Hey everyone, as we prepare for the end of year festivities I want to wish all of our User Group Members and fans a very Happy Holiday Greetings!
We are finishing off this decade in the financial markets breaking records almost every other day and what a comparison from December 2018. I am on the road traveling this next week on what will be one of the busiest travel periods of the year. And as a reminder; – the financial markets in the US will close on Tuesday, Dec 24th at 1 PM ET and will remain closed on Christmas Day, Dec 25th so we can expect very light trading volume this coming week.
Market Sound-Bites:
• The fourth quarter has certainly capped off a truly phenomenal year for the stock market. All three of the major U.S. indices—S&P 500, Dow and Nasdaq—have set new 52-week highs after new 52-week highs in the past three months…in fact, November turned out to be the strongest month of the year for the stock market in 2019, as the S&P 500 set 13 new 52-week highs during the month. And this trend has continued in December, with the S&P 500, Dow and Nasdaq all breaching new highs in the past week.
• 2019 was an exceptionally strong year for the stock market because yield-hungry investors were chasing stocks with high dividend yields. And since the S&P 500 had lackluster earnings in each quarter of 2019, investors were also gravitating towards stocks that were able to maintain strong forecasted earnings
• And not to be outdone, it’s been a banner year for corporate debt, as the Bloomberg Barclays High Yield Index has returned more than 14% year-to-date, on pace for the best year since 2016 and pushing the index yield-to-worst to a five-year low of 5.13%…Investment Grade has fared even better, with the Bloomberg Barclays Index logging a 14.4% gain, which would be the best showing since 2009.
• For those of you that are Members of our User Group stay tuned as we will have a great kick-off to 2020 with my views about opportunities in the coming year and which assets and sectors will offer up the best favorable odds of success. We will also explore Commodities and Currencies to get a great mix and flavor on where to place your money as we ring in the New Year.
Weekly Market Round-Up
Don’t Be A Rat Brain Trader – Be the Red Stripe Zebra !!
Trade Smart !
hpb
