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Greener Pastures
Summary The U.S. economy continues to present conflicting signals from an economic growth standpoint and labor market position. A tug-of-war between the U.S. federal government's spending and the Federal Reserve's tightening financial...
Read MoreMid-Year Update
SummaryThe driving force behind recession predictions from economists has been tightening monetary policy.While the service sector, which accounts for a significant portion of GDP, remains robust, the manufacturing side of the economy...
Read MoreCrisis Averted
SummaryThe U.S. debt ceiling raised concerns as the deadline approached, with potential consequences including missed payments, job losses, and a stock market selloff. Bond yields for shorter-term Treasury bills rose meaningfully to...
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Tug of War
SummaryGlobal economic activity remains strong despite geopolitical shocks and policy tightening.The US economy and job market are resilient, but rising unemployment claims and an inverted yield curve are concerning signs. Aggressive...
Read MoreMarch Madness
SummarySome agony was experienced in March due to the anticipation of further rate hikes, leading to the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history and a combined liquidity backstop from the U.S. Treasury Department, Federal...
Read MoreSECURE Act 2.0 - Summary and Review
SECURE Act 2.0 - Summary and ReviewKey TakeawaysSECURE Act 2.0, signed into law Dec. 29, 2022, makes numerous changes that impact retirement savers and retirees.The age to start taking RMDs increases to age 73 in 2023 and to 75 in 2033...
Read MoreSome Pain is Back
SummaryThe U.S. CPI report for January showed that inflation had decreased for the seventh consecutive month, but still exceeded expectations, with shelter costs being the primary contributor to the increase.While some data suggests...
Read MoreNew Year, New Debt Ceiling Dilemma
Summary2022 will go down in market history as a watershed year. For the first time, both U.S. stocks and bonds fell by double digits as a result of rapidly rising inflation, and many other asset classes failed to alleviate the pain.The...
Read MoreEverything Is Relative
During November, a slew of economic data was released, but the month began on a soft note as the Fed raised its policy rate by the anticipated 0.75%, marking the fourth consecutive hike of this magnitude.Market tone improved...
Read MoreMarkets and the Midterm Elections
September signaled the start of a slow, stunning transformation of green foliage to brilliant reds, oranges, yellows, and purples in many parts of the world. The month of October then brought a fall in leaves that littered the ground...
Read MoreWhen September Ends
Consumer prices in the United States rebounded in August, undermining hopes of a brewing slowdown and a policy shift from the Federal Reserve. The consumer price index increased 0.1% from July, while prices rose 8.3% from a year...
Read MoreFed Hangover
Around this time every year, the chair of the Federal Reserve and central bankers meet in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. The Fed chair typically uses this rustic venue as an opportunity to deliver a particularly important and long-range...
Read MoreThe "R" Word
Inflation took center stage once again, with the consumer price index rising 9.1% from a year earlier for the month of June. This was the largest increase since the end of 1981, and the widely observed inflation gauge increased 1.3%...
Read MoreRegime Change
After months of deliberation over whether inflation was temporary and to what extent, the US Federal Reserve has responded in a strong fashion. By raising the federal funds rate by 75 basis points—the largest single increase...
Read MoreFrom Correction to Bear Market
Inflation and recessionary worries continue to dominate news flow in May, and Google Trends of these particular words have spiked to notable highs as of late. Additionally, the war in Ukraine has created second-order effects worldwide...
Read MoreAnother Headline
Bill Miller is a renowned investor that outperformed the S&P 500 Index for 15 consecutive years in a row through 2005, an impressive streak that made him one of the better known and well respected investment professionals on Wall...
Read MoreThree Trends to Watch for the Fall
The month of August catered to a whole host of extremely hot and humid days, but the beginning of September is starting to feel like fall is upon us. And then there is climate. It has been a season of tortuous heat waves, wildfires,...
