January 31, 2024 | Daily JAM, Mid Term, Morning Briefing |
The Federal Reserve maintained its benchmark interest rate on Wednesday in a range of 5.25%-5.50%–as the financial markets expected. But the central bank pushed back more strongly than financial markets hoped on a March 20 schedule for the first cut in rates. “The Committee does not expect it will be appropriate to reduce the target range until it has gained greater confidence that inflation is moving sustainably toward 2%,” the Fed said in its policy statement.Fed chair Jerome Powell pushed back even moe strongly in his Wednesday press conference pushed back: A march cut is “probably not the most likely case or what we’d call the base case,” he said. “I don’t think it’s likely the Committee will reach a level of confidence by the time of the March meeting to identify March as the time to [cut rates].”
January 27, 2024 | AAPL, Daily JAM, Mid Term, Morning Briefing |
It’s a Federal Reserve meeting week, but I expect Apple’s (AAPL) earnings report for its December quarter to be the big event of the week. With the potential to move the tech sector and the market.
January 25, 2024 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, Short Term |
U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew at an annual 3.3% rate in the fourth quarter, the Commerce Department announced today. That was down from the 4.9% annual growth rate in the third quarter, but substantially above the 2.0% rate expected by economists. For the full year, the US.economy expend at a 3.1% rate.
January 11, 2024 | Daily JAM, Short Term |
Federal Reserve officials were out with one message today: The slightly higher-than-expected CPI inflation number for December/the slightly-slower-than-expected slowdown in CPI inflation argues that there’s still more work to be done on bringing inflation down to the Fed’s 2% target. And that talk of a rate cut in March is premature.
January 10, 2024 | Daily JAM, Long Term, Morning Briefing |
Right now all that the bond market and indeed all the financial markets care about is when will the Federal Reserve begin to cut interest rates. The consensus is that sometime relatively soon–March or more likely June–the Fed will begin to deliver interest rate cuts that will total somewhere around 100 basis points (at least) for 2024. But what if the Federal Reserve and other central banks around the world really aren’t in control of interest rates in the bond market anymore?
January 6, 2024 | Daily JAM |
The big short run question–at least ahead of the Federal Reserve’s March 20 meeting on interest rates–is whether the financial markets have gotten too far ahead of the Fed on the pace of interest rate cuts. Here’s what to watch.
December 16, 2023 | Daily JAM |
I expect the Federal Reserve to continue to try talking back some of the enthusiasm that greeted its December 13 meeting and the release of a new set of Dot Plot projections showing that the median forecast of staff and policy makers at the U.S. central bank called for three interest rate cuts in 2024.
December 15, 2023 | Daily JAM |
Today sure sounded like policy-makers remorse from the Federal Reserve. New York Fed President, the vice-chair of the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate setting Open Market Committee, said that central-bank policy makers weren’t actively debating when to cut interest rates. That’s sure not what the stock market heard on Wednesday.
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 14, 2023 | Daily JAM, Jubak Picks, RUN, SEDG, Stock Alerts |
Among today’s big stock market winners today: SolarEdge Technologies (SEDG), the biggest maker of inverters used in turning sunlight into electricity, closed up 16.67%, and Sunrun (RUN), a leader in the installation of residential solar systems, closed up 19.92%. This rally had absolutely nothing to do with any news out of the recently ended COP28 United Nations Climate Conference. It was a pure reaction to the signs in yesterday’s Dot Plot from the Federal Reserve that the central bank was looking to cut interest rates at least three times in 2024. Makes perfect sense.
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.
