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Data Update 2 for 2022: US Stocks kept winning in 2021, but…

Musings on Markets

In a post at the start of 2021 , I argued that while stocks entered the year at elevated levels, especially on historic metrics (such as PE ratios), they were priced to deliver reasonable returns, relative to very low risk free rates (with the treasury bond rate at 0.93% at the start of 2021). The year that was.

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Data Update 1 for 2022: It is Moneyball Time!

Musings on Markets

Happy New Year, and I hope that 2022 brings you good tidings! To start the year, I returned to a ritual that I have practiced for thirty years, and that is to take a look at not just market changes over the last year, but also to get measures of the financial standing and practices of companies around the world.

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Russia in Ukraine: Let Loose the Dogs of War!

Musings on Markets

Note, though, that while sovereign CDS spreads increased almost 51% between January 1, 2022 and March 16, 2022, in these countries, the overall riskiness of the region remains low, the average spread at 1.30%.

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Data Update 2 for 2023: A Rocky Year for Equities!

Musings on Markets

It is the nature of stocks that you have good years and bad ones, and much as we like to forget about the latter during market booms, they recur at regular intervals, if for no other reason than to remind us that risk is not an abstraction, and that stocks don't always win, even in the long term. at the start of that year.

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Data Update 2 for 2024: A Stock Comeback - Winning the Expectations Game!

Musings on Markets

While stocks had their ups and downs during the year, they ended the year strong, and recouped, at least in the aggregate, most of the losses from 2022. Energy, one of the few survivors of the 2022 market sell-off, had a bad year, as did utilities and consumer staples. increase in market capitalization.

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Market Resilience or Investors In Denial? A Mid-year Assessment for 2023!

Musings on Markets

In my second data update post from the start of this year , I looked at US equities in 2022, with the S&P 500 down almost 20% during the year and the NASDAQ, overweighted in technology, feeling even more pain, down about a third, during the year. That pessimism was not restricted to market outlooks.

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Data Update 3: Inflation and its Ripple Effects!

Musings on Markets

By the end of 2021, it was clear that this bout of inflation was not as transient a phenomenon as some had made it out to be, and the big question leading in 2022, for investors and markets, is how inflation will play out during the year, and beyond, and the consequences for stocks, bonds and currencies.