What happened this past week? A New President Takes Office

This week we saw a snow storm, some freezing cold temperatures (keeping natural gas prices volatile) and a trip for members of our team to California (a Pimco Conference). A Holiday week in January and some headlines from the new (or should I say, 2.0) President Trump about executive orders and what really happened to stocks and bonds?

Well, from my POV (point of view), the technicals continue to speak the story. Since the first post of this blog, I had been watching the 10 year treasury and expected a reversal. A week after that, it happened. And this week, some continued volatility. The Dow did not exceed its' high price but the S&P did eek it out. The signs continue to suggest some further profit taking overall and a pretty volatile year ahead.

But the main thing that happened this past week is....not much. The bottom up buying of stocks or ETFs despite what the overall market is doing is becoming more attractive based on our technical indicators. Finding a good stock at a good price (and being a bit more active than normal) appears to be working. This lends itself to our style of management.

I expect a number of policy changes through this first quarter out of the government will keep the market on it's toes. Let's keep following the movement of interest rates. If we can stay steady or decline a bit...or if oil and gas prices move lower....or any number of factors that give consumers more confidence, we can see some positive equity returns going forward. In the absence of this, I would expect to remain volatile with a nervous market in place as we have seen so far in 2025.

Author: Steve Economopoulos

Published: 1/24/2025