Will stocks manage to stabilize before summer ends? August 2011 is on pace to become the roughest and most volatile month for the stock market in almost three years. Where exactly will this correction bottom out? How long will buyers stay on the sidelines? Two crucial questions...
Some bulls see great opportunities in this correction. “The lower things go, the more I buy.” The legendary Warren Buffett said those words on August 9 in a chat with Fortune. Buffett is a buy-and-hold kind of guy, and even if you don’t buy into his...
Unimpressed with U.S. deficit reduction plans, S&P delivers on its warning Unprecedented and unsettling. Standard & Poor’s issued a historic downgrade of U.S. debt on August 5, sensibly waiting until the market week had concluded to send a shock wave toward global investors. It reduced America’s...
If we slash trillions from the federal budget, what does that do to our GDP? The summer of discontent stretches on. As July ebbs into August, we have no resolution on the federal debt limit issue. The possibility of default is still in play. Republican leaders...
Is there a chance that America could actually default on its debt? When will the debt ceiling issue be solved? The NFL, the NBA, the EU, Congress … wherever you look, it seems people would rather wrangle these days than resolve their differences. The U.S. Treasury...
Stocks are fizzling ...
Will the markets feel stress as the deadline to raise the debt limit approaches? August 2 looms. That is the absolute deadline for raising the federal debt ceiling, according to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. The U.S. actually “hit” the $14.3 trillion ceiling on May 16 but...
Why these stocks are looking attractive again to high net worth investors. Large caps have kept up with small caps this year. 2010 was a great year for small stocks – the Russell 2000 advanced 25.31% while the S&P 500 returned 12.78% (15.06% including dividends). This...
The credit rating agency sends up a flare and hopes for action on Capitol Hill. Pessimism over America’s ability to reduce its deficit. When one of the world’s premier credit rating agencies issues a warning for America, global stock markets dip. On April 18, Standard &...
Rolling the dice on returns. When a man walks into a casino in Monte Carlo and rolls a pair of dice at the craps table, he has a 1 in 36 chance (62=36) of the dice lying face up in any particular combination. He knows this because...