Treasury says debt sales to remain at record levels for rest of 2019
Can you connect the dots? No one in Washington seems to be willing to make the effort. On a day when the Federal Reserve said it would cut its benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points and end its efforts to sell some of the bonds in its own portfolio two months...
Fed cuts interest rates by 25 basis points; financial markets want more, more, more
Today the Federal Reserve's Open Market Committee cut the Fed's benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points. That's pretty much what the financial markets had been expecting--although a sizable minority of investors and traders had been hoping for a deeper cut of 50...Wall Street falling “in like” with gold
We don't know--precisely--what the Federal Reserve will do at the meeting of its interest-rating-setting Open Market Committee on Wednesday July 31. The odds on the CME FedWatch Tool say there's a 100% chance of an interest rate cut but there's still disagreement...
Saturday Night Quarterback says, For the week ahead expect…
... an interest rate cut from the Federal Reserve at its July 31 meeting. That market sure expects the Fed to reduce rates. The CME FedWatch Tool placed the odds of an interest rate cut at 100% on Friday. That means that the market has priced in a drop in interest...
The market dangers of this incompetent Federal Reserve
Add Thursday's remarks by New York Fed President John Williams to those of Fed chair Jerome Powell back in December and the record shows this team at the Fed is the "Gang that Couldn't Talk Straight." In December Powell sent the markets tumbling when he implied that...
Bad news banks–in earnings reports today and yesterday
Th Federal Reserve gives and the Federal Reserve takes away. In 2018 JPMorgan Chase (JPM) reported the biggest profit in banking history--$32.5 billion--as a result of the December 2017 tax cuts and higher interest rates from the Fed. With the tax cuts now more a year...
Selling Pro Shares Short Treasury ETF out of my Volatility Portfolio
I bought this position in the Pro Shares Short 7-10 Year Treasury ETF (TBX) in my Volatility Portfolio on February 2, 2018, back in the days when it looked like the Federal Reserve was firmly locked into a policy of interest rate increases. An interest rate increase...
Using softness to add more Treasury exposure to Volatility Portfolio
Treasury prices have been a little weak over the last two weeks. As a consequence the Vanguard Intermediate Term Treasury ETF (VGIT) and the Vanguard Short Term Treasury ETF (VGSH), for example, have dropped from highs on June 25 of $66.03 and $60.94, respectively, to...
In the longer short term does the market’s intense focus on interest rate cuts from the Fed set up a trap for stocks?
Looking at what I called "the shortish short term" in a post yesterday, I said that in that time frame the market is likely to behave as if nothing much matters besides the Federal Reserve and interest rate cuts. The logic, I argued, works like this: We're in the...
Budget deficit climbs 23% in first nine months of fiscal 2019 to $747.1 billion
The U.S. budget deficit widened by 23% to $747.1 billion in the first nine months of the fiscal 2019 that started in October 2018 from the same nine-month period in fiscal 2018 period. The budget deficit will exceed 4% of GDP this fiscal year and stay above that level...
Powell sounds even more dovish on interest rates but market shrugs
In the second day of his semi-annual testimony to Congress--this time in front of the Senate--Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell sounded even more likely to support an interest rate cut at the central bank's July meeting. The Fed has room to cut rates, he said,...Jim’s Stock Alerts
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