September 21,2022 Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Tangents:
September 21. 2021: McDonald’s announces plans to “drastically” reduce plastic in its Happy Meals by 2025 (these meals make it one of the largest toy distributors in the world).  It claimed that the benefits wrought by this change would be equivalent to close to 700,000 people ditching the use of plastic for a year.
September 21, 1873: Panic swept the New York Stock Exchange in the wake of railroad bond defaults and bank failures. Go to article »

Leonard Cohen, b. 1934.
Stephen King, b. 1947.
Bill Murray, b. 1950.

Tim McGraw falls off stage during concert.  The country music icon lost his balance and fell into his own crowd — but then turned it into a special moment to bond with his fans.

‘SNL’ announces first three guest hosts of the season.  Live from New York… it’s Saturday Night! These celebrities are locked in as guest hosts for the show’s upcoming 48th season.

Researchers in China have cloned a wild Arctic wolf.  Some scientists are now hoping this controversial technology can be used to help save other species from extinction.

7,000-year-old structure near Prague is older than Stonehenge, Egyptian pyramids:  Archaeologists digging near Prague have discovered the remains of a Stone Age structure that’s older than Stonehenge and even the Egyptian pyramids: an enigmatic complex known as a roundel.  Nearly 7,000 years ago during the late Neolithic, or New Stone Age, a local farming community may have gathered in this circular building, although its true purpose is unknown.  Full Story: Live Science (9/21)

3,300-year-old pink granite sarcophagus of Egyptian ‘pyramid keeper’ found at Saqqara:  Archaeologists in Egypt have unearthed the 3,300-year-old stone sarcophagus of an official whose mummified body was stolen by grave robbers long ago.   The coffin, carved from pink granite, was crafted for an official named “Ptah-im-wea,” who, according to the hieroglyphs inscribed on it, lived during the time of Ramesses II (reign circa 1279 B.C. to 1213 B.C.) and managed a temple that Ramesses II had built at Thebes (modern-day Luxor).  Full Story: Live Science (9/21)

Scientists blasted plastic with lasers and turned it into tiny diamonds and a new type of water:  Using ultrapowerful lasers, scientists have blasted cheap plastic and transformed it into tiny “nanodiamonds” — and, in doing so, confirmed the existence of an exotic new type of water.   The findings could potentially reveal the existence of diamond rain on ice giants in our solar system and explain why these frigid worlds have such strange magnetic fields. The laser-blasting technique could also lead to more Earthly applications.  Full Story: Live Science (9/21)
PHOTOS OF THE DAY

More than 1,500 birds from Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore sit in cages during an annual songbird competition
Photograph: Madaree Tohlala/AFP/Getty Images

Drinkers fill a huge tent at the annual Oktoberfest beer festival at the Theresienwiese fairground, which is taking place for the first time since Covid
Photograph: Christof Stache/AFP/Getty Images

Harald Wenske crosses a river in a Spreewald barge fully loaded with pumpkins grown in his field
Photograph: Patrick Pleul/AP
Market Closes for September 21, 2022

