Just days before Halloween, the Fed decided not to jolt the markets with a scary rate hike. That said, two policy goblins out of 12 voted for an increase, hoping to drive a stake through the heart of inflation, which even the head decision maker agrees remains overly alive and well. Since a rate hike…
Wall Street jitters escalated this week, with threats coming from a number of fronts. The U.S/Israel war with Iran is poised to heat up, with President Trump warning of another attack after the midterm elections. Investor anxiety over AI continues to mount, sending the tech-laden NASDAQ down around 6 percent over the past two weeks….
While most macro data, including employment, growth and spending, are disconnected from household sentiment surveys the one notable exception is inflation. That singular downbeat catalyst reared its ugly head again this week and may nudge the Fed to pull the rate-hiking trigger at its upcoming policy meeting on October 29. No doubt, that would exacerbate…
The dearth of headline-grabbing economic data this week did not stop speculation over what the Federal Reserve will do at its upcoming policy meeting on October 28-29. After the September confab, the consensus view was that a rate hike was a virtual certainty, both in October and at the December meeting. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh…
The proverbial dog days of summer were anything but. As new and revised data are coming in, the third quarter is morphing from languid to downright vigorous following a more energetic spring than previously thought. The cooler-than-expected jobs report for September takes some heat off the Fed to hike rates at the October meeting. But…
Despite a swarm of bad news (higher inflation, interest rates, election uncertainty, unending wars) the stock indices remain higher for the year. The “Dow” is up 6.4%, and the more representative S & P 500 Stock Index is up 11.90%. Why? Corporate profits are improving at a much faster pace than anticipated. Interest rates, while…
Despite headline-grabbing headwinds, there is no quit in the U.S. economy – at least not yet. We will get a better sense of how consumers are holding up next week, when the comprehensive personal income and spending report for August is released. But by all accounts households are keeping their wallets wide open, as indicated…
While almost unthinkable earlier this year, the Fed’s first rate hike in three years this week had been telegraphed well in advance, first by Chair Kevin Warsh’s hawkish Jackson Hole speech in August and afterwards by his repeated affirmation that getting inflation under control was a top priority. That commitment was in full display at…
Inflation headlined the economic news this week and the slightly warmer than expected wholesale and consumer price reports for August nudged up the odds that the Fed would hike interest rates at its upcoming meeting next week. However, the financial markets barely reacted to the news, as stock prices recovered some of their earlier losses,…
Note: The weekly commentary will not be published over the Labor Day weekend. The next issue will be published on September 11. Fed Chair Warsh’s keynote address at the Jackson Hole Symposiam on Friday commanded most of the economic headlines this week. That said, the financial markets had plenty of other news to digest, including…