Typically, U.S. Presidents are wary of claiming stock market performance as a referendum on their success. Most have seemed to understand that taking credit also means accepting blame, and no one would want to make the tortured argument that the positive moves reflect well on their presidency but that the negative moves do not.
What explains the fact that municipal bond yields are only slightly lower than equivalent Treasury bonds, giving muni investors a much higher taxable-equivalent yield? The answer lies in their liquidity, which is good news, especially for buy-and-hold investors of individual bonds.
Today’s risks are clear: stock valuations are high, credit spreads are tight and interest rates remain low. A modest tilt toward return-seeking assets still makes sense. But investors should also be willing to look beyond traditional stocks and bonds.
The Federal Reserve is likely to begin normalizing its balance sheet in 2017. Why hasn’t this news rattled the bond market?
“It is a Riddle, Wrapped in a Mystery, Inside an Enigma: but Perhaps There is a Key” - Winston Churchill
Some good data below so I won’t draw out this intro. Stay focused overseas. Keep an eye on earnings which will hopefully be better than the reception that the big banks received on Friday. (But don’t worry, the bank disappointments were interest margin and loan growth caused, not credit related.)
Andrew Susser manages the MainStay High Yield Corporate Bond Fund (MHCAX). Over the last 15 years, the fund has ranked in the 12th percentile of its Morningstar peer group; its annualized return was 8.45%, 395 basis points ahead of the AGG and 95 basis points greater than its peer-group average. In this interview, he discusses the opportunities in the high-yield market.
Markets seem not to care what the media or polls have to say. The Dow Jones Industrial Average continues to hit new all-time highs. Even though it’s stalled a few times, the “Trump rally” appears to be in full-speed-ahead mode, more than eight months after the election.
With Market Indices at or Close to All-Time Highs, Investors Puzzle Over the Course Ahead. Meanwhile, The Slow-Growth Economy Is Perceived as the New "Goldilocks Scenario."
After a long period of “riding the wave” of central bank liquidity, investors are now confronted with much more difficult decisions. Andrew Lo’s new book, Adapative Markets, provides an excellent framework from which to analyze the current situation, evaluate market risks and prepare for changes.
Market risks come in three flavors—recession risk, economic shock risk, and risks within the market itself. Using a red light/yellow light/green light system, this monthly post explores the risk level in the markets, based on a number of factors.
The data for June was generally positive, with a rebound in job growth and a surprise increase in business confidence supported by continued high levels of consumer confidence.
Investing based on headlines and political promises is rarely beneficial to one’s portfolio. It’s dispassionately investing for fundamentals that continue to drive the markets.
Analysis of factors and interest rates, which highlights that there are no consistent relationships between Value, Size, Momentum and interest rates in the US. Applies to high and low and increasing and decreasing rate environments.
We update our geopolitical outlook for the remainder of the year. This report is less a series of predictions as it is a list of potential geopolitical issues that we believe will dominate the international landscape for the rest of the year.
Stocks turned in a strong performance in the front half of 2017 despite geopolitical and monetary policy risks. The question, of course, is whether this performance trend can continue in the second half. I believe these two risks will cast an even longer shadow over markets going forward — making concepts such as diversification and risk management even more important for investors’ portfolios.
Keeping portfolio construction simple improves performance no matter what type of investment process you use. Our industry is in love with complexity, but complexity is costly to clients.
Over 90 advisors responded to a survey I conducted earlier this year with Advisor Perspectives. Here are the important insights into which activities help find new business for RIAs and IBDs.
Russ discusses why momentum, which has thrashed value this year, could struggle in the second half.
Investor confidence in the global outlook for monetary policy, economic growth and inflation has kept volatility contained. Can it continue? We think the risk of a destabilizing policy error is low if central banks remain cognizant of global financial conditions.
The macro data from the past month continues to mostly point to positive growth. On balance, the evidence suggests the imminent onset of a recession is unlikely.
In my many conversations with investors and industry peers about factor investing, one topic seems to always come up: factor investing timing. I’ve had recent discussions on this topic with a central bank whose managers need to think about preserving capital and with a more nimble RIA team which explicitly wants to use timing to pursue incremental returns.
The second quarter of 2017 closely mirrored the first. Global markets continued positive returns for many strategic domestic and global equity investors.
As outflows hit U.S.-focused equity mutual funds, international and emerging market stock funds are seeing massive inflows, bolstering strong share price performance of overseas markets this year. Despite the investor rush abroad, plenty of upside could remain.
You may have heard about bitcoin. Spurred on by breathtaking price runups, some clients may even have asked you if they should invest in them, or if it’s safe to buy them and use them to make payments. Most likely you dismissed the whole thing as some sort of a tulip bubble. But it’s not as simple as that.
Valuations and regulations are among the trends that we’re watching in this industry.
The first half of 2017 is shaping up to be unequivocally brutal for value-oriented rebalancing strategies. Wired to avoid pain, we humans know it’s very tempting to ask whether a model or philosophy is broken, especially the moment it dashes expectations.