International Markets

Bonds

Currencies

Commodities

Market Commentary:
On this day in 1931, the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 6.2% to an intraday low, prompting NYSE officials to debate closing the market. Executives opted for a temporary ban on short-selling, and stocks clawed back much of that loss. A day earlier, the Bank of England had abandoned the gold standard.
Canada
By Geoffrey Morgan
(Bloomberg) — Canadian stocks fell in tandem with their US counterparts Wednesday following the US Federal Reserve’s 75 basis point interest-rate hike.
The S&P/TSX Composite fell for the second day, dropping 1%, or 184.15 to 19,184.54 in Toronto.
The index declined to the lowest closing level since Sept. 6.
Toronto-Dominion Bank contributed the most to the index decline, decreasing 2%. Canopy Growth Corp. had the largest drop, falling 4.6%.
Today, 166 of 236 shares fell, while 68 rose; 10 of 11 sectors were lower, led by energy stocks.
Insights
* This year, the index fell 9.6%, heading for the worst year since 2018
* This quarter, the index rose 1.7%
* This month, the index fell 0.8%
* The index declined 5.2% in the past 52 weeks. The MSCI AC Americas Index lost 14% in the same period
* The S&P/TSX Composite is 13.6% below its 52-week high on April 5, 2022 and 5.6% above its low on July 14, 2022
* The S&P/TSX Composite is down 2.7% in the past 5 days and fell 4.6% in the past 30 days
* S&P/TSX Composite is trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of 13 on a trailing basis and 11.9 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$3.1t
* 30-day price volatility fell to 15.06% compared with 15.64% in the previous session and the average of 13.82% over the past month
================================================================
| Index Points | |
Sector Name | Move | % Change | Adv/Dec
================================================================
Financials | -72.0358| -1.2| 7/22
Energy | -56.9684| -1.6| 0/37
Industrials | -24.8527| -1.0| 3/24
Consumer Staples | -11.7402| -1.5| 3/8
Consumer Discretionary | -8.8510| -1.3| 3/11
Materials | -3.7574| -0.2| 28/22
Information Technology | -3.6044| -0.4| 5/9
Utilities | -1.6456| -0.2| 7/9
Health Care | -1.2980| -1.6| 1/6
Communication Services | -0.0578| 0.0| 2/5
Real Estate | 0.6382| 0.1| 9/13
================================================================
| | |Volume VS| YTD
|Index Points| | 20D AVG | Change
Top Contributors | Move |% Change | (%) | (%)
================================================================
TD Bank | -21.6500| -2.0| -27.2| -11.3
RBC | -15.7500| -1.3| -20.4| -6.4
Canadian Natural Resources | -13.0800| -2.4| -0.2| 32.8
Brookfield Infrastructure | 1.0100| 0.6| -3.8| 7.5
Franco-Nevada | 1.5040| 0.7| -10.5| -8.7
Barrick Gold | 3.6570| 1.5| -35.9| -15.1
US
By Rita Nazareth
(Bloomberg) — Stocks saw some wild swings, with traders overwhelmed by the many headlines that followed the Federal Reserve decision and ended up signaling at least one thing: policy will remain aggressively tight — making the odds of a soft landing look increasingly elusive.
The S&P 500 ended near session lows, pushing its slide from a January record to more than 20%.
The gauge whipsawed in the aftermath of the Fed announcement, climbing as much as 1.3% at one point.
Treasury two-year yields topped 4%, piercing that mark for the first time since 2007.
The dollar rallied.
Jerome Powell vowed officials would crush inflation after they raised interest rates by 75 basis points for a third straight time and signaled even more aggressive hikes ahead than investors had expected.
Powell said his main message was that officials were “strongly resolved” to bring inflation down to the Fed’s 2% goal and added that “we will keep at it until the job is done.”
The phrase invoked the title of former Fed chief Paul Volcker’s memoir “Keeping at It.”
“Jerome Powell almost channeled his inner Paul Volcker today, talking about the forceful and rapid steps the Fed has taken, and is likely to continue taking, as it attempts to stamp out painful inflation pressures and ward off an even worse scenario later down the line,” said Seema Shah, chief global strategist at Principal Global Investors. “With the new rate projections, the Fed is engineering a hard landing — a soft landing is almost out of the question.”
Officials forecast that rates would reach 4.4% by the end of this year and 4.6% in 2023, a more hawkish shift in their so-called dot plot than expected.
That implies a fourth-straight 75-basis-point hike could be on the table for the next gathering in November — about a week before the US midterm elections.

More Comments:
* “We do think that markets, and consequently the economy, will become ‘Fed up’ with too much tightening, if growth (and employment) are tangibly slowing alongside of these tighter policy moves,” said Rick Rieder, BlackRock’s chief investment officer of global fixed income.
* “Today’s Fed action, combined with ongoing rollercoaster-like market volatility, underscore the unease of investors amid the magnified economic and market uncertainties driven by high inflation, corporate earnings warnings, geopolitical concerns and other factors weighing heavily on both Wall Street and Main Street,” said Greg Bassuk, chief executive officer at AXS Investments.
* “They have a brief window to act aggressively, and they seem eager to use it,” said Jan Szilagyi, co-founder of Toggle AI, an investment research firm.
* “The first set of Fed releases from the September meeting are unambiguously hawkish,” said Krishna Guha at Evercore. “Thevmacro projections signal increased risk of a harder landing.”
* “The Fed was late to recognize inflation, late to start raising interest rates, and late to start unwinding bond purchases,” said Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate. “They’ve been playing catch-up ever since. And they’re
not done yet.”

Key events this week:
* Bank of Japan monetary policy decision, Thursday
* The Bank of England interest rate decision, Thursday
* US Conference Board leading index, initial jobless claims, Thursday

Here are some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
* The S&P 500 fell 1.7% as of 4 p.m. New York time
* The Nasdaq 100 fell 1.8%
* The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.7%
* The MSCI World index fell 1.5%
Currencies
* The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index rose 0.7%
* The euro fell 1.2% to $0.9847
* The British pound fell 0.9% to $1.1281
* The Japanese yen was little changed at 143.88 per dollar
Bonds
* The yield on 10-year Treasuries declined six basis points to 3.51%
* Germany’s 10-year yield declined three basis points to 1.89%
* Britain’s 10-year yield advanced two basis points to 3.31%
Commodities
* West Texas Intermediate crude fell 0.7% to $83.34 a barrel
* Gold futures rose 0.6% to $1,681.40 an ounce
–With assistance from Cecile Gutscher.
Have a lovely evening.

Be magnificent!
As ever,

Carolann

Men make war to get attention.  All killing is an expression of self-hate.  –Alice Walker, b. 1944.

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
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www.carolannsteinhoff.com