April 19, 2018 Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Tangents:
1904 – Great Toronto Fire rages for two days, destroying 104 buildings in the city’s business core. 
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1897 – 15 runners competed in the first Boston Marathon. The 24.5-mile race was inspired by the marathon at the first modern Olympic Games in Athens, Greece just a year earlier.  Only 10 runners made it to the finish line.
1932 – Herbert Hoover suggests 5-day work week.
1775 – Battle o Lexington& Concord: Start of the American Revolution
PHOTOS OF THE DAY

The sun rises at Corfe Castle in Dorset.
Credit: Vagner Vidal/INS News Agency LTD

An orca whale hunts sea lion pups on a beach at Punta Norte, Valdes Peninsula, Argentina. 
Credit: Daniel Feldman/AP

A robotics engineer works on the construction of Fred, an ultra-realistic humanoid robot created by NowTV to launch Westworld Season Two. The twelve week process of building the robot involved developing hundreds of thousands of lines of computer code and designing a sophisticated metal skeleton, acrylic eyes and silicone skin, all 3D-scanned from 55 year old Tedroy Newell. 
Credit: Pinpep
Market Closes for April 19^th, 2018

International Markets

Bonds

Currencies

Commodities

Market Commentary:
$The key to making money in stocks is not to get scared out of them. -Peter Lynch
100 million
The number of Amazon Prime members, revealed for the first time by CEO Jeff Bezos in a letter to shareholders
Canada
By Kristine Owram
     (Bloomberg) — Canadian stocks fell the most in nearly two weeks as technology shares came under pressure and a rally in oil prices faltered.
     The S&P/TSX Composite Index lost 76 points or 0.5 percent to 15,454.42, the first decline in six trading days. Tech stocks were the biggest decliners, losing 1 percent, after Taiwan Semiconductor’s disappointing forecast hit chipmakers.
     The energy index fell 0.8 percent after earlier rising as much as 0.9 percent as a two-day rally in crude prices faded in afternoon trading.
     In other moves:
                          Stocks
* Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. lost 1.2 percent ahead of a potential strike this weekend
* Kinder Morgan Canada Ltd. fell 3.8 percent. It spent C$196 million on the stalled Trans Mountain pipeline expansion last quarter before putting the plan on hold
* Maxar Technologies Ltd. rose 1.8 percent. The stock was reinstated at Veritas with a buy rating
                          Commodities
* Western Canada Select crude oil traded at a $17.25 discount to WTI
* Gold fell 0.3 percent to $1,346.80 an ounce
                          FX/Bonds
* The Canadian dollar weakened 0.3 percent to C$1.2662 per U.S. dollar
* The Canada 10-year government bond yield rose four basis points to 2.32 percent
US
By Randall Jensen and Sarah Ponczek
     (Bloomberg) — U.S. stocks fell for the first time in four days as technology shares came under pressure from trade and earnings concerns. Treasuries hit the lowest since February amid inflation worries.
     The S&P 500 Index dropped the most in nearly two weeks as tech shares slumped after Taiwan Semiconductor’s disappointing forecast roiled chipmaker stocks. China’s request for concessions from Qualcomm Inc. to acquire NXP Semiconductors NV ratcheted up tensions over trade. Earnings misses from Procter & Gamble Co. and Philip Morris International Inc. weighed on consumer staples.
     Stocks pared part of the loss in late trading after Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein was said to tell President Donald Trump last week he isn’t a target of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.
     Meanwhile, commodities prices remained high in the aftermath of U.S. sanctions on Russia and heightened tariff concerns. While torrid gains in metals from aluminum to nickel and oil faltered Thursday, the rallies have spurred speculation inflation will pick up. That helped to push 10-year Treasury yields above 2.9 percent for the first time since February.
     Rate-sensitive shares responded, with financial firms rallying the most in the S&P 500. Blowout earnings from American Express helped. Bond proxies like real-estate firms retreated. The dollar gained the most in three weeks.
     “If crude starts to take off and with it wages go higher, prices for housing go higher, etcetera, etcetera, you get your inflation pretty quickly from that,” Joe “JJ” Kinahan, the chief market strategist at TD Ameritrade, said by phone. “This is the second day this week we’ve seen bonds get hit pretty good, so now it has everybody nervous for the economy if rates do go higher, what does it mean for the overall economy outside financials?”
     Elsewhere, the Swiss franc weakened past 1.20 per euro for the first time since the country’s central bank shocked markets in January 2015 with its decision to remove the cap on the currency.    
     Here are the main moves in markets:
                          Stocks
* The S&P 500 Index fell 0.6 percent to 2,693.13 as of 4 p.m. New York time, the most since April 6. Losses halted near the 50-day moving average, which the index crossed for the first time in a month Monday.
* The Nasdaq Composite Index dropped 0.8 percent.
* The Stoxx Europe 600 Index was little changed.
* The MSCI All-Country World Index dropped 0.5 percent.
                          Currencies
* The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index rose 0.5 percent, biggest rise in three weeks.
* The euro fell 0.2 percent to $1.2351.
* The British pound declined 0.8 percent to $1.4090.
* The Japanese yen dropped 0.1 percent to 107.32 per dollar.
                           Bonds
* The yield on 10-year Treasuries increased four basis points to 2.91 percent, the highest in eight weeks.
* Germany’s 10-year yield climbed seven basis points to 0.60 percent, the biggest gain since Jan. 10.
* Britain’s 10-year yield rose 11 basis points to 1.520 percent, the highest in four weeks.
                           Commodities
* West Texas Intermediate crude fell 0.4 percent to $68.18 a barrel.
* Gold slid 0.2 percent to $1,346.41 an ounce.
* LME nickel dropped 1.3 percent to $15,075 per metric ton.
* LME aluminum declined 2.1 percent to $2,485.00 per metric ton.
–With assistance from Samuel Potter. 

Have a great evening.

Be magnificent!

As ever,

Carolann

And once sent out a word takes wing beyond recall.
                                        -Horace, 65 BC- 8 BC

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