August 25, 2022 Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Tangents: Happy Friday Eve.
On Aug. 25, 1944, Paris was liberated by Allied forces after four years of Nazi occupation.  Go to article »
August 25, 1958: Momofuku Ando markets the first package of precooked instant noodles (Chikin Ramen).
1939: The Wizard of Oz is released.

Leornard Bernstein composer, b.1918
Sean Connery, actor, b. 1930.
Elvis Costello, musician, b. 1954
Claudia Schiffer, model, b. 1970

Party City is hiring 20,000 people, expecting an epic Halloween.  Get your costumes early. Halloween celebrations are anticipated to return with pre-pandemic fervor.

Inside Flightradar24, the website that tracks every plane in the sky.  This website was founded “completely by accident.” Now, it tracks the real-time movements of more than 200,000 planes every day.

Watch this baby elephant play with bubbles.  This 10-month-old elephant at the Fort Worth Zoo is 1,090 pounds of cuteness. Watch the video here.

7 million years ago, our earliest relatives took their first steps on 2 feet:  The oldest known human-like species likely walked on two legs as far back as 7 million years ago, a new study finds, and the discovery sheds light on what first set humans apart from our ape relatives.  Researchers analyzed a thigh bone (femur) and a pair of forearm bones (ulnae) from Sahelanthropus tchadensis, which may be the oldest known hominin — a relative of humans dating from after our ancestors split from those of modern apes — according to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. First unearthed in Chad in north central Africa in 2001, the remains are about 7 million years old.
Full Story: Live Science (8/25) 

Broken fortress discovered under ‘mega-monument’ burial mound in Cyprus:  Archaeologists excavating an enormous ancient burial mound in Cyprus have uncovered an even older structure hidden beneath it: a rampart, or part of a defensive wall, according to a statement from the Department of Antiquities Cyprus.  The large mound, known as the tumulus of Laona, is longer than a football field, or 328 feet long by 196 feet wide (100 by 60 meters) and was likely built around the third century B.C., when the successors of Alexander the Great were fighting for control of Cyprus and large swaths of the empire.  Full Story: Live Science (8/24) 

Could a solar storm ever destroy Earth?  All life on Earth owes its existence to the sun’s radiant heat. But what happens when that radiation surges out of control, and billions of tons of charged solar material suddenly barrel our way at thousands of miles a second? What happens when Earth takes a direct hit from a solar flare — and could a strong enough one ever destroy life on our planet as we know it?   The answers are complicated, but most scientists agree on one thing: Earth’s magnetic field and insulating atmosphere keep us extremely well protected from even the most powerful solar outbursts. While solar storms can tamper with radar and radio systems or knock satellites offline, the most harmful radiation is sopped up in the sky long before it touches human skin.  Full Story: Live Science (8/25) 

It took two photographers nine months to take this spectacular photo of the moon.

PHOTOS OF THE DAY

Tourists enjoy a boat ride in a Metasequoia forest in Luyang Lake wetland park in Jiangsu
CREDIT: VCG/Getty

Fishing boats return to port for shelter before the arrival of tropical storm Ma-on in southern China’s Guangdong province. The storm has already displaced thousands in the Philippines
CREDIT: Deng Hua/AP

A turtle crawls into the sea as employees of the oceans and fisheries ministry release six sea turtles, a species in danger of global extinction, on Saekdal beach in Seogwipo, Jeju island. The sea turtles included three born through artificial incubation and two rescued after they were found injured
CREDIT: Yonhap/EPA

