4th Qtr and 2012 Overview 2012 was a year that was full of uncertainty from elections, policy, geo-political conflicts, major fiscal problems in Europe, fiscal cliffs in the U.S. and for some people even the thought that the end of the world was coming. But despite...
The partial passage of the Fiscal Cliff deal, we’ll call this Fiscal Cliff Part 1, was enough to avert falling off the cliff. Part 1 of the Fiscal Cliff focused on the tax law changes but “kicked the can down the road” for the cuts to spending (aka sequester cuts)...
On paper things looked great for the markets as we wrapped up the 3rd quarter. The S&P 500 was up 6.35%, foreign markets as measured by the MSCI EAFE rebounded and were up 6.92% and emerging markets were up 6.97%. Even the bond market had a decent...
The Markets The first half of 2012 is on the books. Our beginning of the year defensive posture came into play as equity markets pulled back substantially during the 2nd quarter falling 7.13% (as measured by the Morningstar aggressive equity portfolio). ...
Is the Strong Start Indicative for the Remainder of 2012? U.S. stock markets started off the year very strong with the S&P 500 returning 12.59% for the first quarter of 2012. On the other hand the main bond benchmark index was up only 0.3% for the quarter. This is...
The S&P 500 attempted to break above its high of May 2011 last week and was briefly trading at multi-year highs. That May 2011 high which is around 1370 for the S&P 500 (red horizontal line in chart) is a very important resistance area. In technical...