In August 2016, Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BAML) wrote a research note characterizing risk parity as one of the central causes of equity market losses in late 2015. The note had all the hallmarks of a compelling plot line, replete with weapons of mass destruction, billion-dollar bets, and evil villains.
As the father of two Millennials (ages 27 and 25), I pay a great deal of attention to articles and studies on this largest generation of 75.4 million Americans. Given the sheer size of this generation and its vast effect on the economy for decades to come, we should all be paying attention to trends within this massive group.
Bob Rodriguez, FPA’s now-retired portfolio manager, earned many awards and distinctions during his 33-year career. In this interview, he talks about the role of the Fed in the price-setting mechanism. “When the markets finally do break, as they always have historically, ETFs and index funds will be destabilizing influences,” he says. Please visit FPA Advisors at booth 123 at Schwab IMPACT.
The mood among investors in Europe is generally positive in spite of mixed cyclical and secular factors influencing the economies and the markets there. The cyclical forces are dominated by a better business tone across the continent.
Disruptive forces are wreaking havoc across the global business world. But not all disruption is fatal. Lots of companies are facing the threat—and thriving. We think they deserve more credit than investors are giving them.
MSCI has taken a cautious approach to A share inclusion that encourages China to increase foreign investor access and ultimately ability to redeem and repatriate funds in exchange for greater future index weightings. It’s a sensible plan.
This week, I’d like to draw to a conclusion my series of notes from Mauldin’s 2017 Strategic Investment Conference. The topics ranged from geopolitical to global macro to specific investment ideas. One of my all-time favorite economists is David Rosenberg. Today I offer my high-level bullet point notes from his presentation.
As we observe events in realms such as financial markets, politics, or weather, we tend to form beliefs — be they explicit or implicit beliefs — about cause and effect, or whether the events were positive or negative, good or bad. Science has formalized this process: testing a hypothesis with empirical data. One of the tradeoffs when evaluating beliefs in light of evidence, or a hypothesis in light of data, is the type of error we would prefer if our beliefs turn out to be wrong. In the investment realm, this bias can affect our beliefs and behaviors, such as our tolerance for risk and our allocation choices. Several examples will help illustrate this point.
Recently the word “they” has surfaced with the media; THEY are influencing elections, THEY colluded with the Russians, THEY are selling U.S. dollars, THEY are manipulating markets, THEY are buying bonds, and a week and a half ago THEY sold the tech stocks causing sort of a minicrash as whispers of a “bubble” careened down the canyons of Wall Street.
I work for a large organization that has very poor leadership. We lack direction, communication and motivation from the very top down to the level of my manager.
There is a small but growing community of advisors who are leaving behind the old ways of picking managers in an effort to give their clients something they can’t get on their own or from a robo-advisor.
Fed hikes rates again, even as inflation falls further from target and financial conditions continue to ease. Smooth sailing ahead? Beware the leverage risks building below the surface.
The Fed does not have to make guesses about exactly what is required to normalize its balance sheet, except to the extent that it ignores a century of evidence.
Ttoday we’ll have a little Minsky refresher and look at some recent danger signs. And I predict that we will soon see Minsky mentions popping up everywhere.
All of a sudden the Fed got a little tougher. Perhaps the success of the hit movie Wonder Woman has inspired Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen to discard her prior timidity to show us how much monetary muscle she can flex when the time comes for action.
When investors rely on any particular model all the time—and CAPE is often that model—fatigue inevitably sets in. We believe that a better approach for meeting future spending needs is to blend portfolios based on different models of return expectations.
Last week's General Election in the United Kingdom was a disaster for the new conservative government of Prime Minster Theresa May. Having called the unnecessary "snap" elections in order to strengthen her political hand, the result actually reduced the number of seats held by the conservatives and delivered large gains to the opposition Labour party, which had seemed in disarray just a few months ago.
Healthcare continues to generate political controversy. So should investors stay away? Absolutely not. What’s important is to target companies that are positioned to deliver long-term growth no matter what happens to the US healthcare system.
Munis sold off in the wake of Trump’s election victory, but have been clawing their way back up as investors glean the difficult paths ahead for tax reform and infrastructure spending.
Many investors seem to be stuck in the middle of the false dichotomy between active and passive investing. At RBA, we argue it’s much more important for investors to ascertain which active or passive portfolio to buy and when to own it.
Each year Americans spend huge sums preparing to transition their assets to their heirs, engaging high-powered estate and tax planners who set up complex vehicles like family limited partnerships, life insurance, charitable remainder, charitable lead and various other kinds of trusts. Yet, despite the best efforts of top-notch professionals, the majority of plans fail. Why?
You could say I’m hoping for the best but preparing for the worst. I advise investors to do the same. No one can say what the future holds, and it’s prudent to have a portion of your portfolio in gold, gold stocks and short-term, tax-free municipal bonds, all of which have a history of performing well in volatile times.
