Latest Research

· The U.S. is leading the foreign markets, but for how long?

While there is plenty to worry about, some important technical trends still suggest that November 20, 2008 stands a good chance of being the final low of this bear market.

The new low in the Dow Jones Transports is a bullish portent, but only if the Dow Jones Industrials can hold above their November low.

In January we expanded our Global Group universe from 67 to 92 groups. We believe these modifications enhance our ability to identify and track important leadership trends, and allow us to target portfolio exposures with greater accuracy.

A last look at a dismal year for Playing the Bounce.

This month’s Of Special Interest focuses on the dismal outlook for earnings. But there is hope, as they should be approaching trough levels soon. After all, with easier comps on the horizon, things can’t get much worse, can they?

2008 is over. We expect 2009 to be better since worst-case scenarios now seem less likely to play out.

Establishing new Select Industries equity portfolio holding in Airlines.

“January Effect” has lost some of its luster in recent years, but historically it has produced very strong returns following big down years.

Still a mountain of cash available (MZM data), which could find its way into the stock market. Don’t confuse scarcity of buyers with scarcity of liquidity.

Even with perfect hindsight, an investor who purchased the 20 best performing groups in 2008 would have generated a 13% loss for the year. The 20 worst performing groups had an average loss of 62.5%.

Last January we noted the appearance of a rare and dangerous technical configuration in the Dow Jones Industrials Average. Some analysts have described this topping pattern as the “Killer Wave”, and did it ever live up to that nickname in 2008.

“Playing The Bounce” strategy produced impressive gains in December, but results are still negative from October introduction.

Once again, this month’s “Of Special Interest” examines deflation but employs a longer time horizon. We also contrast the deflationary environment in Japan versus current U.S. conditions.

Drama, if not direction, have become one of the stock market’s few certainties.

While we can’t be certain that the final figures for the bear market have been booked, it’s worth putting the last 14 months of action into perspective.

New bull markets are front end loaded, with the strongest performance usually coming within the first few months. Study also shows that Small Cap Growth stocks tend to outperform their Large Cap and Value counterparts.

Establishing a new Select Industries Equity Portfolio holding in Education Services. The group was upgraded to Attractive this month, after seeing upgrades in four of seven categories.

The S&P 500 has produced an annual compound return of -0.9% per year for the last ten years (November 1998 through November 2008). This does, however, set the stage for very strong performance going forward.

Non-farm payroll data is poised to register a buy signal for the stock market in early December. Using the year over year rate of change has historically been very effective in identifying recession-related market bottoms.