Markets Rotate: What’s Driving the Shift; Plus, the Dow Crosses a Milestone After leading markets for much of the past two years, AI, tech stocks, and software specifically, are losing leadership in early 2026, as investors rotate capital toward other sectors,...
January Barometer Flashes Green, a Sleepy Fed Gathering The so-called January Barometer holds that the market’s performance in January—measured by the S&P 500 Index—tends to foreshadow how stocks will perform during the year. Since 1970, January finished higher 33...
It’s Hard to Say Good-bye: What Persistently Low Layoffs Say About the Economy Much has been made of the sluggish hiring environment, but less attention has been paid to an important counterpoint: the persistently low level of layoffs. Figure 1 highlights the number...
Forks, Knives, and Economic Clues Let’s review one narrow economic indicator that provides a useful, though not standalone, measure of the overall economy’s health. The US Census categorizes it as ‘food services and drinking places.’ That can best be described as...
Soft December Hiring Underscores Tepid Year On Friday, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that nonfarm payrolls increased by 50,000 in December, underscoring a year of persistently sluggish job growth. The unemployment rate offered a glimmer of optimism,...
A Stock Market Three-Peat The bull market that began in late 2022 continued through last year. The S&P 500 Index, which posted gains that topped 20% in both 2023 and 2024, recorded an advance of 16.39% last year. But the year wasn’t free of volatility. The bulls...
