An Unusually Difficult Year
Market Commentary, September 6, 2022 We are all aware of the headlines. Record Inflation. Rising Interest Rates. Potential Recession. Against these headlines we have some conflicting data. For example, corporate earnings remain strong and Wall Street analysts remain optimistic in their earnings forecasts. Analysts are still calling for the S&P 500 Index in aggregate…
A Summer Markets Deep Dive
Market Commentary || August 15th, 2022 After an impressive summer rally in stocks, it might be helpful to take some data measures and evaluate them to help gain some perspective on the stock market and other assets as we close out the summer season. We will look at: Stock market valuations Corporate earnings Housing valuations…
Breaking: WealthPlan’s Dividend Aristocrat Portfolio Receives 5-Star Rating by Morningstar
August 1st, 2022 WealthPlan Group’s Dividend Aristocrat Portfolio has received a 5-star rating by Morningstar. (Sec Id: F00001DL2C) Morningstar’s risk rating ranges from 1 to 5 based on past performance. A 5-star rating highlights that a Separate Account Portfolio has been a top performer in the market measured by risk-adjusted returns. The ranking is based…
Slack Tide and Crosscurrents
Monday, August 8th, 2022 Thinking about the current economic conditions makes me think of a slack tide. Slack tide refers to the time when the tide appears to neither be rising nor falling. Literally, the water is slack. The current economic conditions seem similarly slack right now. GDP has risen to new heights but is…
A Time for Patience
A Market Commentary by WealthPlan Group || Written July 25th, 2022 The stock market has rallied some which has some people believing the market low has been set. Here’s a chart below of stock prices for this past week. We certainly aren’t going to complain because rallies after losses are nice, much like a refreshing…
A BIG Earnings Release Week
A Market Commentary by WealthPlan Group || Written July 18th, 2022 Over nine hundred publicly traded companies will announce earnings this week across multiple economic sectors. In addition to releasing the earnings for the past quarter, many companies will provide guidance of some kind about business conditions going forward. Then the process of incorporating these…
The Waiting Game
Equity Markets were up last week with a strong rally after a period of selling pressure. Nonetheless, there is still considerable uncertainty with respect to inflation, interest rates, and corporate earnings. Relative to market drawdowns of the more recent past, we have been saying this one has the potential to be much more protracted. Consequently,…
Investor Mailbag: Hot topics
Why was the market down at the end of June? It seemed like it was going to rally back up. Markets ended their two-week rally in June after the Bureau of Economic Analysis released their March 3 estimate of the US real GDP growth for Q1, updating the estimate to -1.6% annually (-0.4% growth for…
The Earnings Crucible
After sharp equity market declines this year, many market observers are of the belief that the stock market is now “fairly valued.” We hear it all the time. Some people even say that the market is cheap. Usually, people who espouse this view are referencing the price today compared to the forecasted earnings in twelve…
Maximum Uncertainty
Several weeks ago, we wrote a piece called “Money Heaven.” In it, we considered how money is created and destroyed. To recap, money is destroyed via two primary mechanisms: 1) Asset Devaluation, and 2) Inflation. We also discussed the root cause of inflation being a monetary phenomenon made worse in the present day by supply…
Courage
The Fed meets again this week to determine its policy track with respect to interest rates and its balance sheet. What is clearer, heading into this week’s meeting than it has been before prior meetings, is that the inflation problem is WAY WORSE than the Fed has acknowledged up to this point. Inflation is not…
What is the S&P Worth Today? What About in 5 Years?
There seems to be a lot of disagreement around what stocks are worth and what the various index levels “should” be. This debate is reaching a high volume of late due to the uncertainties present. How high will inflation go? How long will it last? What will the Fed do with rates? Can inflation be…