By this point, people are accustomed to every new product from Apple being described as the "next iPhone." Now Apple is making a pivot to build its services business, announcing new streaming TV, gaming, magazines, and credit card products at an event yesterday. Can services ever be the "next iPhone?" Tripp Mickle reports on Apple's new strategy for The Wall Street Journal: The iPhone is running out of juice. To go beyond the device that made Apple Inc.AAPL 1.38% a global colossus, Tim Cook is betting on a suite of services—marking the company’s biggest shift in more than a decade. The … [Read more...]
Archives for March 2019
The One Thing Investors Forget Late in A Bull Market
More than ten years into a bull market it’s easy to forget that your investment portfolio (assuming it has been crafted properly) was designed for a full investment cycle. How do you invest for a full-cycle investment cycle? When you invest for the full-cycle, you not only focus on how your portfolio will do when risk sentiment is at a peak, but you also consider how your portfolio will hold up when risk sentiment plunges. There may not be a better reminder of the power of full-cycle investing than the performance of Consumer Staples stocks over the last three decades. The Power of Full … [Read more...]
Can Private Equity Really Save Sinking Pension Funds?
In The Wall Street Journal, Jason Zweig tells the story of Calpers, the nation's largest pension fund, and the nation's growing investments in private equity. Like Calpers, many pensions are hoping to meet unrealistic return expectations (something I have written about many times, including here, here, here, and here) by investing in private equity. The problem is, it isn't a sure bet that private equity will be able to produce the returns necessary. Zweig writes: Still, the future for private equity might not be as lucrative as the past, with money gushing in and with buyouts priced near … [Read more...]
What’s Driving the Housing Market?
In February, sales of existing homes in the U.S. increased by 11.8%. Laura Kusisto of The Wall Street Journal explains that the market appears to be driven by the strong labor market and rising wages. She writes: Sales of previously owned homes posted their largest monthly gain since 2015 in February, a sign that lower mortgage rates and more attractive prices are helping to lure buyers back to the market just in time for the critical spring selling season. Existing home sales rose 11.8% in February from the prior month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.51 million, the National … [Read more...]
Don’t Get Kicked Out of the Game
One of the biggest mistakes an investor can make is to imagine that the market will perform the same way year after year. Last year’s winners are often this year’s losers. I warned investors against this mistake in July 1992, writing: How many investors—not you I hope—buy mutual funds keyed to recent performance ratings? These are usually the funds not to buy. Have you ever heard of Frank Russell Co.? These folk do a really good job of researching vital investment info. In a recent Pension & Investments article, the following item was of vital importance to you. A new study by the Frank … [Read more...]
Here’s How States Can Double Their Manufacturing Job Growth
In an analysis of new data published by the U.S. Labor Department, the National Right to Work Committee found that states with Right to Work laws had a manufacturing job growth advantage of 2:1 compared to forced unionism states. NRTWC writes: Last week, the U.S. Labor Department issued updated and revised annual data for payroll manufacturing employment in each of the 50 states. The newly-published figures for 2018 show that 6.76 million manufacturing jobs — or 53% of all factory jobs across the U.S. — are located in the 27 states that have passed and implemented Right to Work laws … [Read more...]
Are Canadian Banks in Trouble?
Steve Eisman of "The Big Short" fame believes Canadian banks are in trouble thanks to a sagging housing market and slow economy. The FT's Richard Henderson and Lindsay Fortado report: Steve Eisman, a portfolio manager at Neuberger Berman, is among a growing number of short-sellers taking positions in the likes of TD Bank and Royal Bank of Canada, in anticipation that the shares will fall. The moves come after property prices raced ahead of incomes for several years, boosted by loose lending, low interest rates and lax controls on foreign money. But new house prices in Canada slipped year on … [Read more...]
Fed Delivers a Sucker Punch to Retired Investors
The Federal Reserve delivered a sucker punch to retired investors yesterday. The Fed managed to announce an even more dovish decision than Chairman Powell had hinted at in January. Powell took any additional rate increases off the table in 2019 and announced a much faster end to the roll-off of the Fed’s bloated balance sheet than expected. Bonds will stop rolling off the balance sheet in September, with a reduction in the pace of roll-off starting in May. The Fed increased the size of its balance sheet by $3.6 Trillion during the crisis, but it is only taking back about $750 billion of … [Read more...]
Is This a Generational Opportunity in Foreign Stocks?
The chart below shows the ratio of U.S. stocks to developed market foreign stocks. As anybody who takes a proper approach to crafting stock portfolios by diversifying globally can attest, U.S. stocks have carried the load in global equity portfolios for the last decade. But has Wall Street taken this trend too far? As things stand today, the ratio of U.S. stocks to foreign stocks sits nearly three standard deviations above its long-term mean. Assuming a normal distribution, a measure this extreme happens once every century. If global equity performance remains a cyclical business as … [Read more...]
Welcome to Florida
In response to reports of the sagging luxury real estate market in Manhattan, blaming the capping of the State and Local Tax deduction for the drop in demand, Senator Rick Scott of Florida has written an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal explaining exactly why New Yorkers are fleeing to low tax Florida. He writes: A recent article in a Beltway publication warned about a potential recession and considered how it might affect President Trump’s chances at re-election. The story began—no joke: “The luxury real estate market in Manhattan is sagging.” It goes on to argue that softening in the … [Read more...]
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