March 26, 2021 Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Tangents: Happy Friday.

Full moon this weekend – officially on Sunday – aka the “Worm Moon”.
In the 1930s the Maine Farmer’s Almanac began publishing American Indian Moon names for each month of the year. According to this almanac, as the full Moon in March this is the Crow, Crust, Sap, Sugar, or Worm Moon. The more northern tribes of the northeastern United States knew this as the Crow Moon, when the cawing of crows signaled the end of winter. Other northern names were the Crust Moon, because the snow cover becomes crusted from thawing by day and freezing by night, or the Sap (or Sugar) Moon as this is the time for tapping maple trees. The tribes more to the south called this the Worm Moon after the earthworm casts that appear as the ground thaws. It makes sense that only the southern tribes called this the Worm Moon. When glaciers covered the northern part of North America they wiped out the native earthworms. After these glaciers melted about 12,000 years ago the more northern forests grew back without earthworms. Earthworms in these areas now are mostly invasive species introduced from Europe and Asia.
In the Hebrew calendar the months change with the new Moon and full Moons fall in the middle of the lunar months. This full Moon is in the middle of Nisan, which corresponds with Pesach or Passover. This year Pesach begins at sundown on March 27, and ends at nightfall on April 4, 2021. -NASA

Here’s how to safely observe upcoming holidays like Passover, Easter and Ramadan.

Another trip around the sun during Covid means another year of virtual Passover Seders and smaller gatherings. For the Food contributor Susan Spungen, it’s a good year to try something new and perhaps a bit more exciting than the usual. She developed five Seder dishes you’ll want to eat all the time, like coconut macaroons, above. And if you need more inspiration through out the holiday week, here are 18 recipes to brighten the table. –NY Times.

And finally, how do you complete Mozart?  It’s hard to imagine a more intimidating task for a musician. But that’s exactly what Timothy Jones, a Mozart expert who teaches at the Royal Academy of Music in London, has done, completing violin sonata fragments that the composer left behind. Listen to them here.  Posthumous completions aren’t uncommon in classical music. But Mr. Jones’s latest effort comes with a twist: He made multiple completed versions of each fragment, each emphasizing different aspects of Mozart’s style.  “Putting the hubris aside,” Mr. Jones said, “I’d much rather Mozart had finished these pieces than I.”

PHOTOS OF THE DAY

A couple do a hand stand amongst the daffodils in Sefton Park in Liverpool 
CREDIT: IAIN WATTS/MERCURY PRESS

A man walks next to a repaired broken heart made of wool by Croatian designer Ivona, put on a building in downtown Zagreb, Croatia, as the country is fighting coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak and the aftermatch of an earthquake that hit the country
CREDIT: ANTONIO BRONIC/REUTERS

A man delivers fruits and vegetables by rowboat to his customers’ houses during the current emergecy of the coronavirus (COVID-19) in Venice
CREDIT: MANUEL SILVERTSI/REUTERS