Read MoreThe Chickens Have Come Home to Roost
The back half of the year has officially started, and it has been off the races. Spurring forward optimism from the economic recovery, the S&P Index has once again legged higher. The S&P 500 rose +2.3% for the month of July and was up...
Read MoreInflation Nation: Temporary or a Longer Stay?
With the passage of the latest $1.9 trillion COVID relief package in March, changes are in full swing. Vaccination efforts have continued to expand largely across the U.S. and other countries around the world, though blood-clotting...
Read MoreThe Agony of Extraordinary Returns
After returning 5.8% in the first quarter of 2021, the S&P 500 has continued its bull market advance, adding over 5% more in the first two weeks of April alone. The market could very well continue to make new highs on the back of...
Read MoreJust One Year Ago
February 19th, 2020 marked a new high for the S&P 500 Index. The U.S. stock market was chugging along nicely, returning just over 5% for the year and the NASDAQ was up just shy of 10%. If we fast forward to March 4th, 2020 the S&P 500...
Read MoreInflation Tantrum
Weather conditions throughout the U.S. for the month of February were quite mixed—lovely in some places, frozen and wretched in others. A similar dynamic has been playing out across various economic sectors. A few key economic...
Read MoreA Swing and a Miss?
Various risk assets continued to rally in January on optimism over the vaccine rollout moving forward and prospects for a global recovery in sight. As of January 28, over 26 million Americans have now had a least one shot of a vaccine,...
Read MoreA November and December to Remember
November was a month dominated by news headlines surrounding the U.S. presidential and congressional election campaigns. In the weeks and days leading to November 3rd, share prices fell due to anticipation that Joe Biden would defeat...
Read MoreDo Politics Matter?
We are making our way into the homestretch of the 2020 presidential election season. With an ongoing pandemic, social unrest, and two polarizing candidates, the market can certainly be unsettling. At times, the fate of the world seems...
Read MoreNASDAQ Nausea
Reopened economies around the world are continuing to grapple with resurgent COVID-19 cases in August and September, as governments in various regions were compelled to return to partial shutdowns or various restrictions. However, on a...
Read MoreMarket Update: July 2020
Things Are Looking Shiny Congress is currently working towards a new stimulus package with the goal of increasing the size of millions of Americans’ unemployment paychecks, but in the interim, the extra $600 that has helped keep...
Read MoreMarket Update: June 2020
Back In the Spotlight As the first half of the year comes to a close, the economy remains in an uncertain state and the fate of displaced workers is perched on a knife’s edge. The resurgence of COVID-19 has once again taken...
Read MoreMarket Update: May 2020
Say It Isn’t So Since hitting lows in mid-March, most stock markets around the world have regained over half of what they lost from their peak in mid-February. This sharp rebound has led many people to wonder why the markets have...
Read MoreMarket Update: April 2020
A Few Headscratchers The yield on Germany’s 10-year government bond first went negative during the summer of 2016 with Japan’s 10-year government bond soon following suit. It’s as if all logic was thrown out the...
Read MoreReflecting During a Tough Market
The global upheaval has truly been unprecedented. In a short amount of time the world has experienced one of the worst pandemics since the Spanish Flu (102 years ago), the largest economic contraction since the Great Depression, the...
Read MoreConsidering a Roth Conversion as a way to Take Advantage of the Market Decline?
A Roth Conversion is a transfer of some of all of money in a tax-deferred IRA into a Roth IRA, which is retirement account into which you contribute after-tax dollars and get tax-free withdrawals. This means tax-free growth, indeed...
Read MoreMarket Update: December 2019
Nova R Wealth Market Update: December 2019
Read MoreMarket Update: November 2019
Nova R Wealth Market Update: November 2019
Read MoreMarket Update: October 2019
Nova R Wealth Market Update: October 2019
Read MoreMarket Update: September 2019
Nova R Wealth Market Update: September 2019
Read MoreMarket Update: August 2019
Nova R Wealth Market Update: August 2019
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