April 12, 2019 Newsletter
Dear Friends,
Tangents: Happy Friday!
April 12, 1945~ Franklin D. Roosevelt died.
April 12, 1955 ~ Polio vaccine.
April 12, 1961 ~ 1st man in space, Yuri Gagarin, USSR.
Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man to fly in space, orbiting the Earth once before making a safe landing.
April 12, 1981 The space shuttle Columbia blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on its first test flight.
The final season of “Game of Thrones” begins Sunday night after a nearly two-year hiatus. As the fantasy saga heads for the explosive finale it has promised, our TV critic is hoping for a little more conversation and a little less action. We also have this very thorough guide that details where the show left off, and what’s to come. –NY Times.
PHOTOS OF THE DAY
Chihuly at Kew: Reflections on nature at Kew Gardens, London. The individual blown glass forms of Sapphire Star radiate outward to create a celestial visual experience. The world’s most celebrated contemporary glass artist brings his work to Kew Gardens, in a major exhibition of installations. The majority of the artworks have never been seen in the UK. The exhibition runs from 13th April to 27th October 2019. CREDIT: ELLIOTT FRANKS
The 10th Red Ball Ragnarok annual snowkite race held in Hardangervidda National Park, Norway. The skies above the stark wilderness of Scandinavia’s biggest national park were filled with hundreds of colourful snowkites for the Red Bull Ragnarok annual race. The stunning images show hundreds of snowkites floating above the stark frozen plateau. This year 250 participants from 30 different nations tackled the gruelling five-lap course which was held in Hardangervidda National Park for the 10th time. CREDIT: RED BULL/SWNS.COM
Framed through the Empty Sky Memorial in Jersey City, N.J., sunrise lights up the sky behind the New York City skyline. CREDIT: AP PHOTO/J. DAVID AKE
The Milky Way over Dunstanburgh Castle in the early hours of Thursday morning. Dunstanburgh castle is a 14th-century fortification on the coast of Northumberland in northern England, between the villages of Craster and Embleton. The castle was built by Earl Thomas of Lancaster between 1313 and 1322. CREDIT: OWEN HUMPHREYS/PA WIRE
Market Commentary:
On this day in 1996, Yahoo launched its IPO on the Nasdaq Composite, selling 2.6 million shares at an initial price of $13 a share. In one of Wall Street’s wildest feeding frenzies, mutual funds and other big investors “flipped” the shares over and over until the first day’s trading volume hit 204.36 million shares, meaning that each share changed hands more than 78 times that day. The stock finished the day with a 34% gain.
Canada
By Aoyon Ashraf
(Bloomberg) — Canadian stocks climbed for the ninth day in 10, hovering near all-time high. Canopy Growth led the gainers amid news that the company will replace Goldcorp Inc. in the S&P/TSX 60 Index.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index 0.5 percent to 16,480.53. in Toronto. All sectors were in the green, with financials in the No. 2 spot as bank earnings took off for some of the big U.S. companies. Materials lagged, mainly as fertilizer giant Nutrien underperformed.
Meanwhile, even with danger signs piling up, the shares of the six biggest Canadian banks have stubbornly refused to drop –
— frustrating short sellers hoping to make money on stock-price declines.
In other moves:
Stocks
* Lundin Mining Corp. continued Thursday’s gains after being upgraded to buy at Goldman as copper outperformed all the other metals
* Teck Resources, Ero Copper, Hudbay Minerals are also among base metal miners that rose with copper prices
* Encana Corp. rose 5.3 percent; Goldman named the stock as one of the best stock ideas
* Crescent Point, Ensign Energy, Whitecap Energy are among the energy companies rising with oil prices
Commodities
* Western Canada Select crude oil traded at a $9.25 discount to WTI
* Gold spot price fell 0.1 percent to $1,290.77 an ounce
FX/Bonds
* The Canadian dollar strengthened 0.4 percent
* The Canada 10-year government bond yield rose to 1.781
US
By Randall Jensen and Sarah Ponczek
(Bloomberg) — U.S. stocks rose amid solid bank earnings and a major deal in the energy sector, while Treasuries fell as Chinese data bolstered optimism in the global economy.
The S&P 500 gained for a third straight week as it punched through the key 2,900 level for the first time in six months. JPMorgan Chase & Co. surged on a strong first-quarter report, while Walt Disney Co. jumped to a record after it announced a new streaming service, sinking Netflix Inc.’s shares. Anadarko Petroleum Corp. soared along with shares in its competitors after Chevron agreed to buy the energy producer. Chevron slumped. Health-insurer stocks slid for a second day as policy makers in Washington spared over proposals that threatened to disrupt their businesses, weighing on the Nasdaq indexes.
The 10-year Treasury yield pushed to the highest level in nearly a month, while the dollar gave back Thursday’s gains after China’s trade and lending signaled that the world’s second-largest economy is on more stable footing.
“We’ll see financials move today because of the bank earnings, but a lot of other sectors we probably won’t see much action in,” Michael O’Rourke, JonesTrading’s chief market strategist, said by phone. “Today seems more like a lot of the past two weeks where you just have a lot of sideways action with a slight upward bias.”
The rally in equities since late December had been struggling for momentum over the last week amid renewed trade tensions and reports of slowing global growth. Earnings and Chinese data Friday helped to ease some of those concerns. Traders will now be looking to companies to provide the next kicker as the reporting season in the U.S. gathers pace.
Elsewhere, the pound rose after Prime Minister Theresa May accepted the European Union’s offer to push the Brexit deadline out to October.
These are the main moves in markets:
Stocks
* The S&P 500 Index increased 0.7 percent as of 4 p.m. New York time.
* The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1 percent.
* The Stoxx Europe 600 Index gained 0.2 percent.
* The MSCI Asia Pacific Index advanced 0.2 percent.
* The MSCI Emerging Market Index added 0.3 percent.
Currencies
* The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index declined 0.1 percent to the lowest in more than two weeks.
* The euro advanced 0.4 percent to 1.1296.
* The Japanese yen fell 0.4 percent to 112.09 per dollar.
* The MSCI Emerging Markets Currency Index rose 0.1 percent.
Bonds
* The yield on 10-year Treasuries rose six basis points to 2.55 percent.
* Germany’s 10-year yield gained six basis points to 0.055 percent.
* Britain’s 10-year yield rose six basis points to 1.212 percent.
Commodities
* West Texas Intermediate crude rose 0.4 percent to $63.86 a barrel.
* Gold gained 0.1 percent to 1,294.30.
* Copper climbed 1.8 percent to $2.93 a pound.
–With assistance from Vildana Hajric and Todd White.
Have a wonderful weekend everyone.
Be magnificent!
As ever,
Carolann
All my possessions for a moment of time.
-Elizabeth l, 1533-1603
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