We want to share a short note on our thoughts. With the coronavirus now above the fold of every national newspaper, the complacency that’s dominated markets over recent months is finally being challenged. This is also evident in the sharp ETF outflows – over the last 3 days, some $16bn has been pulled from the SPY and nearly $3bn from the HYG (both records). As we wrote yesterday, a decent chunk of the market is sufficiently oversold, but it takes more time to chip away at sentiment. With s… View More
Monday, fear over the Coronavirus finally gripped investors, as both the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 index fell over 3% - the largest daily declines in two years. These drops wiped out all the gains for the year. Frankly, it’s amazing to us that the market had been so resilient! Maybe it’s because recent history with stocks and viruses is that markets overreact leading to significant buying opportunities along the way. Over a 38-day trading period during the height of t… View More
Coronavirus-related economic fears continue to dominate markets, but we believe effects will be short term and limited. Once investors begin to look past near-term risks, we think areas of the global financial market that have benefited on a relative basis (growth styles, defensive areas and bond market proxies) could take a hit. On balance, we think the equity bull market should continue, but we are concerned that valuations look stretched in some areas. Investor attention remains dominated b… View More
Markets are off sharply this morning as the virus headlines appear to have worsened over the weekend, yet we’re still struck with how complacent the options market has been. The daily put/call ratios remain very low, inconsistent with the type of fear often associated with an exogenous event like Coronavirus. This likely has to change, and lower prices are a catalyst. Ultimately we suspect this is a correction in an ongoing bull market, but better S&P support is still a ways off in the 305… View More
Once again, the major indices moved higher last week despite the on-going focus on the coronavirus. The Nasdaq (2.21%) led the major indices followed by the Russell 2000® Index (1.87%), the S&P 500® Index (1.58%) and the Dow Jones Industrial Average (1.02%). On Thursday, China announced revised diagnostic criteria for the virus; the change increased the number of cases to 66,492 with 1,523 deaths. The news unsettled the markets on Thursday, with modest gains in the Nasdaq and S&P 500®… View More