September 20,2022 Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Tangents:
September 20, 1873: Panic swept the New York Stock Exchange in the wake of railroad bond defaults and bank failures.  Go to article »

Hong Kong’s colorful new ‘pocket parks’ are revitalizing public spaces.  These eye-catching park designs are not what you’d expect to see in urban Hong Kong. Take a look here.

Brad Pitt makes his debut as a sculptor in Finland exhibition.  A-list actor. Guitarist. Dad of six. And now, sculptor. Brad Pitt is a busy man

The Hurricane Fiona fallout continues.
Would you wait in line to eat live sea urchin?
Twenty quadrillion ants go marching. (h/t Atika Valbrun)
I am very intimidated by Japan’s “Wagyu Olympics.”

Can the James Webb Space Telescope really see the past?  On July 12, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) made history by releasing its debut image: a jewel-filled photo that’s been touted as the deepest photo of the universe ever taken.  Besides looking farther across space than any observatory before it, the James Webb Space Telescope has another trick up its mirrors: It can look further back in time than any other telescope, observing distant stars and galaxies as they appeared 13.5 billion years ago, not long after the beginning of the universe as we know it.   How is this possible? How can a machine look “back in time”? It’s not magic; it’s just the nature of light.
Full Story: Live Science (9/19)

3,300-year-old cave ‘frozen in time’ from reign of Ramesses II uncovered in Israel:  Archaeologists in Israel have discovered an “exceptional” cave that ancient people sealed 3,300 years ago, hiding grave goods and possibly human burials within it, just yards from a beach south of Tel Aviv.   Use of the cave dates to a time when the ancient Egyptians, led by Ramesses II — who reigned from about 1279 B.C. to 1213 B.C. — ruled what is now Israel, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) said in a statement. During the time of Ramesses II, Egypt controlled an empire that stretched from modern-day Sudan to Syria.  Full Story: Live Science (9/20)

9 million told to evacuate after super typhoon Nanmadol slams southern Japan, heads toward Tokyo:  Officials in Japan have ordered 9 million people to evacuate as the powerful super typhoon Nanmadol pummels the island nation with winds gusting up to 145 mph (234 km/h) and bears down on Tokyo, home to nearly 14 million inhabitants.  Dozens of people were injured and two people have died since the storm made landfall on Sunday morning (Sept. 18) on Kyushu, Japan’s southernmost large island, and then on Monday (Sept. 19), Nanmadol slammed into Honshu, the largest of Japan’s islands, BBC News reported.  Full Story: Live Science (9/19

Hurricane Fiona hits the Dominican Republic after wiping out Puerto Rico’s power grid:  Hurricane Fiona struck the eastern coast of the Dominican Republic on Monday (Sept. 19) after the Category 1 storm had caused widespread flooding, landslides and a territory-wide blackout in Puerto Rico the day before.  Fiona strengthened from a tropical storm to a hurricane on Sunday morning (Sept. 18), and the National Hurricane Center (NHC) warned that the approaching cyclone would likely bring “torrential rains and mudslides” to both Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic.  Full Story: Live Science (9/19)
PHOTOS OF THE DAY

British artist Thomas Houseago, centre, poses with US actor Brad Pitt, centre right and Australian musician Nick Cave, prior to the opening of their joint exhibition
Photograph: Jussi Koivunen/AP

Katherine Crockett attends the 10th edition of ‘Diner en Blanc’ at Brookfield Place in Lower Manhattan. The all-white pop-up, the location of which is revealed hours before the event, draws over 5,500 guests who dress in head-to-toe white attire for an under-the-stars dining experience.
Photograph: Timothy A Clary/AFP/Getty Images

An archaeologist holds a vessel that contained opium in the 14th century BC when it was used by Canaanites as an offering for the dead, according to a study by the Israel Antiquities Authority, Tel Aviv University and the Weizmann Institute of Science
Photograph: Ronen Zvulun/Reuters
Market Closes for September 20, 2022