Market Closes for March 26^th, 2021

International Markets

Bonds

Currencies

Commodities

Market Commentary:
     On this day in 1979, OPEC declared that its members would raise the price of crude oil from $13.34 a barrel to $14.55, igniting a round of global inflation.
Canada
By Michael Bellusci
(Bloomberg) — Canadian equities fell this week with health care and technology stocks leading the declines, while utilities advanced. The S&P/TSX Composite Index still rose 0.5% Friday, with eight of eleven sectors higher. Materials and energy led the charge. Canada received assurances Covid-19 vaccine shipments to Canada will continue from the European Union after speaking to officials from the European Commission and three EU countries about the tightening of export restrictions, according to two statements from the Canadian government. Oil in New York barely nudged this week despite whipsawing over several days, as renewed lockdowns in some regions blunted near-term demand outlooks and muted the impact of a standstill at the Suez.
Commodities
* Western Canadian Select crude oil traded at a $10.10 discount to West Texas Intermediate
* Spot gold rose 0.3% to $1,732.36 an ounce
FX/Bonds
* The Canadian dollar rose 0.3% to C$1.2576 per U.S. dollar
* The 10-year Canada government bond yield rose 3.2 basis points to 1.500%
By Bloomberg Automation:
     (Bloomberg) — The S&P/TSX Composite rose for the second day, climbing 0.5 percent, or 101.48 to 18,752.58 in Toronto. The move was the biggest since rising 0.6 percent on March 17. Toronto-Dominion Bank contributed the most to the index gain, increasing 0.9 percent. MEG Energy Corp. had the largest increase, rising 6.3 percent. Today, 172 of 231 shares rose, while 57 fell; 8 of 11 sectors were higher, led by materials stocks.
Insights
* This quarter, the index rose 7.6 percent
* This month, the index rose 3.8 percent
* So far this week, the index fell 0.5 percent, heading for the biggest decline since the week ended Feb. 26
* The index advanced 40 percent in the past 52 weeks. The MSCI
AC Americas Index gained 54 percent in the same period
* The S&P/TSX Composite is 1.5 percent below its 52-week high on
March 17, 2021 and 49.4 percent above its low on March 30, 2020
* S&P/TSX Composite is trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of
27.7 on a trailing basis and 16.7 times estimated earnings of its members for the coming year
* The index’s dividend yield is 2.7 percent on a trailing 12-month basis
* S&P/TSX Composite’s members have a total market capitalization of C$2.9t
* 30-day price volatility rose to 11.60 percent compared with
11.54 percent in the previous session and the average of 13.36 percent over the past month
================================================================
| Index Points | |
Sector Name | Move | % Change | Adv/Dec
================================================================
Materials | 37.0680| 1.7| 46/6
Energy | 26.5317| 1.1| 21/3
Financials | 25.9045| 0.4| 22/6
Industrials | 18.2151| 0.8| 23/7
Utilities | 6.8961| 0.8| 15/0
Consumer Discretionary | 5.6470| 0.8| 8/5
Real Estate | 2.5042| 0.4| 21/5
Consumer Staples | 0.7553| 0.1| 7/5
Information Technology | -3.8323| -0.2| 6/5
Health Care | -4.2751| -1.5| 3/7
Communication Services | -13.9379| -1.5| 0/8
US
By Vildana Hajric and Claire Ballentine
(Bloomberg) — U.S. stocks rose on optimism over the vaccine rollout and after the Federal Reserve freed banks from restrictions on dividends. Oil gained as the dollar slumped. The S&P 500 Index climbed the most in three weeks amid a late-afternoon surge and swung to a weekly gain, with energy producers and health companies among the best performers Friday. Automakers retreated as they confront a worsening global shortage of semiconductors. Risk appetite also came back in Europe and Asia, capping a volatile week beset with vaccine-supply disputes, a traffic block on the Suez canal and further deterioration in China’s relations with the West. The U.S. outlook got a boost after President Joe Biden doubled the goal for vaccinations in his first 100 days in office to 200 million. “The tone of the market has somehow altered from angst to optimism, spurred by President Biden’s doubling of the U.S. vaccine-rollout target and the Fed’s end to pandemic-era dividend cuts,” Nema Ramkhelawan-Bhana, a strategist at Rand Merchant Bank in Johannesburg, wrote in a note. “It’s remarkable how little it takes to shift the mood.”
The delay in freeing the ship stuck on the Suez Canal boosted oil, trimming a weekly loss in West Texas Intermediate crude. European stocks rose in a broad advance. Miners and energy firms benefited from a rotation into cyclical re-opening trades. An index of Asian shares jumped the most in two weeks. Elsewhere, Bitcoin clawed back earlier losses to trade near $54,000.
These are some of the main moves in financial markets:
Stocks
* The S&P 500 Index climbed 1.7% as of 4 p.m. New York time.
* The Stoxx Europe 600 Index rose 0.9%.
* The MSCI Asia Pacific Index added 1.3%.
* The MSCI Emerging Market Index rose 1.4%.
Currencies
* The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index slipped 0.2%.
* The euro gained 0.3% to $1.1796.
* The British pound rose 0.4% to $1.3784.
* The Japanese yen weakened 0.5% to 109.67 per dollar.
Bonds
* The yield on 10-year Treasuries added three basis points to 1.66%.
* Germany’s 10-year yield jumped four basis points to -0.35%.
* Britain’s 10-year yield rose three basis points to 0.75%.
Commodities
* West Texas Intermediate crude rose 3.8% to $60.80 a barrel.
* Gold rose 0.3% to $1,731.61 an ounce.
–With assistance from Robert Fullem, Mark Cranfield, Haslinda
Amin, Robert Brand, Emily Barrett, Srinivasan Sivabalan and Cecile Gutscher.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone.

Be magnificent!

As ever,

Carolann

We have to make the choice – every single day – to exemplify the truth,
the respect, and the grace that we wish for this world. –Oprah Winfrey, b. 1954

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