Latest Research

The mini bond market sell-off in September was fueled by a string of positive developments, which should support the case for further upside in the Economic Surprise Index in the fourth quarter.

A fascinating aspect of long-running bull markets is the emergence of money-spinning strategies that come to be seen as “sure things.”

Read this week's Major Trend Index.

This multi-factor estimate of stock market risk is based on a regression to median stock market levels. The valuation comparisons in the detailed tables consider all inflation periods since 1957.

Read this week's Major Trend Index.

We believe the continued strength of this seemingly ageless bull market is due in part to the weakening U.S. dollar, which impacts the real economy and financial asset returns alike.

Read this week's Major Trend Index.

We just completed a simple study for those market bulls who might find themselves temporarily lacking in confidence (assuming such an animal isn’t extinct by now).

Read this week's Major Trend.

The Major Trend Index has bounced back into positive territory, and we expect an already-expensive U.S. market to make even higher highs later this year and into early 2018. But we are keeping an eye on the Intrinsic Value work to assess the potential losses that might occur when cyclical conditions eventually turn hostile—possibly in later 2018 or in 2019.

See this week's Major Trend Index.

Last month we assessed the effectiveness of using valuation factors as a basis for country allocation. Using 20 years of data, our results showed that they work quite well specifically for Emerging Market (EM) country-rotation, however, the same valuation-based strategy does not appear to be value-added for Developed Market (DM) allocation/rotation.

We recognize it’s uncultured to discuss federal debt and deficits during a multi-year bull market, but in economics and investing it frequently pays to worry when others don’t, and to stop worrying when others do.

We find it remarkable that the five-year trailing real return on Treasurys has dropped to zero without investors having (yet) suffered any real pain.

Bond investors residing in the Lower For Longer© camp no doubt feel vindicated by the summer rally that’s taken yields on 10-year Treasury bonds to as low as 2.06% in early September.

U.S. companies hoping for a reduction in the corporate tax rate are not exactly doing a convincing job of demonstrating “need.”

While the bond market doesn’t believe it, the past couple of months leave no doubt that the U.S. industrial economy has recovered from the energy-related slump of 2015-2016.

The milestones achieved by the current cyclical bull market have been so numerous that we hope you’ll forgive us for missing one back in May.

Throughout the early and middle innings of the current bull market, we published a variety of “terminal” S&P 500 price targets based on historical bull market norms, various technical retracements/extensions, and miscellaneous valuation objectives.

We shouldn’t bite the hand that feeds us, but it’s easy to lie with charts.