Seasonal quirks in economic and inflation data releases into the end of September have helped produce the weakest week for the S&P 500 and strongest week for U.S. 10-year notes.
After a red-hot summer, the health care sector has cooled off a bit this month. Despite risks from rising policy uncertainty, the sector continues to outperform.
Today's topics include hedge funds' struggle, economic optimism, two takes on populism, trouble in Europe, arbitraging the Fed, Chinese stocks and Wall Street paychecks.
U.S. 10-year yields and term premium are setting records for the longest period of ultra-tight trading ranges. Nominal yields are again looking to break out, which should place focus on investment grade industries with high sensitivities.
The divergence between net flows between physical gold and miner-backed funds is at its widest since 2013. Despite some positive shifts in search trends, gold bulls are counting on help from a weaker U.S. dollar or a national security scare.
A look at 170 years of hurricane data in the United States
Today's topics include a comparison of debt to GDP, small cap stocks, the trade war, European equity ETF outflows, Yellen's "lower for longer", negative fee funds, the dollar as the world's reserve currency, the tick size pilot program, preparing for the next crisis and banks join forces with tech companies.
U.S. politics is the most polarized it has been since at least the Civil War, and this simply reflects the divergence in opinions among the public. All indications are the midterm election results will make this even more extreme, not less.
The great showdown between the Fed and markets over the path of inflation intensifies. Markets will not move toward Fed expectations for five hikes in the next twelve months until inflation expectations break out to the upside.
Expectations for retail sales remain high. We see continued tailwinds for home improvement and consumer services, but policy uncertainty and falling interest in consumer borrowing are key risks.