Q2 2024

Many likely consider AI as having started when OpenAI launched ChatGPT in November 2022. But several years of work went into the release, with OpenAI having been founded in 2015. Rather than the years devoted, we focus on the incredible progress made over that time.

Q1 2024

The recovery among Industrial stocks is more easily explained than gold’s resurgence. The sector notched the fourth best performance during the quarter, trailing Technology, Financials, and Communications. Technology and Communications benefited from continuing artificial intelligence (AI) excitement with Nvidia and Meta leading the way, while rates remaining higher for longer supported bank margins.

Q4 2023

Entering the second half of 2023, concerns of a “higher for longer” interest rate environment weighed on the market, sending both indices into negative territory for the summer.

Q3 2023

In the third quarter of 2023, investor attention was primarily focused on the interest rate environment (ignoring political issues, such as Congressional battling over budgets, funding, and the Speaker of the House). While Federal Reserve rate increases moderated, the target rate was raised 25 basis points (bps) at the July meeting, and the current outlook envisages one additional hike.

Q2 2023

Year-to-date, the S&P 500 Index rose a healthy 16.89%, while the more Tech-heavy NASDAQ Composite Index soared 32.32%. Such figures, however, belie a darker picture just below the surface, as index performance was driven by a handful of mostly mega-cap stocks: Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta (Facebook), Microsoft, Netflix, Tesla, and Nvidia.

Q3 2022

Times of tumult, such as we’ve seen this year, warrant reflection. The pandemic and the government’s shifting focus to issues at home overshadowed the saber-rattling seen in 2019. Part of this shift included a flood of fiscal and monetary stimulus, which provided support to keep economies from succumbing to a microscopic agent, but eventually led asset prices to balloon and the economy to overheat.