ISN Coffee House – BREXIT
The UK has been a less than enthusiastic member of the European Union for many years with problems blamed upon Brussels for a variety of situations only sometimes fair.
ISN Coffee House – Jerome Powell in Zurich
Coffee houses in both the UK and USA historically are meeting places, obviously for coffee, but also to discuss the issues of the day normally with a business emphasis. This tradition is still active today. The ISN Coffee House occasional musings are in a similar vein discussing issues of the day.
This past week FED Chairman Jerome Powell, spoke at the Zurich University. I ( Bruce Albrecht ) attended with many others. One does not go to these events expecting to learn some new revelation although it is good to have some things confirmed and one never knows what questions might be asked from the audience.
Market Outlook – Start of the BEAR
WE were asked this question over the weekend. Any time the market declines fear rises in investors’ minds. No one wants to have large equity portfolios if the market is heading to a serious bear market. In the attached report we went through some of our main indicators and factors that explain equity markets. None of the factors are calling for a bear market. That does not mean that we cannot have a correction type of shorter term decline. Rather the economic environment does not call for a bear market. This is similar to the reports that we regularly produce although the text is more casual than normal. On the cover we show clips of past forecasts by advisors expecting the start of the bear market in 2017 and again this January. The January bear call much have been particularly painful as the US market advanced very rapidly immediately after this forecast. Flip through the factor charts and see that the big bear is not yet upon us.