Perspectives

Today, the Senate Budget Committee voted to pass the tax reform bill, and it will now make its way to the senate. In the background, Trump is working to get tax reform through. He's turned from against the Alexander - Murray bill to supportive of it. He's also agreed to the risk pool legislation sponsored by Susan Collins. To be blunt, it appears he's working overtime to gather the necessary votes to get tax reform through the Senate. However, tax reform still has a number of significant hurdle… View More

Some will dismiss the growth as "the rich getting richer," but the facts say otherwise. Usual weekly earnings for full-time workers at the bottom 10% are up 4.6% versus a year ago; earnings for those at the bottom 25% are up 5.3% from a year ago. By contrast, usual weekly earnings for the median worker are up 3.9% while earnings for those at the top 25% and top 10% are up less than 2%. Yes, that's right, incomes are growing faster at the bottom of the income spectrum than at the top. A higher e… View More

Markets were mixed Last week, with small and mid-cap stocks gaining while large cap stocks were mostly unchanged. Tax reform once again dominated headlines: the House passed its version of the legislation, while the Senate bill advanced out of the Finance Committee on a party line vote; the Senate may schedule a vote in two weeks. Retailers outperformed; Wal-Mart’s digital and e-commerce initiatives helped produce a +2.7% increase in same-store-sales, the company’s best quarterly performance… View More

Click here to view a side-by-side comparison of the House and the Senate versions of a new tax plan. We will continue to provide updates as more information becomes available.    … View More

Stocks lagged last week as competing visions of tax reform weighed on investor sentiment; small cap stocks and sectors which respond to economic growth, such as Materials and Industrials, underperformed. On Thursday, the Senate revealed its proposal for tax legislation which differs from the House version that was released last week. Republican lawmakers now face the challenge of crafting a bill that can pass both chambers with a simple majority vote. The market’s negative reaction this week m… View More

With the stock market at its current level, a recurring question many investors have is when will we reach the top, or are we there already? In answer to this question, we believe the market will continue to climb. Consumer confidence continues to be strong and the data can be validated across multiple data sources, like the level of voluntary separation from employment (which is at levels not seen since the early 2000's), the savings rate (which has dropped, typically indicating a higher level … View More

Markets were mixed Last week; strong economic data and the release of the House’s initial tax reform plan were unable to spark a rally in stocks. The U.S. economy added 261,000 jobs in October, the largest monthly gain since July 2016, as employers recovered from Hurricanes Harvey and Irma. The unemployment rate fell to 4.1%, its lowest level since 2000; wage growth was essentially flat month-over-month, but may pick up over the next few months. Consumer confidence rose to its highest level in… View More

House Republicans are pushing for a major tax reform. Below, we have included links to a number of the documents the House of Representatives has made available to explain their tax plan. We also expect the government will provide a calculator that will be available to the public to compare individual tax obligations between the current tax system and the proposed tax plan. We will continue to provide updates as more information becomes available. Please call or email us with any questions. … View More

The after effects of hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria have done little to sway the opinion of Federal Reserve members that the economy is ready for further rate hikes. While leaving rates unchanged at today's meeting - as expected - they set the table for December. The Fed essentially waved off the hurricane-related September payrolls declines, and more notably strengthened rhetoric about economic growth, which they now characterize as "rising at a solid rate" compared to September's "rising m… View More