REIT - Weekly Market Pulse: Don't Just Do Something Sit There
2024-04-01 08:00:00 ET
Summary
- Energy stocks were the leaders as oil prices rose strongly in the quarter, lower crude oil demand being another consensus opinion taken out behind the woodshed during the first three months of the year.
- Digging down to the industry level, homebuilders had another good quarter and insurance stocks handily beat the market.
- Gold and commodities both rose while small and mid-cap stocks also had solid quarters. About the only losers were bonds and REITs, both down in a rising rate environment.
The first quarter of 2024 is in the books and the US economy and markets continue to defy expectations, which coming into this year were that growth and inflation would both moderate and the Fed would be able (or forced, depending on how much things slowed) to cut interest rates 0.25% as many as six times this year. In fact, at the beginning of this year, there was a better than 50% chance the first cut would come in the month we just ended. That, of course, didn’t happen because while real growth and inflation both likely slowed in the first quarter (we don’t have all the data yet), it wasn’t enough to get the Fed too excited. The consensus opinion the last two years has been that a recession was/is just around the corner and it has been nothing if not consistent – and wrong. And it still is....
Weekly Market Pulse: Don't Just Do Something, Sit There