August 2, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal The Sahm Rule triggered the recession call today. The (data) shows that the +80 bp jump in the jobless rate over the past year is a 100% iron-clad indicator that the downturn has either arrived or is about to. The Fed is as behind the economic curve [...]Read More >

  July 26, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "I changed my mind. The Fed needs to cut rates now." - Bill Dudley, former New York Fed President, Source: Bloomberg After an initial bounce Thursday morning, the equity markets reversed course late afternoon. The S&P 500 declined 0.51%, and [...]Read More >

  July 12, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "The Chevron decision means that the American civil service and agencies will no longer have wide authority to interpret legislation. Now, they will generally require legislation to act. In practical terms, this means that there is no more latitude [...]Read More >

  June 28, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "The AI boom is fueling an insatiable appetite for electricity, which is creating risks to the grid and the transition to cleaner energy sources."  - Katherine Blunt and Jennifer Hiller, Wall Street Journal, “Big Tech's Latest Obsession Is Finding [...]Read More >

  June 21, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "All of the following factors appear to be inflationary: ongoing fiscal spending, remilitarization of the world, restructuring of global trade, capital needs of the green economy and possibly higher energy costs due to the lack of needed [...]Read More >

  June 14, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "I'll reiterate my belief again that after the inflation spike and inflation slow down, we are not just magically coming down to around 2% and staying there. Inflation volatility is here and will be for a while."  - Peter Boockvar, The Boock [...]Read More >

  June 7, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "One of the prime lessons learned from long-term analysis is that no asset class can stay permanently detached from fundamentals."  - Jeremy J. Siegel, Stocks for the Long Run: The Definitive Guide to Financial Market Returns & Long-Term [...]Read More >

  May 31, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "Do I think that rates can go up a little bit? Yes I do. And if they do is the world prepared for it? Not really." - Jamie Dimon, CEO, JPMorgan Chase A seemingly endless amount of research crosses my desk each week. Most of it is nonsense. My head [...]Read More >

  May 24, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them." -John F. Kennedy This is a short note this week as I'm racing to get on the road to Ithica, NY. Our youngest is graduating [...]Read More >

  May 25, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "One of the key priorities today of Chinese policymakers is to de-dollarize their trade, is to reduce their dependency on the U.S. dollar. And this is much more for geostrategic reasons than economic reasons. I think in the past 15, 20 years, you have [...]Read More >

  May 10, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "The horizon leans forward, offering you space to place new steps of change." – Maya Angelou Grab your coffee and find your favorite chair. This week, I will continue sharing several high-level takeaways from the Mauldin Economics 2024 Strategic [...]Read More >

  May 1, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "All of the following factors appear to be inflationary: ongoing fiscal spending, remilitarization of the world, restructuring of global trade, capital needs of the green economy and possibly higher energy costs due to a lack of needed investment." – [...]Read More >

  April 26, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal “The greatest wealth is created by being an early investor in innovation. Making that investment requires believing in something before the majority of people understand it. You will be mocked, ridiculed & criticized for your non-consensus [...]Read More >

  April 19, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "World peace must develop from inner peace. Peace is not just mere absence of violence. Peace is, I think, the manifestation of human compassion." – Dalai Lama XIV   I've been writing about the growing geopolitical challenges, mainly a rising [...]Read More >

  April 12, 2024 By Steve Blumenthal "The deficits today are even larger and occurring in boom times—not as the result of a recession—and they have been supported by quantitative easing, which was never done before the great financial crisis [...] These markets seem to be pricing in at [...]Read More >