Friends As expected, the markets were very quiet today, despite semi-hawkish comments from Fed Chair Yellen and a little hotter than expected CPI number (the core is where the inflation is showing, and admittedly it's not really that much). As unlikely as a June rate...

Friends By the looks of this week's trading action, one might think that we were in the dog days of summer. There has been almost no movement in prices this week and bonds seem to have settled down a bit also. Today saw the market averages hug the flat line for most...

Friends For the third day in a row, trading was quiet and stocks had little movement. Even the Fed minutes were unable to stir animal spirits. Speaking of those Fed minutes, it appears that the FOMC has moved on from any possibility of a June rate hike (no one really...

Friends Another very quiet day for the stock market. Despite the mix of some good and not so good earnings from selected retailers, in addition to some distinctly positive housing data, traders seemed unable to generate any interest on the buy or sell side of the...

Friends The week kicked off with a very quiet day of trading. Yes, there was an upward bias and new highs in market averages, but participation was light and volatility was non-existent. It is scheduled to be a somewhat light week for economic data, despite the Fed...

Friends Another day, another plethora of weak economic data. The Empire State number showed softness in manufacturing, the Industrial Production number was negative and the Consumer Sentiment number was much worse than expected. Understandably, bonds rallied (rates...

Friends If Fed officials are having second thoughts about an interest rate hike sometime this year, the often mentioned economic data points are providing plenty of cover. After yesterday's dismal retail sales number, we got a very weak PPI number today, confirming...

Friends With another weak retail sales number released this morning, market participants and economists are asking themselves why aren't consumers spending? It seems like economists have complained forever that the U. S. is full of profligate spenders, and now that it...

Friends Although stocks ended the day on the negative side of the ledger, it could have been worse. In early morning trading stocks were down considerably more than where they ended up and, with yesterday's slump, had basically erased the gains that had been garnered...

Friends After Friday's rally, it didn't come as a big surprise that stocks might cool off some on the first day of the new trading week. Yes, there was a little bit of hawkish talk from a Fed governor on television, but today's biggest story might have been the...

Friends With the jobs number coming in about where expected (223,000 new jobs created in April), and the unemployment rate falling to 5.4% (I know the participation rate is ridiculously low), there seemed to be enough of "whatever they were looking for" for the bulls...

Friends The amnesia market strikes again, as everything that seemed out of kilter yesterday, reversed itself today. Bonds rallied (rates dropped), oil prices fell, the dollar rallied and finally stocks rallied. Sentiment seems to change on a daily basis, but overall...

Friends Stocks were already having a difficult morning having reversed early gains and fallen into negative territory, when Fed Chair Yellen in a Q&A session commented that stocks are a bit pricy. She then qualified that statement by adding that the low level of...

Friends That calm Monday that we had yesterday turned into a tumultuous Tuesday, as market participants decided that today was a day to sell. As we have pointed out for most of the year, the market seems to have amnesia from day to day and this week is shaping up no...

Friends After last week's volatility, especially Thursday and Friday, today's action was on the quiet side. Stocks had an upward bias at the opening and were able to hold onto the gains as the session wore on. By the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 46...