On average Trump’s approval rating is roughly 3.25% higher in online polls (blue) than polls with human operators (orange). This is referred to as a “shy bias” because some poll respondents are afraid to approve of Trump to another human being whereas they are willing to do so in an online poll. As of December… Continue reading Trump’s Approval Rating
As we have stated several times in the past, hedge funds have struggled since the end of the financial crisis. The chart below shows how hedge funds have performed relative to the broader market since the Fed announced the end of QE3 (10/29/2014). Quant funds have also underperformed the broader market despite being all the… Continue reading Hedge Fund Performance Since QE3 Ended
Since the announced the end of QE3 on October 29, 2014, bonds are up 5.09%. The Bloomberg High Yield index is up 17.56%. To view all bond market returns, use the interactive chart below:
The S&P 500 is up 43% since the Fed announced the end of QE3 on October 29, 2017. Value stocks (+33%) and growth stocks (+38%) both lag the broader market. The Info Tech sector is up 73%. Tech stocks have lost almost 7% since November 27. Financials are up 56%. … Continue reading Stock Returns Since QE3 Ended
Commodities have had the poorest returns since QE3 ended. The Bloomberg Commodity index is down 27%. Energy has been the worst performing commodity sub-group, down 55% as a group. Natural gas has been the worst performer in the energy sub-group, down 68% while spot crude is down 30%. Use the… Continue reading Commodity Returns Since QE3 Ended
Tim Duy’s Fed Watch – Will Growth Slow In 2018? And Why? In short, the Fed has already done a lot, growth likely to slow, and inflation is a mystery, so why hike now? But if your answer is the third option then you believe that the necessary (at least in the Fed’s view) tempering of… Continue reading Hard Data Finally Closes the Gap!
Never mind Dr. Copper. Despite weakness in industrial metals, commodity returns are still consistent with modest economic growth.
Summary Our analysis shown above of U.S. hard economic data extremes translates into potential for U.S. Treasuries to outperform their Australian and German brethren. Both U.S. / Germany and Australia / U.S. sovereign spreads are battling major technical barriers. We use global fund flows, economic data (hard/soft), inflation expectations, and rate hike timing to assess… Continue reading U.S. Sovereigns Show Potential to Out-perform Australia and Germany
CNBC – The GOP isn’t getting a political payoff from its tax plan * Americans oppose the Republican tax-cut effort by nearly two-to-one, according to a poll conducted by Quinnipiac University. That’s a worse showing than Obamacare ever recorded. * Most Americans don’t buy the core arguments Republicans have offered for their plans. Moreover, debate over… Continue reading Trump Approval “Shy Bias” Returns
Bloomberg Gadfly – 98,750,067,000,000 Reasons to Be Worried About 2018 As 2017 enters its final month, here are 12 charts to illustrate what a year it’s been in markets. Far be it from us to be party-poopers; but let’s just say what we see makes us slightly nervous about 2018. The total value of companies listed… Continue reading Value Of Companies Listed On The World’s Stock Markets Closes In On $100 Trillion
Bloomberg View – Ben Emons: Europe’s Yield Curve May Hold Key to Markets in 2018 One byproduct of a flatter yield curve in the U.S. has been a weaker dollar and a loosening of financial conditions, which have provided a supportive backdrop to both local and worldwide risk assets. There’s no reason to suspect that also… Continue reading U.S. and European Interest Rate Expectations And Europe’s Yield Curve
Bloomberg Gadfly – Marcus Ashworth: So Long, Year of the Bond-Market Rooster But it is the much smaller, though only marginally-less indebted, Portugal, that has benefited the most from the QE program. The Iberian peripheral has been the star of the European government bond market this year, with spreads to Germany narrowing by far the… Continue reading The Illusion Of A Healthy European Bond Market