January 16, 2015 By Steve Blumenthal  “All I can do is advise you on what has happened before. Once one country goes, capital will look around and turn on whoever they think is next. Eventually, this will move from one to the next. The dollar will be the last man standing. After that, we are [...]Read More >

January 9, 2015 By Steve Blumenthal "We shouldn't be raising rates before 2016." Chicago Fed President Charles Evans Evans, a voting member on the central bank's policymaking committee, told CNBC this week. The market responded favorably. Evans said he's hopeful that inflation will pick up. [...]Read More >

January 2, 2015 By Steve Blumenthal Each month, I like to look at the market’s valuation to get a sense of potential upside reward relative to downside risk. Today, let’s look at three valuation measures, one based on reported earnings through 12-31-2014, one based on operating revenue, and the [...]Read More >

December 26, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal All cycles eventually come to an end.  In the case of commodity bulls, 16 years is the average duration.  The longest lasted 24 years (1896–1920), the shortest lasted 8 years (1972–1980), and the most recent secular bull ended in 2011 after 12 years. What [...]Read More >

December 12, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal "Unselfish acts are the real miracles out of which all the reported miracles grow." - Ralph Waldo Emerson Have you watched any of the great Netflix TV series House of Cards? Set in present-day Washington, D.C., House of Cards is the story of Frank Underwood [...]Read More >

December 12, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal "That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach.” Aldous Leonard Huxley (1894-1963) Put me down as a long-time Philadelphia Eagles fan. But let's just say I'm on the good [...]Read More >

December 5, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal "Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do work you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all [...]Read More >

November 21, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal “A safe investment is an investment whose dangers are not at that moment apparent.” – Lord Bauer All investments involve risk. Cash under your mattress (theft or fire), bank accounts, CDs, bonds, stocks… Truly, nothing is safe – yet some risks are less and [...]Read More >

November 14, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal Shortly after each month end (after the most recent reported earnings numbers are posted), I like to run through a few of my favorite valuation charts to gauge level, asses risk and to get a sense for what the probable forward return may be. Fortunately, [...]Read More >

November 7, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal “Traditional Capitalism: You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull. Your herd multiplies and the economy grows. You sell them and retire on the income. “American Capitalism: You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publically listed company, [...]Read More >

October 31, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal “If you want to change the world, start off by making your bed” Admiral William H. McRaven “Have you heard about the Making Your Bed speech”, Susan asks me.  I was sifting through a week’s worth of research trying to figure out what might be meaningful to [...]Read More >

  October 24, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal Paul Harvey, The Rest of The Story “Years ago a teacher in Detroit asked Stevie Morris to help her find a mouse that was lost in the classroom. You see, she appreciated the fact that nature had given Stevie something no one else in the room had. [...]Read More >

October 17, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal “Investors should understand that prices and valuations are high is another way of saying future returns have already been realized, leaving little to be gained for quite some time.” John Hussman In 2005, I was pitched a Bear Stearns leveraged hedge fund that [...]Read More >

October 10, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal “We’re in a period with many daily (often hourly) points that represent pixels in the market’s picture. The short-run trends (the cyclical cycles) of the market are hard to predict. Without extraordinary powers of clairvoyance, the best plan is a diversified, [...]Read More >

October 3, 2014 By Steve Blumenthal  “A lot of people are not psychologically suited to buy stocks that bump around all the time.” Warren Buffett (CNBC Oct 2, 2014) Last week it was Dalio, Bloomberg, Dudley, Cooperman, Robertson and Conway as well as Julian Robertson’s “we have created two [...]Read More >