If I told you at the start of the year we'd have the second largest bank failure in the history of our country in March, you'd probably expect the stock and bond markets to have a rough quarter. While we saw a short sell-off, stocks finished the month with a
The markets appear to be stabilizing. The thought is the Fed, FDIC, and Treasury Department have successfully eliminated the risk of another financial contagion. I said last week, "We shouldn't take a move up in prices as a sign the crisis is over. There will be more companies who run
Last week was certainly an eventful one. It seemed every day had a "crisis" at a (relatively) small bank, which caused a big drop in share prices across the financial sector. This pulled the markets lower, but then a rumor, news release, government announcement, or something else emerged to calm
This year I've marveled about the optimism shown by market participants and Wall Street experts alike who truly believe the Fed has reigned in inflation and would not cause a recession (or even a slowdown in earnings). They also believed the Fed would be stopping their rate hikes soon, which
It's probably hard for most people to understand 25 years ago the Federal Reserve was quite secretive and didn't have the sole (perceived) focus of keeping the stock market afloat. Then in 1998, the Federal Reserve decided to bailout a handful of Wall Street banks who were overexposed to a
