July 25, 2023 After a pause last month, would anyone be surprised if the Federal Reserve raised short-term rates by .25% again tomorrow? Not after hearing statements by Chairman Powell during the past month. As a matter of fact, he indicated that two increases in a row were on the table – though the Fed […]
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August 8, 2023 The Federal Reserve and every market analyst have been waiting for the job market to cool down a bit so that one of the last bastions of inflation could fall. The June employment picture was a bit cloudier for the first time this year. Though the headline job data again was just […]
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August 1, 2023 Every year we seem to publish the “Dog Days of August” edition. And there is always new fodder for the edition. Certainly, August a few years ago was unique because we were in the height of the pandemic. This year, the battle between good and evil is taking place within our economy. […]
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July 18, 2023 For two years from the inception of the pandemic, the Federal Reserve kept short-term interest rates close to zero. Then as the pandemic waned and the economy bounced back, the Fed went on an inflation fighting campaign and they raised rates at ten straight meetings over a 15-month period. At the last […]
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July 11, 2023 Last month, the Federal Reserve Board took a breather from raising rates. They went into “wait and see mode” in order to determine what they would do next. Well, one data point they were waiting for arrived last Friday – the jobs report. Up until now the jobs machine has not taken […]
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June 27, 2023 Just about every market analyst has been predicting a recession sometime in 2023. Well, here we are ending the first half of the year and we have seen very few signs of a recession. To the contrary, as of last month the economy had added almost 1.5 million jobs in the first […]
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June 13, 2023 When a kitten or puppy waves their paws at us, it is considered major cuteness in action. When the Federal Reserve Board is faced with a decision regarding the “pausing” of interest rate hikes, there is no cuteness involved – just a bunch of hemming and hawing (not pawing). So, the Fed […]
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June 13, 2023 Fifteen months ago, the Federal Reserve Board’s Open Market Committee met and raised short-term interest rates for the first time in almost four years. Since then, there has been an automatic rise in short-term rates each time they have met – ten times in all. In a previous commentary we spoke about […]
Read More May 30, 2023 Why did we put these three words together? First, we just celebrated Memorial Day. Though summer does not start officially for a few weeks, Memorial Day is the unofficial start of the summer season. It is the time that school starts to let out and the masses plan their vacations. In the […]
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May 23, 2023 For a year we have had to deal with rising interest rates and lower home affordability. Much of this was expected after record-low interest rates helped fuel a real estate purchasing frenzy which resulted in prices increasing by double digits for the past few years. Fast forward to today, and home prices […]
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