California’s Delicate Energy Situation How long the war might last is not clear, but its effects are being felt in global energy markets. Oil moves easily across borders, which means supply disruptions quickly lead to higher gasoline prices. However, it is harder to...

Decoding the Fed: Impact on Investors Against the backdrop of the war, the Federal Reserve met last week and decided to hold its key rate—the fed funds rate—unchanged at 3.50–3.75%. The decision was completely expected. What jolted investors was Fed Chief Jay Powell’s...

Looking Past the Pump: A Granular Look at Gasoline Prices A quick trip to fill up the gas tank is a painful reminder that prices at the pump have jumped over the last couple of weeks—Figure 1—due to supply concerns. There are fears that higher prices will exacerbate...

The War and Its Impact—So Far What is the efficient market theory? Textbooks have been written to fully explain the theory. But if we can sum it up in one sentence: Assets, such as stocks, reflect all publicly available information. It is a foundational principle of...

Q4 Government Shutdown Drags on GDP; Supreme Court Blocks Tariff Plan The government shutdown proved to be a far greater drag on the economy than earlier estimates indicated. On Friday, the U.S. BEA reported that fourth-quarter Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the...

Revisiting 2025 Employment The US Bureau of Labor Statistics published its final benchmark revisions covering employment during the 12‑month period between April 2024 and March 2025. The revisions showed that payrolls were revised lower by 898,000 jobs compared with...