Market Closes for August 25^th, 2022

International Markets

Bonds

Currencies

Commodities

Market Commentary:
On this day in 1872, Justin Ford Kimball was born near Huntsville, Tex. In 1929, as an administrator at Baylor University’s hospital, he noted that Baylor was treating many Dallas teachers who couldn’t pay their hospitalization costs. So he created a plan enabling teachers to prepay 50 cents a month for up to 21 days of treatment at Baylor. By the end of 1929, as the Great Depression set in, three-fourths of all teachers in Dallas had signed up, and Kimball’s Blue Cross health insurance soon went nationwide.
Canada
By Stefanie Marotta
(Bloomberg) — Canadian stocks jumped the most in two weeks as markets rallied ahead of US Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell’s keynote at the Jackson Hole conference.
The S&P/TSX Composite rose for the third day, climbing 0.8%, or 150.96 to 20,172.34 in Toronto.
The move was the biggest since rising 0.9% on Aug. 12. Royal Bank of Canada contributed the most to the index gain, increasing 2.1%.
Tilray Brands Inc. had the largest increase, rising 8.8%.
Today, 167 of 238 shares rose, while 65 fell; 10 of 11 sectors were higher, led by financials stocks.
Insights
* This month, the index rose 2.4%
* So far this week, the index rose 0.3%
* The index declined 2% in the past 52 weeks. The MSCI AC Americas Index lost 8.4% in the same period
* The S&P/TSX Composite is 9.2% below its 52-week high on April 5, 2022 and 11% above its low on July 14, 2022
* The S&P/TSX Composite is down 0.5% in the past 5 days and rose 5.6% in the past 30 days
* S&P/TSX Composite is trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.6 on a trailing basis and 12.5 times estimated earnings of its members for the coming year
* The index’s dividend yield is 3.1% on a trailing 12-month basis
* S&P/TSX Composite’s members have a total market capitalization of C$3.2t
* 30-day price volatility fell to 11.64% compared with 12.84% in the previous session and the average of 15.35% over the past month
================================================================
|Index Points | |
Sector Name | Move | % Change | Adv/Dec
================================================================
* Financials | 53.4213| 0.9| 20/9
* Materials | 26.1394| 1.1| 31/15
* Industrials | 22.0079| 0.9| 27/2
* Information Technology | 15.6139| 1.5| 11/3
* Energy | 12.5035| 0.3| 16/21
* Communication Services | 6.3299| 0.6| 7/0
* Real Estate | 5.6938| 1.1| 21/2
* Consumer Discretionary | 5.0485| 0.7| 9/4
* Health Care | 3.8818| 5.3| 7/0
* Consumer Staples | 1.5050| 0.2| 8/3
* Utilities | -1.1763| -0.1| 10/6
================================================================
| | |Volume VS |
| Index | | 20D AVG |YTD Change
Top Contributors |Points Move| % Change | (%) | (%)
================================================================
* Royal Bank of | | | |
* Canada | 24.9900| 2.1| -7.4| -6.3
* Nutrien | 14.4000| 3.0| 20.1| 38.2
* Canadian Natural | | | |
* Resources | 10.0200| 1.7| 11.9| 42.6
* Element Fleet | -0.9640| -2.1| -34.3| 27.3
* Agnico Eagle Mines | -1.2560| -0.7| -1.7| -12.4
US
By Rita Nazareth
(Bloomberg) — Stocks rallied and bond yields fell, with traders awaiting Jerome Powell’s keynote for clues on how much further the Federal Reserve will pump the brakes on the economy to bring inflation back under control.
The S&P 500 closed near session highs, trimming a selloff that knocked down the market earlier in the week.
Following the slowest trading day of 2022 for US equities, volume was once again below average.
Megacaps like Apple Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. jumped, though Tesla Inc. whipsawed as its stock split took effect.
Treasury 10-year rates traded near 3%, while the dollar slipped.
Investors were mostly unfazed by hawkish comments from Fed officials gathering for the annual conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.
Powell’s speech at 10 a.m. Washington time Friday will mark the highlight of an event that’s been used for making key announcements.
The Fed’s boss is widely expected to restate his resolve to keep tightening policy to fight inflationary spirals.
“We are not convinced Jackson Hole tomorrow will be a negative market shock because expectations are hawkish while exposure still low,” said Dennis DeBusschere, founder of 22V Research.
“We thought the market correction would be leading into Jackson Hole, and that has largely played out. We are neutral short term.”
Traders will also be watching out for any signals about the pace of the Fed’s balance-sheet runoff — known as quantitative tightening — which gets up to full speed in September at a monthly clip of up to $95 billion.
While some strategists are convinced the unwinding could pose a threat to equities, others say there’s still plenty of liquidity left from stimulus measures to prop up the market.
In fact, stocks surged 18% during QT from October 2017 through July 2019, Ed Yardeni, president of Yardeni Research, wrote in a recent note.
Meantime, a survey conducted by DeBusschere’s firm showed that over half of the respondents believe QT will push Treasury yields higher, 32% say they will be unchanged and only 12% bet on a drop.
The Fed “should not blink” as it addresses hot inflation, and Powell faces a “huge” challenge finding ways to cool price growth without damaging the economy, Mohamed El-Erian, chief economic adviser at Allianz SE, told Bloomberg Television.
“We are confident that Powell’s commentary will be void of any major-market moving surprises,” said Robert Schein, chief investment officer at Blanke Schein Wealth Management.
Should Friday’s PCE inflation reading top forecasts, “that will firmly quash any expectations of a policy pivot,” he added.
Investors also waded through data showing the government’s main measures of US growth pointed in different directions in the first half of 2022, adding to the ongoing debate on the health of the economy.
Another report showed applications for unemployment benefits fell for a second week, suggesting employers are holding on to workers despite growing uncertainties.
In corporate news, China stocks listed in the US rallied as talks between both countries to avoid delisting of firms on the New York Stock Exchange ramp up. Snowflake Inc. surged as an upbeat forecast reassured Wall Street that companies are still investing in their technology systems to boost efficiency.
Peloton Interactive Inc. tumbled as a bleak outlook renewed concerns about the fitness company’s comeback plan.

What to watch this week:
* Fed Chair Powell speaks at Jackson Hole, Friday
* US personal income, PCE deflator, University of Michigan consumer sentiment, Friday

Some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
* The S&P 500 rose 1.4% as of 4 p.m. New York time
* The Nasdaq 100 rose 1.7%
* The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1%
* The MSCI World index rose 1.3%
Currencies
* The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index fell 0.2%
* The euro rose 0.1% to $0.9977
* The British pound rose 0.3% to $1.1835
* The Japanese yen rose 0.4% to 136.52 per dollar
Bonds
* The yield on 10-year Treasuries declined eight basis points to 3.02%
* Germany’s 10-year yield declined five basis points to 1.32%
* Britain’s 10-year yield declined eight basis points to 2.62%
Commodities
* West Texas Intermediate crude fell 1.8% to $93.16 a barrel
* Gold futures rose 0.5% to $1,770.50 an ounce
–With assistance from Andreea Papuc, Robert Brand, Abigail
Moses, Vildana Hajric, Isabelle Lee and Emily Graffeo.
Have a lovely evening.

Be magnificent!

As ever,

Carolann

But what is happiness except the simple harmony between a man and the life he leads. -Albert Camus, 1913-1960.

Carolann Steinhoff, B.Sc., CFP®, CIM, CIWM
Senior Investment Advisor

Queensbury Securities Inc.,
St. Andrew’s Square,
Suite 340A, 730 View St.,
Victoria, B.C. V8W 3Y7

Tel: 778.430.5808
(C): 250.881.0801
Toll Free: 1.877.430.5895
Fax: 778.430.5828
www.carolannsteinhoff.com