Whether we’ve been the driver or a passenger—perhaps as a child in the back seat on a family road trip—we’re all familiar with the question “How long until we get there?” Now, following the third consecutive quarter of market declines in both stocks and bonds amidst the Federal Reserve’s campaign to hike interest rates and […]
We’ve all seen action movies where the hero-protagonist seems to suffer one setback after another in the opening half, to the point where you’re left thinking “What else can go wrong? How is the hero ever going to get out of this?” The front half of 2022 in financial markets has felt a bit that […]
The first quarter of 2022 was a uniquely challenging one for financial markets and investors, as both stocks and bonds generally declined. As a consequence, the boost, or at least store of value, from bonds that normally accompanies a stock decline didn’t happen, causing a mixed stock and bond portfolio to exhibit results much closer […]
Like the turn of weather, the stock market has a way of changing and casting a new brightness or gloom that can pervade our mood and quickly have us forget the recent past. For those like your author, living in the marine climate of Puget Sound, we are accustomed to frequent weather changes and have […]
The fiscal quarter that ended September 30 was supposed to be the off-ramp to normalcy for the economy. It now seems a long time ago, but early summer 2021 was a time of low Covid case counts and great optimism. (We pause here as you, our reader, may sigh upon thinking this is another story […]
We hope you’ve been outside this summer and fall, and perhaps had the chance to hike, enjoy nature and let free the mind for thought. In the nearby Cascade Mountains, many trailheads start at a creek bed and, as the elevation increases, the path switches back and forth up to a ridge and even beyond. […]
Our newsletter for the third quarter is a departure from custom as we use the reasoning and analysis for a recommended trade to illustrate what we see happening in financial markets. We will follow under separate cover with a request for trade approval if you own the relevant funds. Among the many cognitive errors that […]
All families, and many of us individually, have memories of what things cost in the past as evidence of inflation. When your author’s parents were married in Billings, Montana in 1963, they had $110 between them and needed $107 the following week to pay tuition for my father at the local community college. They marked […]
Dear Clients and Friends of the Firm: In looking back at the year, as we always do in our customary January newsletter, the Covid-19 pandemic was obviously the big event, and it caused a cascade of subsidiary effects, some of which will have enduring consequences for our economy, and investment and financial planning, as we […]
President Lincoln began his second inaugural address with an enormous caveat: “The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself; and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it […]