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recession

Weekly Market Pulse: Signal To Noise Ratio

By |2023-06-05T07:31:51-04:00June 4th, 2023|Alhambra Portfolios, Alhambra Research, Bonds, Commodities, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets, Real Estate, Stocks|

The stock market surged last Friday after the employment report showed a gain of over 300k jobs while the year-over-year change in average hourly earnings fell to 4.3%. That was the popular explanation and it makes sense; continued economic growth and fading inflation pressures would certainly seem a big positive (although wages have little to do with the recent bout [...]

Weekly Market Pulse: Politicians Acting Badly

By |2023-05-22T08:42:25-04:00May 22nd, 2023|Alhambra Portfolios, Bonds, Commodities, Currencies, Economy, Markets, Real Estate, Stocks|

Should investors be worried about the impending breach of the US debt ceiling? A default would be catastrophic according to numerous news articles I've read recently. Well, to be honest, I didn't read past the first few paragraphs of most of those articles because if you've read one of them, you've read them all. Obviously, a default would be bad [...]

Weekly Market Pulse: Not Dead Yet

By |2023-05-01T08:36:20-04:00May 1st, 2023|Alhambra Research, Bonds, Commodities, Currencies, Economy, Markets, Real Estate, Stocks|

Bring out your dead! CUSTOMER: Here's one. CART MASTER: Nine pence. DEAD PERSON: I'm not dead! CART MASTER: What? CUSTOMER: Nothing. Here's your nine pence. DEAD PERSON: I'm not dead! CART MASTER: 'Ere. He says he's not dead! CUSTOMER: Yes, he is. DEAD PERSON: I'm not! CART MASTER: He isn't? CUSTOMER: Well, he will be soon. He's very ill. DEAD PERSON: I'm getting better! CUSTOMER: No, you're not. You'll be stone dead in [...]

Weekly Market Pulse: This Too Shall Pass

By |2023-04-24T09:11:36-04:00April 24th, 2023|Alhambra Portfolios, Alhambra Research, Bonds, Commodities, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets, Real Estate, Stocks, Taxes/Fiscal Policy|

What is the state of the US economy? When will this long-anticipated recession finally arrive? And when it does, what does it mean for investors? Those are the questions everyone is asking and the answers are, well, hard. Despite years - decades, centuries? - of research, there is no accurate way I know of to predict the timing or depth [...]

Weekly Market Pulse: History Lessons

By |2023-04-10T08:39:57-04:00April 10th, 2023|Alhambra Portfolios, Alhambra Research, Bonds, Commodities, Currencies, Economy, Markets, Real Estate, Stocks|

One of the toughest things about navigating this bear market and the widely anticipated coming recession is that we've had to differentiate between real and nominal economic and market variables like nothing in recent decades. There are very few market commentators today who have navigated an inflationary environment like the current one. I haven't either, of course, which is why [...]

Weekly Market Pulse: Been There, Done That

By |2023-03-20T07:51:06-04:00March 19th, 2023|Alhambra Portfolios, Alhambra Research, Bonds, Commodities, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets, Real Estate, Stocks|

A bank's assets triple over a few years when interest rates are low. The bank invests those assets in long-term, higher-yielding municipal bonds with little credit risk. Inflation flares up and interest rates rise, reducing the value of the municipal bonds and funding dries up. Regulators become concerned that the failure of this bank could damage public confidence in the [...]

Weekly Market Pulse: Look Up In The Sky! It’s A UFO! Or Not!

By |2023-02-13T07:51:25-05:00February 12th, 2023|Alhambra Portfolios, Alhambra Research, Bonds, Commodities, Currencies, Economy, Markets, Real Estate, Stocks, Taxes/Fiscal Policy|

As I sit here writing this Sunday afternoon, the US has just shot down a third UFO in the last 3 days in addition to the Chinese "weather" balloon last week. I have no insight into what these things might be but I do wonder if we haven't declared war on the National Weather Service. The federal government has become [...]

A Heavy Duty Recession Indicator

By |2023-02-07T18:22:47-05:00February 7th, 2023|Alhambra Research, Economy|

I was reading Bill McBride's blog, Calculated Risk, recently and came across this post on heavy truck sales as a recession indicator. As Bill notes: Usually, heavy truck sales decline sharply prior to a recession.   Sales were solid in January. It certainly looks like sales do indeed peak before recession. But how long before recession? Does this really work as [...]

Weekly Market Pulse: Happy Days Are Here Again!

By |2023-02-06T09:05:47-05:00February 5th, 2023|Alhambra Portfolios, Alhambra Research, Bonds, Commodities, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets, Real Estate, Stocks|

Your cares and troubles are gone There'll be no more from now on! Happy days are here again! The skies above are clear again Let us sing a song of cheer again Happy days are here again! Lyrics: Jack Yellen, Music: Milton Ager That's certainly how it's felt since the turn of the new year with the NASDAQ up nearly [...]

This IS The Soft Landing. What Now?

By |2023-01-31T18:11:26-05:00January 31st, 2023|Alhambra Research, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets, Taxes/Fiscal Policy|

I've been writing for over a year about the economy rebalancing back to its pre-COVID trends. The massive fiscal expansion during COVID and the Fed's accommodation of that spending via QE is what caused the spike in prices over the last 18 months. Yes, there were supply issues too but the size of the demand shock overwhelmed the supply issues. [...]

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