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@theMarket: Fed Expected to Begin Interest Rate Cuts Next Week
By Bill Schmick,
03:50PM / Friday, September 13, 2024
After two years of monetary tightening, the Federal Reserve Bank is poised to begin loosening its policy. Is the event already priced in or will the stock market celebrate with new highs?   It may depend on how deep a cut the Fed is willing to make. In my opinion, in the long run it won't matter unless you are one of those day-to-day options traders who live or die based on the next trade. Nonetheless, in a market that may well hit a new high next week, what the Fed does and how it talks about future cuts will be important.   Some believe the Fed should cut one-half of a percent (50 basis points), while others are in the camp that it will only need a

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@theMarket: September Into October Could Be Bumpy for Stocks
By Bill Schmick,
03:36PM / Friday, August 30, 2024
We enter September with the three major averages close to or above yearly highs. Momentum is still on the side of the bulls. As such, in the next week or so, markets could attempt to scale those heights and possibly better them.   It is what happens next that concerns me. The next two months are seasonally the worst period for the stock market. However, investors also expect the Federal Reserve Bank to cut interest rates at their meeting on Sept. 17-18. That is normally a bullish development for stocks. We won't know if the Fed will cut rates, but the markets are betting heavily on that outcome.   The macroeconomic data this week certainly reinforced those

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@theMarket: Stocks Battle Back to Even
By Bill Schmick,
02:09PM / Friday, August 16, 2024
It was a good week in the equity market. The bounce back from the 8 percent sell-off at the beginning of the month is but a distant memory. Does that mean we are in the clear for further gains?   Maybe. So far, the financial markets have seen a "V" shaped recovery from the lows of Monday a week past. Technically, that is a rare occurrence after a downdraft of that magnitude. And yet, that is exactly what has happened thus far.   The gains have been helped by a spate of good corporate earnings, with 80 percent of S&P 500 companies beating estimates. A few benign macroeconomic readings suggested continued economic growth, a lessening of inflation,

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@theMarket: Has the Fed Waited Too Long?
By Bill Schmick,
12:31PM / Saturday, August 03, 2024
"Be careful what you wish for" is an often-used quote. In the case of the financial markets, all year long, traders and the Fed wished for a slower economy, less employment, and therefore a decline in inflation. Now that we have it, the markets don't like it.   Earlier in the week, the bulls could not have asked for a more dovish Federal Open Market Committee meeting. While the central bank maintained its higher-for-longer stance, it hinted that September could see the first of several interest rate cuts. Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank, said it will depend on economic data over the next several weeks. "If that test is met, a

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@theMarket: Markets Midsummer Slide Wallops Technology
by Bill Schmick,
03:52PM / Friday, July 26, 2024
July, as promised, has turned out to be a month where financial markets have been buffeted by fireworks on various fronts. A gambit of data from inflation to economic growth combined with a new American brand of populism has led to some unexpected market consequences.   The good news first. In the second quarter, gross domestic product grew well above economists' expectations at an annualized pace of 2.8 percent, compared to forecasts of 2 percent growth. The "core" Personal Consumption Expenditures Index (PCE), which excludes food and energy, grew by 2.9 percent in the second quarter. That was above estimates of 2.7 percent but significantly lower than the 3.7

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