the yellow metal rose to 2,250 metric tons on January 22, according to Bloomberg. That’s the highest level of gold held by ETFs since May 2013. After turning in its best year since 2010 in 2017, gold has continued to climb in 2018
January 16, 2018 | Daily JAM, Perfect Five-ETFs, Volatility, You Might Have Missed |
Back in October 2017 I set up a very simple portfolio of 5 ETFs with the goal of beating the performance of a Standard & Poor’s 500 ETF (so that’s the benchmark) with less risk (because of the added diversification.) I said that I would rebalance this portfolio as needed–or on a six month schedule (which ever came first.) But that this would be a relatively passive portfolio of passive ETFs–but with some active management thrown in by way of those shifting allocations. Well, the portfolio certainly isn’t six months old, but we have flipped the calendar page into 2018 so I’m going to do the first performance report now and at the same time do an initial rebalancing of assets.
January 9, 2018 | Daily JAM, Notes You Need |
In my daily trawling through the market I come upon lots of tidbits of knowledge that I think are important to investors but that don’t justify a full post. I’ve decided to start compiling these notes here each day in a kind of running mini blog that I’m calling Notes You Need. A typical post would resembles this one from today: “10:20 a.m.: Wall Street analysts continue to position their target prices ahead of earnings season. Today I’ve seen higher target prices for MGM Resorts International (MGM), up to $4 from $41; Microsoft (MSFT), up to $115 from $100; and Charles Schwab (SCHW), up to $60 from $52. I’ve also seen lower targets for Allegan (AGN), down to $215 from $230; and Alibaba (BABA), down to $219 from $221.”
January 2, 2018 | Daily JAM, Notes You Need |
In my daily trawling through the market I come upon lots of tidbits of knowledge that I think are important to investors but that don’t justify a full post. I’ve decided to start compiling these notes here each day in a kind of running mini blog that I’m calling Notes You Need. A typical item resembles this from today: “10:40 a.m.: Ahead of earnings Barclays raised its target on U.S. Bancorp (USB) to $65 from $60. Stock was trading at $53.38 at the open. Before Christmas, December 17, to be precise UBS downgraded the bank stock to neutral from buy (while raising its target price to $60 from $58.) The downgrade reflects a shift to favor banks with a higher exposure to tax cuts in the recently passed tax bill.”
December 29, 2017 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
Oil climbed to a two-and-a-half year high this morning. Judging from the general “there’s no news today so follow the trend” nature of trading this morning, the bump in oil prices is likely to be a reflection of a continued belief in solid global growth for the year ahead and a bet on the continued downward trend in the U.S. dollar.
December 13, 2017 | Daily JAM |
I’m not sure I can put together the disparate action of gold, financials, and bonds today. The combination of directions certainly isn’t the conventional one.
November 9, 2017 | Daily JAM, Notes You Need |
In my daily trawling through the market I come upon lots of tidbits of knowledge that I think are important to investors but that don’t justify a full post. I’ve decided to start compiling these notes here each day in a kind of running mini blog that I’m calling Notes You Need. Posts include items like this one from today: “11:40 a.m.: Just a reminder in the midst of all the chaos over the tax bill: The deal to continue funding the federal government expires on December 8. Without a new deal (most probably another temporary extension of funding authority) the government will have to close down after that date. (The deal to suspend the debt ceiling expires on that same date but Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin says “extraordinary measures” will enable the Treasury to keep paying the government’s bills through the end of January.)”
November 3, 2017 | Daily JAM, Notes You Need |
In my daily trawling through the market I come upon lots of tidbits of knowledge that I think are important to investors but that don’t justify a full post. I’ve decided to start compiling these notes here each day in a kind of running mini blog that I’m calling Notes You Need. Items in this mini-blog include mentions like this one: “10:20 a.m.: Japan’s stock market was closed today but the Nikkei 225 index gained 2.4% for the week continuing its post-election run higher.”
