Time to Read: 5 Minutes After March delivered a historical drop in the stock market and ended the longest bull market on record, BWM rebalanced portfolios to move from an underweight position in stocks to an equal weight, taking advantage of attractive valuations and extreme pessimism. Yesterday, we rebalanced again for very similar reasons,
Time to Read: 7 Minutes 2020 has been a wild year so far—an unprecedented year, you could even say, as many memes do. And yet, another major event looms on the horizon: the presidential election, set against a backdrop of recession, global pandemic and social unrest. Here we consider how markets have behaved through
Time to Read: 5 Minutes Last month, Brown Wealth Management hosted a webinar titled “Is the Recession Over?” where we examined what appeared to be signs of a bottom in economic activity and the implications for markets and the economy in a COVID-19 world. The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) is a private, non-profit,
Time to Read: 7 Minutes The US unemployment rate jumped to 14.7% in April, the highest level since the Great Depression. Manufacturing activity plunged to an 11-year low. The Leading Economic Index posted the largest decline in its 60-year history. Full-year earnings estimates have tumbled downward across all sectors. While all this bad economic news
Time to Read: 6 Minutes The economic fallout from COVID-19 continues to smash records. Last week, initial claims for unemployment insurance totaled a breathtaking 6.606 million, well above consensus estimates of 4.500 million and just barely below the record-setting 6.867 million claims recorded the week before, as shown below. Over the past four weeks, initial
Time to Read: 8 Minutes Last week, President Trump signed into law the historic $2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act). The legislation is the largest economic relief bill in US history and provides aid for Americans and businesses via direct payments, expanded unemployment insurance, loans and grants. At Brown Wealth
Time to Read: 6 Minutes Five short weeks ago, the US stock market was sitting at all-time highs—then everything changed. As the novel coronavirus began establishing a foothold in countries around the world, US stocks entered bear market territory with record-setting speed. In this article, we look at the current bear market and implications for
Time to Read: 7 minutes On March 3rd, the Federal Reserve announced an emergency rate cut, lowering the federal funds rate by 50 basis points to a range between 1% and 1.25%. In its first intermeeting cut since 2008, the committee noted that the fundamentals of the US economy are still strong but the coronavirus
Time to Read: 6 minutes After weeks of coronavirus news coverage and considerable handwringing, markets (finally) took a steep tumble as the fear factor intensified. With the virus spreading to more locations—making it clear that China’s quarantine efforts have fallen short—and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warning Americans to brace for a widespread
Time to Read: 7 Minutes In July 2019, the US economic expansion crossed the 121-month mark, stealing the crown for the longest uninterrupted stretch of post-war growth from the economic boom of the 1990s. As the expansion—now in month 127—continues to grow longer, our clients have been asking, “When will the next recession occur?” Analyzing