December 14, 2021 Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Tangents:
December 14, 1911: Amundsen reaches the South Pole.
On Dec. 14, 1981, Israel annexed the Golan Heights, seized from Syria in 1967. Go to article »
Sandy hook Elementary School shooting: Twenty-eight people, including the gunman, are killed in Sandy Hook, Connecticut.

Nostradamus, astronomer, b.1503.

Time magazine names Elon Musk as Person of the Year.  Wait a minute! Are we positive he’s human?

An electric pickup wins MotorTrend Truck of the Year Award.  I’m shocked, shocked!

PHOTOS OF THE DAY
A small house and fields covered in snow in the Alps
CREDIT: Marco Bertorello/AFP/Getty Images
The Royal Liver buildings appear surrounded by early morning fog
CREDIT: Peter Byrne/PA
A Roman coin hoard of copper-alloy nummi (coins), originally contained in three separate pots, (AD 300-400), found in Wickwar, Gloucestershire, is displayed at the British Museum
CREDIT: Yui Mok/PA

Market Closes for December 14^th, 2021

International Markets

Bonds

Currencies

Commodities

Market Commentary:
     On this day in 1900, German physicist Max Planck, in a lecture at the German Physical Society, introduced the theory of quantum mechanics. Today its principles of discontinuity and packets of emitted energy underlie an estimated 30% of the U.S. economy, including semiconductors, lasers and medical MRI devices.
Canada
By Geoffrey Morgan
(Bloomberg) — Canadian equities dropped Tuesday as Ottawa announced the details of tax plans on real estate and large technology companies. The S&P/TSX Composite fell for the fifth straight day, dropping 0.5%, or 99.88 to 20,648.57 in Toronto. The index dropped to the lowest closing level since Dec. 3, led by information technology stocks. Shopify Inc., Canada’s largest tech company and largest firm by market value, contributed the most to the index decline, decreasing 2.9%. Nuvei Corp. had the largest drop, falling almost 9%, as the company responded to a short-seller report. Today, 175 of 233 companies fell, while 56 rose; 9 of 11 sectors were lower, led by information technology, communications, materials and energy stocks.

Insights
* This year, the index rose 18 percent, poised for the best year since 2019
* This quarter, the index rose 2.9 percent
* The index advanced 19 percent in the past 52 weeks. The MSCI AC Americas Index gained 24 percent in the same period
* The S&P/TSX Composite is 5.3 percent below its 52-week high on Nov. 16, 2021 and 19.4 percent above its low on Jan. 29, 2021
* The S&P/TSX Composite is down 2.4 percent in the past 5 days and fell 5.1 percent in the past 30 days
* S&P/TSX Composite is trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.6 on a trailing basis and 15.7 times estimated earnings of its members for the coming year
* The index’s dividend yield is 2.6 percent on a trailing 12-month basis
* S&P/TSX Composite’s members have a total market capitalization of C$3.29t
* 30-day price volatility fell to 14.18 percent compared with 14.22 percent in the previous session and the average of 11.76 percent over the past month
================================================================
| Index Points | |
Sector Name | Move | % Change | Adv/Dec
================================================================
* Information Technology | -49.3402| -2.2| 2/13
* Energy | -21.5106| -0.8| 2/21
* Materials | -19.1415| -0.8| 7/48
* Communication Services | -8.1391| -0.8| 2/5
* Real Estate | -4.8104| -0.8| 4/20
* Consumer Discretionary | -3.5247| -0.5| 4/9
* Consumer Staples | -3.0430| -0.4| 6/6
* Financials | -1.4218| 0.0| 16/11
* Health Care | -1.2021| -0.7| 1/8
* Utilities | 1.7783| 0.2| 7/9
* Industrials | 10.4788| 0.4| 5/25
================================================================
| | |Volume VS| YTD
|Index Points| | 20D AVG | Change
Top Contributors | Move |% Change | (%) | (%)
================================================================
* Shopify | -40.1600| -2.9| 4.6| 21.1
* Couche-Tard | -7.2820| -2.5| 289.5| 11.0
* CGI Inc | -4.3270| -2.6| -13.0| 6.7
* Canadian National | 3.1480| 0.5| 5.6| 15.5
* Constellation Software | 3.3810| 1.2| 43.7| 33.1
* Canadian Pacific | 20.9200| 3.6| -1.5| 5.9

