EFIV News and Press, SPDR S&P 500 ESG From 01/22/23

Summary We have hit the debt limit; we have a problem. How can we put off the problem and make someone else deal with somewhere down the road? Both political parties, in my opinion, don't really want a solution to the "debt" problem; they just want to send it off once again into the...

Summary Investors are counting on inflation melting away by the summer. However, easing financial conditions and a weaker dollar are breathing life back into inflation. Commodities and import prices are just two reasons why inflation may come back sooner than you think. ...

Summary The long-awaited downturn in global trade will take place in 2023. Supply chain realignments that have been years in the making will begin to take effect. Government policies launched in 2022 will bear fruit in 2023 and include subsidies for semiconductors and automotive electri...

Summary Reserve provisioning by banks against the likelihood of further deterioration in their consumer and small business loan portfolios. Analysts’ earnings estimates are finally catching up to the market, which decided already in 2022 that conditions were headed south. The...

Summary Looking at the most recent readings of many economic indicators, nowcasting gives a more up-to-date reading of the economy than gross domestic product. The weakest US sector is housing. Building permits have been on a downward trend for much of 2022 and dropped again in December...

Summary Absent greater clarity around inflation and the Fed’s moves to combat it, we do think stock prices can fall further and that market bounces such as those seen in Q4 2022 are more likely a bear market rally rather than the start of a new bull trend. A continued decline in ...

Summary UnitedHealth Group has been making important governance changes in response to investor feedback, with sustainability a growing priority. As sustainability has increased in importance, UNH has revamped and elevated board oversight of ESG. The establishment of a corporate sus...

Summary Engaging a company on strategy can sometimes lead to concrete changes. In an October 2022 engagement with Cellnex, we encouraged the company to embrace a fiscally responsible strategy in order to protect the business in a high interest rate environment. Cellnex’s resp...

Summary On November 9, 2021, I launched the ETF Reliable Retirement Portfolio. Working from various 2022 investment outlooks as well as other research material, I constructed a 16-ETF portfolio that seeks to balance diversity, growth, and current income. In this update, I report on ...

Summary S&P 500 EPS growth for Q4 is set to come in at -3.9%, the lowest rate in over 2 years, but an improvement from last week. Despite headwinds, an early reading of corporate uncertainty seems to indicate that companies are actually the least anxious they’ve been in 5 yea...