Headlines had oil selling at -$37.63 per barrel at close on Monday, April 20. The negative sign in front? Sellers had to pay buyers $37.63 to take the oil off their hands. Except this wasn’t the price of oil. It was the price of a useful financial instrument, called a futures contract, in this case [...]
Stock returns get all the headlines, and with US equities entering their first bear market since 2008, there is good reason for that. However, fixed income may account for a significant portion, or even a majority, of many investors’ portfolios, making bond returns just as important for those investors. While we believe stock returns can [...]
We continue to follow our Road to Recovery Playbook for help determining where the market is in its bottoming process. Today we are making two changes: The first is to Signal #1, which we upgraded from “monitoring daily” to ”almost there.” We aren’t ready to check this one off completely, based on the latest data from Johns [...]
First quarter earnings season will kick off this week with 40 S&P 500 Index companies slated to report results, including several of the biggest banks on Tuesday and Wednesday. Analysts are calling for a roughly 10% year-over-year decline in earnings for the index, as shown in the LPL Chart of the Day, down from the [...]
The economic damage inflicted by the current COVID-19 pandemic has been unprecedented, with thousands of businesses temporarily shuttered and millions of workers out of work. While the historic drop in economic activity is real and will be reflected in the second quarter gross domestic product (GDP) numbers, some nuances in the way GDP is reported [...]
Experiencing a major pullback in stocks is never a comfortable feeling when you're investing. In times like these, we believe it can be helpful to set aside the daily headlines and keep perspective of how stocks have historically performed over the long term. After all, the majority of market participants are long-term investors, not day [...]
“Could there be another depression” is one of the top questions we’ve received over the past week. “Yes, we are in a recession and many are worried if things may get much worse before they get better,” explained LPL Financial Senior Market Strategist Ryan Detrick. “But we continue to think the double-barrel of support from [...]
Factor #1 in our Road to Recovery Playbook is finding confidence in the peak of COVID-19 cases in the United States. At LPL Research we are monitoring this factor daily, and we wanted to provide an update into what we are seeing. As shown in the LPL Chart of the Day, while the number of [...]
The big equity bounce has continued, with the S&P 500 Index up more than 17% from the multi-year lows hit last Monday. The big question on many investors’ minds is could this be a bear market rally? After all, some of the most spectacular short-term bounces took place during bear markets. According to our friends [...]
Another wild week. The emotions are running high and that might cause you to make bad decisions about your money and your 401(k). In the last few days I've gotten calls asking: "What do I do now?" - Some clients want to cash out or move to a money market. If you do, when the [...]
