Musings on Markets

MAY 20, 2022

In general, higher and more volatile inflation has negative effects on all financial assets, from stocks to corporate bonds to treasury bonds, and neutral to positive effects on gold, collectibles and real assets. The former is short hand for the small cap premium and the latter is the proxy for the value factor in returns.

Price to Book 96

Price to Book Dividends Beta Equity 96

Musings on Markets

JANUARY 27, 2022

Put simply, no central bank, no matter how powerful, can force market interest rates down, if inflation expectations stay low, or up, if investor are anticipating high inflation. For those who track the slope of the yield curve, and I am not one of those who believes that it has much predictive power, it was a confusing year.

Risk-free Rate 84

Risk-free Rate Treasury Price to Book Start-ups 84

Musings on Markets

MARCH 19, 2022

The table below summarizes the market cap change, by region of the world: It is no surprise that Eastern Europe and Russia, which are in the eye of the hurricane, have seen the most damage to equities, but other than the Middle East, every other equity market in the world is down, with the US, EU and China shedding significant market capitalization.

Start-ups 100

Start-ups Risk Premium Equity Market Capitalization 100

Musings on Markets

MARCH 25, 2021

The first quarter of 2021 has been, for the most part, a good time for equity markets, but there have been surprises. The first has been the steep rise in treasury rates in the last twelve weeks, as investors reassess expected economic growth over the rest of the year and worry about inflation.

Equity 52

Equity Risk-free Rate Treasury Start-ups 52

Musings on Markets

JANUARY 9, 2021

Consider, for instance, an investor who picks stocks based upon price to book ratios, who finds a stock trading at a price to book ratio of 1.5. While some of the companies in this data trace their existence back decades, there is a healthy proportion of younger companies, many in emerging markets and new industries.

Risk Premium 52

Risk Premium Market Capitalization Equity Start-ups 52

Musings on Markets

JANUARY 19, 2022

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). from its level at the start of the year.

Risk Premium 80

Risk Premium Risk-free Rate Start-ups Equity 80

Musings on Markets

JULY 17, 2023

In my third post at the start of 2023, I looked at US treasuries, the long-touted haven of safety for investors. In 2022, they were in the eye on the storm, with the ten-year US treasury bond depreciating in price by more than 19% during the year, the worst year for US treasury returns in a century.

Marketability 95

Marketability Risk Premium Start-ups Treasury 95