International Markets

Bonds

Currencies

Commodities

Market Commentary:
On this day in 1873, the stock market crashed and the NYSE Board of Governors closed the exchange for the first time in history. The cause of the plunge: A third of all money on loan from New York banks had gone into buying stocks on margin
Canada
By Bloomberg Automation
(Bloomberg) — The S&P/TSX Composite fell 1% at 19,368.69 in Toronto.
The index dropped to the lowest closing level since Sept. 7 after the previous session’s increase of 0.9%.
Today, financials stocks led the market lower, as all sectors lost; 199 of 236 shares fell, while 32 rose.
Shopify Inc. contributed the most to the index decline, decreasing 5.2%.
Interfor Corp. had the largest drop, falling 6.6%.
Insights
* This year, the index fell 8.7%, heading for the worst year since 2018
* This quarter, the index rose 2.7%
* This month, the index was little changed
* The index declined 3.9% in the past 52 weeks. The MSCI AC Americas Index lost 13% in the same period
* The S&P/TSX Composite is 12.8% below its 52-week high on April 5, 2022 and 6.6% above its low on July 14, 2022
* The S&P/TSX Composite is down 1.4% in the past 5 days and fell 3.7% in the past 30 days
* S&P/TSX Composite is trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.1 on a trailing basis and 12 times estimated earnings of its members for the coming year
* The index’s dividend yield is 3.2% on a trailing 12-month basis
* S&P/TSX Composite’s members have a total market capitalization of C$3.13t
* 30-day price volatility rose to 15.64% compared with 15.42% in the previous session and the average of 13.77% over the past month
================================================================
| Index Points | |
Sector Name | Move | % Change | Adv/Dec
================================================================
Financials | -55.7715| -0.9| 1/28
Information Technology | -27.2738| -2.6| 3/10
Materials | -24.5963| -1.1| 5/45
Industrials | -16.2244| -0.6| 6/21
Real Estate | -14.8936| -3.0| 0/22
Energy | -13.4282| -0.4| 11/24
Consumer Staples | -11.1773| -1.4| 1/10
Utilities | -10.1380| -1.0| 1/15
Communication Services | -9.8897| -1.0| 1/6
Consumer Discretionary | -8.4678| -1.2| 3/11
Health Care | -1.8379| -2.2| 0/7
================================================================
| | |Volume VS| YTD
|Index Points| | 20D AVG | Change
Top Contributors | Move |% Change | (%) | (%)
================================================================
Shopify | -18.5500| -5.2| -19.2| -76.3
TD Bank | -7.0920| -0.7| -22.8| -9.5
Brookfield Asset Management | -7.0810| -1.1| 11.9| -17.0
Brookfield Infrastructure | 1.3570| 0.8| 129.2| 6.9
Suncor Energy | 3.3260| 0.9| -38.6| 31.8
Nutrien | 4.4160| 1.0| -17.0| 26.3
US
By Rita Nazareth
(Bloomberg) — Stocks came under pressure as Treasury yields hit multiyear highs, with traders bracing for a hawkish Federal Reserve that’s expected to boost rates to levels not seen since before the 2008 financial crisis.
A slide in equities pushed the S&P 500 more than 10% below its Aug. 16 high — which marked the peak of rally from its June lows.
About 93% of its companies were down Tuesday, with all major groups in the red. Two-year US yields approached 4%.
Investors also kept an eye on geopolitical developments amid news that the Kremlin was moving hastily to stage sham votes on annexing the regions of Ukraine its forces still control.
Fed officials are about to put numbers on the “pain” they’ve been warning of when they publish new projections for the economy Wednesday.
They could show a substantial rise in rates and unemployment ahead as the estimated price tag for reducing inflation.
Officials are also widely expected to boost rates by 75 basis points — and a few market observers say a full-point hike might also be on the table.
To Charlie McElligott, cross-asset strategist at Nomura Securities International, the market is underpricing the possibility that the Fed could opt for a bigger move of 100 basis points.
In addition to last week’s inflation surprise, he cited the fact that both the labor market and wages remained “hot” since Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s Jackson Hole speech at the end of August.
Only two of the 96 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg are currently predicting a full-point move this month.
“The idea that the Fed will raise rates and immediately cut again in mid-2023 should now be put back into storage alongside the beach chairs,” said Gargi Chaudhuri, head of iShares investment strategy for the Americas at BlackRock Inc. “Recent data have confirmed the necessity of the Fed’s tough stance. We believe we are entering a new regime of structurally higher volatility and slowing growth.”
For traders grappling with a hawkish Fed and a looming recession, the next shoe to drop will be on corporate earnings, said a BlackRock co-chief investment officer.
“What we’re concerned about increasingly is earnings downgrades and we haven’t had that yet,” said Nigel Bolton of BlackRock Fundamental Equities, which comprises active stock strategies. “The tone of management teams is already starting to change and we’re going to see pretty substantial reductions for 2023,” he said.
Professional speculators are refusing to surrender to a punishing equity market prone to seemingly endless volatility — boosting bullish and bearish positions at the fastest rate in five years.
As the S&P 500 plunged last week, hedge funds snapped up single stocks while betting against the broad market with products like exchange-traded funds, data from Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s prime brokerage show.
The appetite for protection against an index-wide drop in the S&P 500 in the next three months has been falling together with the stock market, pushing the put-to-call ratio to a fresh one-year low, data compiled by Credit Suisse Group AG’s derivatives strategists show.
The opposite has been happening on  a single-stock level: A similar ratio jumped to a one-year high as company-specific announcements have been triggering outsized stock reactions.
The risk-off sentiment on Tuesday also dragged down cryptocurrencies, with Bitcoin sinking below $19,000.
The US needs to either regulate the existing stable coin market or create its own Fed-backed digital currency to preserve the dominance of the dollar, a panel of experts said at a House hearing Tuesday.
Key events this week:
* Federal Reserve decision, followed by a news conference with Chair Jerome Powell, Wednesday
* Big-bank CEOs testify before US Congress in a pair of hearings on Wednesday and Thursday
* US existing home sales, Wednesday
* EIA crude oil inventory report, Wednesday
* Bank of Japan monetary policy decision, Thursday
* The Bank of England interest rate decision, Thursday
* US Conference Board leading index, initial jobless claims, Thursday

Some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
* The S&P 500 fell 1.1% as of 4:01 p.m. New York time
* The Nasdaq 100 fell 0.9%
* The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1%
* The MSCI World index fell 0.9%
Currencies
* The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index rose 0.4%
* The euro fell 0.5% to $0.9978
* The British pound fell 0.4% to $1.1386
* The Japanese yen fell 0.3% to 143.66 per dollar
Bonds
* The yield on 10-year Treasuries advanced seven basis points to 3.56%
* Germany’s 10-year yield advanced 12 basis points to 1.93%
* Britain’s 10-year yield advanced 15 basis points to 3.29%
Commodities
* West Texas Intermediate crude fell 1.5% to $84.45 a barrel
* Gold futures fell 0.3% to $1,673.80 an ounce
–With assistance from Cecile Gutscher, Vildana Hajric and Isabelle Lee.
Have  a lovely evening.

Be magnificent!
As ever,

Carolann

It is a waste of time to be angry about my disability.  One has to get on with life and I haven’t done badly. 
People won’t have time for you if you are always angry or complaining. –Stephen Hawking, 1942-2018.

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