Market Update
We’re a month into 2019. Here’s our take.
2019 year calendar. January calendar on a white background. 3d RenderingWell folks, the first month of 2019 is in the books, and we’re already dealing with all those winter ailments. Fayette County schools even closed last week for sanitizing, as so many kids were home sick with various symptoms. These bugs have not discriminated against anyone, as children and adults alike have fallen victim. Many in our office have been hit, including yours truly! But, I think we’re all on the mend.
This sickness has all of us a little ahead on our New Year weight loss plans too! So, despite Girl Scout Thin Mint season coming up, please, don’t bring any more treats into the office until next Christmas! So many of our clients are amazing cooks and bakers, but we really are trying to be healthy.
Now, back to financial news. So far this year, the markets have surprised us in showing some resilience, as the Dow has bounced back up from where we ended last year. By now I know you’ve gotten your 2018 statements, but keep in mind that they don’t reflect where things are now. Many of your balances are probably significantly higher than they were on December 31, and I think we can all agree that’s a good thing.
This is also the start of the S&P 500 earnings reports, and so far, the majority are beating their earnings estimates. In general, we’re not hearing companies talk about a significantly weakening economy. Yes, we have seen some seasonal slowness in the auto and housing industries, and are having some backlog in the semiconductor sector, sure. But people are still using Proctor & Gamble products, buying Starbucks coffee and going shopping. We continue to see data that the rest of the world is in the midst of a slow-down, but that’s been recurring overseas for some time. And, we don’t think that we have to slow down just because other parts of the world are. Our economy is completely different from China’s, or Germany’s.
My opinion is that we aren’t going into a full-blown recession, and it’s nice that the markets have bounced back, but I don’t think the recent volatility is all we’ll see. I believe that a lot of the recent market activity is due to computer trading and artificial intelligence, and that is something the regulators need to address, just as the NFL needs to address what happened to the Saints! Will they? Well, in a perfect world, they would…
So far this year, the markets have surprised us in showing some resilience, as the Dow has bounced back up from where we ended last year. By now I know you’ve gotten your 2018 statements, but keep in mind that they don’t reflect where things are now. Many of your balances are probably significantly higher than they were on December 31, and I think we can all agree that’s a good thing.
