Job Growth Came Up Short in November

Posted by lplresearch Friday, December 3, 2021 The domestic economy added just 210,000 jobs during November, well below Bloomberg-surveyed economists’ consensus forecast for a gain of 550,000 and below October’s revised tally of 546,000. The net revision to prior months was positive but only by 82,000. The modest 23,000 gain in leisure and hospitality jobs, which […]

December 3, 2021

Is the Bond Market Pricing in a Fed Policy Error?

Posted by lplresearch Tuesday, December 7, 2021 After months of carefully communicating the Federal Reserve’s (Fed) plan to reduce its asset purchases toward the middle of 2022, Fed Chairman Jerome Powell seemingly sped up that timetable during his Congressional testimony last week. While not officially announced policy yet, the expectation is that the Fed will now accelerate […]

December 7, 2021

Have We Reached Peak Quit?

Posted by lplresearch Thursday, December 9, 2021 The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its monthly Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) report this week revealing that the number of American workers who are voluntarily quitting their jobs may have peaked, after hitting record levels in September. The overall quit rate fell from 3% […]

December 10, 2021

Peak Inflation: Are We There Yet?

Posted by lplresearch Friday, December 10, 2021 The Consumer Price Index, the most well known measure of inflation, climbed 6.8% over the last year through November, according to data released today by the Labor Department. While in line with economists’ consensus expectation, that’s the highest level since 1982. The “core” inflation reading, which excludes the more volatile […]

Record High for the Consumer Staples Sector

Posted by lplresearch Thursday, November 18, 2021 The S&P 500 closed at a record high on Friday, but only two of its eleven underlying sectors could say the same. The first was technology, which as we noted last month, has been showing consistent relative strength since May and was boosted by a more than 10% gain from Apple […]

December 14, 2021

Five Important Charts To See Right Now

Posted by lplresearch Wednesday, December 15, 2021 As we head into the end of 2021, here are five charts that caught our attention. First up, last week was one of the best weeks of the year for stocks, and that could be a good sign. “It turns out that big weeks like last week usually have […]

December 15, 2021

Federal Reserve Meeting Recap: Powell Pivot: Confirmed

Posted by lplresearch Thursday, December 16, 2021 The Federal Reserve (Fed) ended its two-day Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting yesterday and there were some notable shifts to monetary policy, although these shifts were largely expected by markets. After months of carefully communicating the Fed’s plan to reduce its asset purchases toward the middle of 2022, […]

December 16, 2021

Sector Playbook For Fed Rate Hikes Favors Value

Posted by lplresearch December 17, 2021 For those of us who haven’t already started holiday vacations, we all know this was Federal Reserve (Fed) meeting week. In anticipation of how much investors would be focused on the Fed this winter, we put a chart in Outlook 2022: Passing the Baton showing how well stocks have historically handled the start […]

December 17, 2021

The Federal Reserve Wants to Hike Rates. Can it?

Posted by lplresearch Tuesday, December 21, 2021 At the conclusion of last week’s Federal Reserve (Fed) meeting, the Fed released its dot plot, which showed the median forecast among officials is now for three rate hikes in 2022. Moreover, it showed eight rate hikes over the next three years, which would take the fed funds rate to […]

December 21, 2021

Do You Believe In The Santa Claus Rally?

Posted by lplresearch Wednesday, December 22, 2021 “If Santa should fail to call, bears may come to Broad and Wall.” —Yale Hirsh December is widely known as one of the best months of the year for stocks, but most don’t realize that the majority of the gains happen in the second half of the month. View […]

December 22, 2021