Time to read: 5 minutes | “Don’t fight the Fed” is one of our rules of tactical investing. This year it’s been easy to observe Federal Reserve policies directly affecting capital markets. The Fed pivot on January 5 ignited a stock-market rally that took some of the US averages, such as the S&P 500 and
Time to read: 7 minutes | The first half of May has been a rude awakening for investors as the U.S./China trade conflict has unexpectedly escalated. This escalation started with a weekend tweet by President Trump, followed by increased tariffs on Chinese imports that range from 10% to 25%. The response from China - tariffs on
Time to Read: 10 minutes | Tips for Retirement Income Planning Much time, energy, and thought are put into the fundamentals of saving for retirement before retirement happens – how to allocate assets, understanding the benefits of tax-advantaged retirement accounts, etc. Less emphasis is put on how to withdraw the funds once you’re in retirement. Retirement
Time to read: 5 minutes | While capital markets have advanced off of the late December lows, few of our objective market measures indicate that the bottoming process is complete. The list of potential sources for further market gyrations is long—including slowing global economic growth, monetary and trade policy errors, investor complacency, overbought asset classes, and
Time to read: 7 minutes | On July 11th, 2018, we wrote about the “tug of war” between strong domestic economic news and potential for interest rate hikes, domestic policy mistakes, and increased risks for international equity markets. We argued it was no longer prudent to own stocks in excess of our benchmarks. Accordingly, equity exposure
Time to read: 7 minutes | Economic growth drives profits, which should help fuel long-term gains in stocks through 2019. Most economic sub-cycles are still young, there’s little debt creation and consumer confidence is high. There’s no over investment, tighter conditions or shocks— which often precede recession. How much further can the U.S. expansion go?
Time to read: 5 minutes | It appears 2018 will be the first year since 1972 when no major asset class returned 5% or more. Global quantitative tightening could be the culprit according to Ed Clissold, Chief U.S. Strategist at Ned Davis Research. While the Federal Reserve has been trimming its balance sheet for over a
Time to read: 5 minutes | On Friday, November 2, 2018, Brown Wealth Management reduced equity investments across each of our clients’ managed portfolios. The resulting allocations own less than their benchmark in stocks for the first time since 2009. The change comes on the heels of our recent reduction to equity investments because of extended
Time to read: 4 minutes | This week we trimmed equity holdings on all of our portfolios. Since early 2016, Brown Wealth Management accounts have owned equities in excess of their respective benchmarks. This bullish stance has corresponded with a period of strong stock market performance. Our changes this week reduced stock holdings to our benchmark
Time to read: 4 minutes | In the last few weeks, we have seen several economic reports that paint a strong US employment picture. Non-Farm Payrolls reported over 229,000 jobs added in May, bringing the unemployment rate down to 3.8%, the lowest level since April of 2000. In addition, the recent Job Openings and Labor Turnover (JOLTS) report
