Posts by Todd Hurlbut - CIO

Stock markets are off to a strong start in 2023 following a dismal performance in 2022. Notwithstanding sharply higher interest rates and fears of a forthcoming recession, the bulls, at least for now, are in control.  There are several arguments to be made for being bullish or bearish in this environment. The bullish argument relies Read More

Will the Fed pivot or more importantly does it matter? We’ll see… There lived an old farmer who had worked in his fields for many, many years. One day, his horse bolted away. His neighbors dropped in to commiserate with him. “What awful luck,” they tut-tutted sympathetically, to which the farmer only replied, “We’ll see.” Read More

The Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 75 basis points this week and Fed Chairman Jerome Powell reiterated its intention to get inflation back under control no matter the consequences to short-term economic growth or asset prices. After all, inflation affects 100% of the population while capital market assets affect a much smaller cohort globally.  Read More

Stock markets rallied sharply in July and have continued to climb in August in response to the cooling of record levels of inflation. Investors expect the Federal Reserve to ease back the frequency and magnitude of interest rate hikes in response, an apparent bullish case for stocks. According to Wednesday’s edition of The Wall Street Read More

The bear market in stocks in 2022 began like most others in history: with a deterioration in the number of companies participating in the market uptrend. Initially weakness is seen in the smaller more speculative stocks and over time it migrates into the large capitalization companies. In the end, no stock is spared as selling Read More