December Fed Meeting: In the final meeting of 2018, the U.S. Federal Reserve elected to raise its target range for the federal funds rate another 0.25% to between 2.25% and 2.50%. This caps off a year which saw 3 such quarter point increases. After the steep stock market declines in October and November, many market participants began to speculate that the Fed would hold off on a final increase for the year…

U.S. Housing Market with a Closer Look at Dallas: After 6 years of steady improvement for home builder optimism, we are finally starting to see some significant pull back from 2017 highs. This data is supported by declines in profitability for home builders due to higher costs and declines in prospective buyer traffic. As a result, housing starts and building permits have seen a dip as well…

Bank Shares Underperforming: Recently, the banking sector has begun to significantly underperform the broader market. Despite maintaining a relatively high correlation throughout the past year, as the Fed has begun to increase the short term interest rate target, banks (particularly smaller, regional banks) have slid in value. Areas that have been raised as particular concern, and thus explanations for the recent declines, include slowing loan origination growth due to higher rates and soft property markets…

U.S. & China Trade War: Earlier this summer, a 25% tariff was imposed on $50 billion of Chinese goods. Starting September 24th, a 10% tariff was placed on $200 billion of Chinese products entering the United States. This latest round is different since it is not only larger, but the White House has also indicated that it will pursue a higher rate of 25% later this year if progress is not made in trade negotiations with China…

Cohen and Manafort in Court: Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, admitted in court on August 21st that he had been directed by “a candidate for federal office” to arrange payments to two women during the 2016 campaign in order to dissuade them from speaking out about their affairs with the candidate…

The Manafort Trial: Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, has been key person of interest in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into election meddling and potential Trump campaign violations. In October of last year, Manafort was first indicted (in Washington D.C.) on 12 federal charges that included money laundering and failing to register as a foreign agent…

Indictments, NATO, and the 2018 Russia–US Summit: Despite calls from top democrats to cancel the 2018 Russia–US Summit in the wake of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s recent indictment of 12 Russian intelligence officers for election interference, the meeting between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin is firmly set to take place in Helsinki, Finland on Monday, July 16. Russia’s foreign ministry is calling the Special Counsel’s claims a “heap of conspiracy schemes” designed to “damage the atmosphere” ahead of the summit…

The Trump & Kim Summit: For the first time in history, a sitting U.S. president and a North Korean leader have met face-to-face to begin peace talks. This summit between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un took place beginning at 9:00 A.M. Singapore time on June 12th at the Capella Hotel on the resort island of Sentosa where the two met one-on- one (with translators present), participated in an bilateral meeting with advisors present, shared a working lunch, signed a joint statement, and met with the press separately…

Trump’s Stormy Situation: Back on January 12, 2018, The Wall Street Journal broke headlines after a report outlined how Trump’s attorney, Michael Cohen, paid $130,000 to Stephanie Clifford (also known as “Stormy Daniels”) in order to keep an alleged affair from coming to light in October of 2016…

The Trade War: While the United States and China are not currently in the midst of a trade war, the recent rhetoric between Washington and Beijing has been a growing concern. More specifically, these fears snowballed after Trump began tweeting on March 2nd that, “When a country (USA) is losing many billions of dollars on trade with virtually every country it does business with, trade wars are good, and easy to win. Example, when we are down $100 billion with a certain country and they get cute, don’t trade anymore-we win big. It’s easy!”…

Major Market Corrections: On Monday, February 5th, the Dow Jones Industrial Average took a 1,175 point (4.6%) plunge – its largest one-day point drop in history that sent shockwaves around the globe. At its worst, the Dow fell nearly 1,600 points in the late hours of the afternoon. Meanwhile that day, the S&P 500 fell 4.1% to 2,648 and the Nasdaq fell 3.78% to 6,967. Of the hardest hit, energy, financial, and health care stocks saw the most significant declines…

The State of the Union Address: Although presidents have provided annual addresses to Congress since President Washington delivered his in 1790 and President Wilson helped it become routine practice after 1913, Trump’s first State of the Union Address was certainly one that will stand-out in the history books. During his speech, he covered tax cuts, immigration, energy, health care, bipartisanship, and infrastructure. Instead of our usual headline and takeaway format, we will simply breakdown and dissect the aforementioned key points Trump made in his speech…