Friends  It was a difficult day for stocks. Whether it be the old momentum darlings losing their luster or just a broad base selloff due to the President announcing tariffs aimed at China, the bears seem to be firmly in control of the situation. Sure interest rates...

Friends  As expected the Fed raised the Fed Funds rate a quarter of a point with the new range now 1.50% to 1.75%. In their continuing attempt to scale back accommodation, the statement and subsequent testimony from Fed Chair Jerome Powell indicates that there will...

Friends   As we wait for tomorrow's Fed release, markets were once again occupied with the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica story. Cambridge suspended its CEO today, and if I didn't know better, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg might have suspended himself. Both he and COO...

Friends  Stocks has a difficult day led by the shares of Facebook which had a very difficult day as a result of news that their platform is mined for information that can be used in questionable ways. Feel free to review various published stories on the subject, but...

Friends  Stocks had a nice quiet day as the market averages lingered in mainly positive territory while, for a day at least, there weren't any drastic headlines. The economic data was somewhat of a mixed bag with Industrial Production showing renewed life, Consumer...

Friends  It was another odd day for markets as political headlines continue to frustrate traders whichever way they are leaning, and yet another tragedy-this time a just opened pedestrian bridge collapse in Florida. Stocks tried to rally more than once as the Dow...

Friends  I've watched Larry Kudlow on television now for decades and he seems like a very nice man, so I'm not going to blame today's selloff in stocks on the fact the he was named head of the President's Economic Council to replace Gary Cohn. On the contrary his...

Friends  Despite a CPI number that was as expected and not too hot or too cold, stocks weren't able to hold their early gains and sold off during the afternoon part of the trading session. Perhaps the markets were concerned about the continuous turnover in the White...

Friends  It was a Goldilocks jobs report - a way better than expected jobs number, and wages that only rose slightly. Growth without inflation! Sign me up. That's basically what the bulls said as a stock buying stampede ensued.   By the close, the Dow Jones Industrial...

Friends  Traders spent the day with one eye on the television as the President was speaking at a cabinet meeting and then this afternoon at a press conference to announce his tariffs. Stocks looked pretty much confused by all the rhetoric with the market averages...

Friends  After the announcement of the resignation of Chief Economic Advisor Gary Cohn from the White House, stocks were supposed to plummet today. Well, we did get a 300 plus point Dow selloff in the morning, but as the trading session wore on, buyers appeared and...

Friends  It appears that traders are trying to figure out where we are headed as a country with regards to tariffs and potential trade wars. Is the President "negotiating" with his tariff talk? Are we going to settle into something that the markets could find...

Friends  Stocks were expected to go down today. After all, we are talking about tariffs, protectionism and trade wars. Stocks should have gone down, but of course the stock market has a mind of its own and after a down opening buyers began to appear and stocks...

Friends  The bears had the bulls on the run again this morning and it appeared it was going to be a long ugly trading session. But as the day went on it seemed like the bears lost a bit of their bite and stocks gradually began to eliminate much of the morning's...

Friends  Stocks were minding their own business today after receiving decent but non-threatening economic data this morning when the White House introduced the idea of tariffs with regards to the steel industry. Now, it should come as no surprise that the President...