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Posts Tagged ‘negative yields’

Bonds Are Markets Too

June 12th, 2019 by Kurt L. Smith

The bond market has been on quite a tear of late. With lower yields and higher prices, bond market articles have been on the front pages of The New York Times as well as other prominent articles in their business section.

Stocks on the other hand ended last month with their sixth consecutive down week. With bonds moving higher in price and stocks moving lower maybe there is something new going on. Perhaps your stock portfolio hasn’t been performing as it once did. Is something new happening?

From our vantage point, there is nothing new going on in the markets. The bond bear market began in 2012. Others may argue with me on this but that gives us a sense of how long a topping (or turning) pattern may take to develop or be fully recognized.

The bond (price) topping pattern or yield bottoming pattern has unfolded over many years already. Perhaps we will see something similar time-wise with stocks, but perhaps not. Perhaps the reason your stock portfolio isn’t performing the way you think it should is because we are in a similar topping pattern currently with stocks. If this is the case, which I believe, the key issue we need to address is one of risk versus reward.

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First Bonds, Now Stocks

August 8th, 2016 by Kurt L. Smith

The bond market has performed well of late and municipal bonds added to their top ranked performance last year. Yields seem to move in only one direction, down, making prices appear to only go up.

Around the world bond prices have gone up so much, yields on trillions of dollars of bonds are now negative. The trend in bond prices has continued for so long (thirty-plus years) and has produced seemingly consistent returns for so long, investors seem loath to do anything except buy more.

Whatever the reason, whatever the narrative, almost all pundits are on the same side of the boat: low yields and high prices will continue. Money managers may be buying high priced negative yielding bonds now because they are judged on their current performance, not the negative performance calculated if they hold the bonds to maturity in five, ten or more years. Good performance seems to beget good performance, so enjoy the ride!

If you liked the bond market rally this year then I think you will really enjoy the stock market rally which appears to be gathering steam. Stocks rebounded from their early season low in February and new all-time highs are being set regularly of late. Like bonds, as the rally continues to gather momentum, expect stocks to generate excitement, the excitement previously held for bonds. (more…)

We’re Not Going To Take It….Anymore

July 21st, 2016 by Kurt L. Smith

Britain decided it no longer wanted to be a member of the European Union. Britain had enough of Europe or precisely 52% of British voters had enough. The reasons why they had enough was not an issue. The result however is clear: Britain will no longer be a member of one organization bigger than itself: The EU.

Soon Britain may not be a part of another larger organization, the one that makes it Great. So blow the winds of change, especially when the issues that trouble many are seemingly ignored by those who hold the power.

How many Brits voted for an exit because of fear of immigration and the fear of more, seemingly out of control, immigration? We don’t know. We do know that immigration has been an issue longer than a European Union has been a dream. If times are good and spirits rising odds are we can ignore the issue or simply praise the benefits of immigration. Times are not that good now, the mood has changed and leadership needs to change with the times. (more…)

Over The Top

May 16th, 2016 by Kurt L. Smith

For the past several months we have discussed the manic moves of municipal bonds. As one of the best performing asset classes last year, it looked like we would be poised to experience follow-through this year with additional new money flowing into municipal bonds.

Indeed this has been the case. Money flows into tax free municipal bond funds continues week after week. Not only are new deals like the one’s presented at the bottom of each month’s newsletter selling well in the marketplace, we are also seeing intense competition for bonds in the secondary market. In a word, the market in my opinion is “hot”. But after several months of “hot”, the market seems to me to be “over the top”. (more…)

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