magazine archive
magazine archive
Russ Mould
Why America’s interest bill is so important and why no-one is talking about it
Thursday 03 Oct 2024The US Federal Reserve is cutting interest rates for the first time since the pandemic-poleaxed year of 2020 in a welcome (and necessary) affirmation of the equity markets’ bullish narrative that inflation will cool, the American and Western economies will enjoy a soft landing (if they suffer any...
Stodgy sectors come to the fore in 2024
Thursday 19 Sep 2024This column is no adherent to ‘efficient market hypothesis’, not least because there would not be equity booms and busts, or even marked day-to-day volatility, if investors really knew what was coming around the corner – it simply would not be possible to make a profit if everything was perfectly...
How to ride central bank rate cut cycles (without falling off)
Thursday 05 Sep 2024Interest rate cuts in the month of August in the UK, Sweden and New Zealand, to name but three, take the global total to 108 this year, according to the website www.cbrates.com . That is more than 2022 and 2023 combined, and the US Federal Reserve is now dropping very unsubtle hints that it will be...
Why chip stocks need to keep cooking
Thursday 22 Aug 2024Regular readers of this column will be well aware of its faith in the Philadelphia Semiconductor index, or SOX, as a valuable indicator to follow and after the summer stock market stumble the 30-stock benchmark is well and truly in the headlines. At its early-August low, the SOX had lost 25% of its...
Why the yen holds the key to markets and what may lie ahead
Thursday 08 Aug 2024A market storm is emerging from a seemingly cloudless summer sky. The question now is whether this is just a tempest in a teapot, and the result of thin trading volumes as the big hitters head to the beach and leave deputies and juniors in charge, or whether it is the harbinger of a more serious –...
Are UK equities ready for a return to favour with global investors?
Thursday 25 Jul 2024As fund management legend and Vanguard founder John Bogle once noted: ‘The stock market is a giant distraction from the business of investing. In the long run, investing is about the returns earned by businesses not the stock market.’ In other words, sentiment may drive prices in the near term but...
What do Biden’s blunders mean for US bonds?
Thursday 11 Jul 2024The debate over the mental acuity of Joseph R. Biden and his physical readiness to take on a second, four-year term as American’s forty-sixth president at the age of 82 (as he will be this November) is unlikely to abate any time soon. The Democratic Party has until its convention in Chicago,...
Will the third plenum prime fresh interest in China?
Thursday 27 Jun 2024For all of its current challenges, China’s economy is still the second largest in the world, trailing that of only America. According to data from the International Monetary Fund, Chinese GDP had from $1.2 trillion in 2000 to almost $18 trillion in 2023 (and thus as big as Germany, Japan, India,...
Come back Sir John Barnard, all is forgiven
Thursday 13 Jun 2024Here we go again. Shares in GameStop (GME:NYSE) are surging, US equity markets are setting new highs and a lowly reading on the VIX index suggests investors are confident that volatility will remain low and equity markets buoyant. This is all barely three years after the year GameStop melt-up (and...
How to assess the market cycle
Thursday 30 May 2024This column has no axe to grind with Nvidia (NVDA:NASDAQ) and – like everyone else – it continues to be both surprised and impressed by the growth that the semiconductor specialist is generating, thanks to the competitive position it is crafting itself in providing silicon chips that power the data...