Weekly Stock Market Update & SPY Technical Analysis Markets kicked off the new month with optimism as stocks rallied to end last week following multiple key economic and earnings reports. The Fed left rates unchanged as expected, and large cap tech stocks came in line with earnings estimates. Following The Fed’s meeting, Powell’s speech sparked hope of a July interest rate cut, but he stated it will highly depend on economic developments. We got some of those economic developments on Friday after the U.S. Unemployment Report reflected an uptick to 3.9% in unemployment, the highest in months. Although higher unemployment puts a strain on the economy, it can help slowdown demand, which ultimately cools inflation and helps The Fed’s agenda....
Weekly Market Update & SPY Technical Analysis The Federal Reserve is set to hold their third FOMC meeting of 2024 this week, which could set the tone for the new month that we’re transitioning into. April proved to be a very volatile month for markets due to lingering inflation, rising geopolitical tensions, and mixed earnings; however this week’s events will give markets a clearer picture of where The Fed stand on monetary policy and how some of the biggest companies on the market performed last quarter. Despite the excellent progress on inflation, odds of an interest rate cut in this week’s FOMC meeting have dwindled down to near zero percent. Investors started off this year hopeful that we’ll see a...
Weekly Market Update: The market downturn intensified last week after tensions heightened in the Middle East and new earnings were released. The situation between Palestine and Israel introduced new threats geopolitically, specifically the involvement of Iran. With the U.S. already funding Ukraine against Russia, economists are uneasy on how this new war will impact the U.S. economy. Unlike Ukraine, the countries involved in the Middle East aren’t major grain or wheat exporters, which means that this war won’t directly impact food prices like we saw after Russia’s invasion. However the Middle East accounts for roughly 30% of global oil production, and tensions in the region have historically driven oil prices higher. A rise in oil prices impacts all other sectors...
Weekly Stock Market Update & SPY Technical Analysis Markets ended sharply lower last week after one of Wall Street’s most prominent CEOs warned of a possible slowdown in the U.S. economy, pointing specifically to rising geopolitical tensions and inflation as being the reason. Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JP Morgan, spoke on Friday after the financial institution reported its quarterly earnings and sent fears across markets with his unsettling comments. His comments came during the same week of CPI, which showed a month over month uptick in inflation from 3.2% to 3.5% largely because of rising energy prices. Energy has been on a rampage as demand heats up to fuel multiple wars around the globe and as OPEC+ leaders change...
Weekly Market Update & SPY Technical Analysis Markets saw their strongest sell-off day in months last week after Fed’s Kashkari floated the idea of leaving interest rates unchanged this year. His comments about the lingering inflation and more necessary economic development have all been heard before, but his reference to not cutting interest rates in 2024 was a shocker to the market. The market rally that started in October of last year has been built on the anticipation of multiple interest rate cuts this year. This first cut, which was supposed to be in March, still hasn’t come, and odds of a rate cut in the June FOMC meeting have declined to about 50% thanks to sticky inflation. This makes...
