Authored by Axel Merk via MerkInvestments.com,
With the stock market and Bitcoin reaching all-time highs, what can possibly go wrong? In offering my thoughts on 2018, I see my role in reminding investors to stress test their portfolios. Is your portfolio built of straw, sticks or brick?
First, let me allege many investors have portfolios built of straw and sticks rather than brick. How do I know this? Here’s a brief check:
As if inflation wasn't "mysterious" enough to the Fed already, today the New York Fed joined the Atlanta Fed first in releasing its own measure to track underlying inflation called, simply, the Underlying Inflation Gauge. What is notable is that this latest inflation tracker shows prices behaving quite differently from traditional indexes this year.
It's deja vu all over again.
Authored by Jeffrey Snider via Alhambra Investment Partners,
Back on March 10, the New York Fed’s attempt at real-time GDP forecasting predicted that the Q1 2017 estimate would be 3.2%. That would have qualified as another decent quarter, the second out of the past three and somewhat in keeping with “reflation.” As we know today, the advance figure calculated by the Commerce Department amounted to just 0.69% growth in Q1.
The key economic releases this week are the durable goods report on Thursday and Q1 GDP on Friday. It iweek is the busiest week of earnings season, with 40% of S&P 500 equity cap reporting. In addition, there are a few scheduled speaking engagements by Fed officials this week.