This is the first in a series of the opportunities and threats to productivity. I begin the series with a focus on the productivity effects of AI adoption. There has been a lot of excitement over the productivity-enhancing promise of artificial intelligence. From a policy perspective, productivity is important as it defines the rate...
Mid-week market update: The combination of the Quarterly Census Employment and Wages (QCEW) weakness and a soft PPI report has moved the market to expect to at least a quarter-point rate cut at the FOMC meeting next week. There are even whispers that the Fed may even move by a half-point, though the odds is...
Preface: Explaining our market timing models We maintain several market timing models, each with differing time horizons. The “Ultimate Market Timing Model” is a long-term market timing model based on the research outlined in our post, Building the ultimate market timing model. This model tends to generate only a handful of signals each decade. The Trend...
In the wake of the August Payroll Report, let’s review the Fed’s dilemma and the views of Fed Governor Chris Waller, one of the frontrunners to be the next Fed Chair. Is monetary policy restrictive? Yes, by a number of measures. The Cleveland Fed recently published a study that estimated r-star, or the neutral...
Special Announcement: Humble Student of the Markets will cease publishing a year from now, on March 31, 2026. (This is being published on March 31, 2025 and it is not an April Fools joke). Here's some history. I began writing Humble Student of the Markets in 2007. I had left Merrill Lynch to begin...
Preface: Explaining our market timing models We maintain several market timing models, each with differing time horizons. The “Ultimate Market Timing Model” is a long-term market timing model based on the research outlined in our post, Building the ultimate market timing model. This model tends to generate only a handful of signals each decade. The Trend...
Markets were rattled by policy under Trump 1.0 by his unpredictable and chaotic nature. Trump 2.0 promises to be more of the same. Other than the transactional nature of Trump’s deal making, what’s his ultimate end game? It’s to undo the effects of globalization. The political backdrop can be explained by Branko Milanovic’s famous...
Mid-week market update: The stock market’s relief rally arrived this week when the WSJ reported over the weekend that Trump’s “Liberation Day” reciprocal tariffs due to be announced on April 2 will be narrowly focused. The S&P 500 rallied to regain its 200 dma. The index pulled back below the 200 dma when Bloomberg reported...
Preface: Explaining our market timing models We maintain several market timing models, each with differing time horizons. The “Ultimate Market Timing Model” is a long-term market timing model based on the research outlined in our post, Building the ultimate market timing model. This model tends to generate only a handful of signals each decade. The Trend...
The latest FOMC statement and subsequent press conference were full of references to “uncertainty”. Most notably, the FOMC statement changed the language related to the Fed’s goals being “roughly in balance” to “uncertainty around the economic outlook has increased”. Not only is uncertainty elevated, but also the risks to inflation, GDP growth and...
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