Author: 1st Discount Brokerage

S&P 500 monthly price changes for 2016. January started the year off on a sour note, -5.1%. March rallied the troops with the index gaining 6.6%. August petered out as usual -.1%; in fact, since WWII the 8th month has posted -.2% on average and has earned the penultimate position for worst performing month.

Janet Yellen’s words painted an improving picture for the overall economy. She expressed sufficient improvement in the labor market and gradual increases in economic output. Specifically, the area she cited enthusiastically was the “solid growth in household spending.” For those of us that are interested in knowing what’s happening in our world economically speaking –

United States Q2-2016 GDP growth figures came in at 1.1% (below 1.2% earlier est.). For Americans standard of living to increase and stay above the cost of food, shelter and heath care costs, the growth rate needs to step up another 2 percent on a continuum.http://bit.ly/2blffhe  

Is there any inflation? This morning’s consumer price report came in completely flat for the month of July, meaning the CPI index, a measure of consumer prices neither rose or fell. For the past 12 months inflation has trailed below 1 percent. There are those who would say no inflation is a good thing, while

There is an old saying on Wall Street that earnings are the lifeblood of the market. Stocks are apt to follow earnings, both up and down. As the chart below illustrates, operating earnings during the dark days of the great recession plummeted to $39.61. This sent the broad market index spiraling downward to 676, its