While we had some recovery today so far 2016 is off to a less than wonderful start for equity investors. For a brief period we were 10% off the highs and in legitimate correction territory but todays rally changed that. The rally was attributed to a lack of bad news out of China, a bid in oil for the first time this week and decent earnings from JP Morgan (JPM). We had decent results out of Intel tonight but the outlook was a little dim so we will see what that means for tomorrow. It is still a fairly volatile environment for equities and we will see what the next week or two brings us.
Looking at the economy I see that there is still a lot of talk about who wonderful the US economy is right now. The president in his State of the Union drug out that tired old canard about the US being the strongest in the world. I am sorry but being the tallest short person does not mean you will be starting at center for the New York Knicks tonight (see how I shamelessly pandered to those readers in the heart of the financial world there?) We are better than most of the economies because the other economies are horrific right now not because we are seeing wonderful surge of economic activity. Listen to what Steelcase, the office furniture company, CEO Jim Keane had to say last week He told his investors that” “I will also comment I am a member of various groups where CEOs come together and talk about what they see. And for these large customer CEOs, some of the outlooks, for example, business roundtables, commentary recently about business capital spending, would confirm that are large customers are seeing this headwind. So, ...