US
By Rita Nazareth
(Bloomberg) — As the Federal Reserve gets ready to wrap up its final meeting of the year, another report showing inflation running hot sank some of the most-expensive pockets of the stock market. Revered by investors during the pandemic for their solid balance-sheets, technology giants dragged down equities on Tuesday. Sentiment soured on concern that a jump in both producer and consumer prices will put pressure on the Fed to act more aggressively. While officials have given no signals they would rush to tighten policy, a hasty shift is seen as the biggest downside risk for stocks in 2022, according to an informal Bloomberg News survey of fund managers. The S&P 500 dropped for a second day, with financial companies posting the only gain among 11 major industries. Treasury two-year yields topped 0.65%, while the U.S. dollar rose. Oil and gold retreated.

Comments:
* “Anytime there’s a risk of easy money being taken away, that will result in some of these very expensive areas of the market to pull back,” said Megan Horneman, director of portfolio strategy at Verdence Capital Advisors.
* “The pressure on the Fed to pick up the pace of tightening is only mounting. With higher prices permeating the marketplace, we could see a snowball effect when it comes to inflation challenges as more suppliers justify higher prices and more consumers begin to close their wallets,” said Mike Loewengart, managing director of investment strategy at E*TRADE Financial.
* “The inflation trajectory remains worrisome. While we believe that price pressures will abate next year, the Fed is doing the prudent thing by tapering faster, so that it is well positioned to hike rates if needed,” said Win Thin, global head of currency strategy at Brown Brothers Harriman.

A Goldman Sachs Group Inc. basket of the 50 most-shorted stocks has plummeted back into a bear market for the first time since June, ringing up gains for traders who sell shares they’d borrowed in hopes of buying them back at lower prices. The renewed selloff in the more speculative corners of the market adds more evidence of a waning appetite to take risks as a new variant of the coronavirus spreads and the Fed zeroes in on fighting inflation.

Corporate highlights:
* Elon Musk made more headway toward his pledge to sell 10% of his Tesla Inc. stake, and it may have cost the carmaker its $1 trillion valuation.
* Boeing Co. received 109 gross orders for 737 Max airliners last month, bringing its sales tally for the narrow-body jets to 692 this year, according to the plane maker’s website.
* 3M Co. agreed to separate its food-safety business and join it with Neogen Corp. in a deal that would value the combined company at about $9.3 billion.

Here are some key events this week:
* China releases November industrial output, retail sales data, Wednesday.
* Fed rate decision, Wednesday.
* U.S. business inventories, retail sales, empire manufacturing, Wednesday.
* BOE rate decision, Thursday.
* ECB rate decision, Thursday.
* U.S. housing starts, initial jobless claims, industrial production, Thursday.
* BOJ monetary policy decision, Friday.
* S&P Dow Jones Indices quarterly rebalance effective after markets close, Friday.
* “Quadruple witching” day in the U.S. market, when options and futures on indexes and equities expire, Friday.

Some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
* The S&P 500 fell 0.7% as of 4 p.m. New York time
* The Nasdaq 100 fell 1%
* The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.3%
* The MSCI World index fell 0.8%
Currencies
* The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index rose 0.3%
* The euro fell 0.2% to $1.1256
* The British pound was little changed at $1.3227
* The Japanese yen fell 0.2% to 113.74 per dollar
Bonds
* The yield on 10-year Treasuries advanced two basis points to 1.44%
* Germany’s 10-year yield advanced one basis point to -0.37%
* Britain’s 10-year yield advanced three basis points to 0.72%
Commodities
* West Texas Intermediate crude fell 1.3% to $70.36 a barrel
* Gold futures fell 0.9% to $1,771.80 an ounce
–With assistance from Andreea Papuc, Abigail Moses, Vildana Hajric, Peyton Forte, Emily Graffeo and Lu Wang.
Have a lovely evening.

Be magnificent!

As ever,

Carolann

Between two evils, choose neither; between two goods, choose both. –Tryon Edwards, 1809-1894.

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