March 1st, 2024, Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Tangents: Happy Friday.  Happy 1^st day of March.

March 1^st, 1872: Yellowstone becomes the world’s first national park.
1961: U.S. Peace Corps established.
1974: Former Nixon White House aides H.R. Haldeman and John D. Ehrlichman and former Attorney General John Mitchell were indicted on obstruction of justice charges related to the Watergate break-in.  Go to article >>
1999: UN Land Mine Ban.

Harry Belafonte, b.1927.

Items used by Roman cavalry and other treasures unearthed by metal detectorist in Wales
A collection of artifacts found on an island in Wales could be part of a religious offering. Read More.

Striking new satellite images show Indonesia’s new jungle capital city taking shape.
Before and after images show Nusantara taking shape, as Jakarta continues to sink into the ground. Read More

James Webb telescope spots trouble in Orion Nebula: Stellar winds are eroding planet-forming material around a young star
A group of extremely bright stars may be slowly reshaping the Orion Nebula and stopping one of their neighbors from forming planets, new James Webb Space Telescope observations suggest. Read More.

Why do people dissociate during traumatic events?
Ever feel disconnected during a stressful event? That could be your brain protecting you. Read More.

Flying car designed to hop across the Philippines’ 7,000 islands coming this year
The Luft Pinoy is an electric minivan combined with a hydrogen-powered eVTOL system to create a flying car that’s practical for island-hopping. Read More.

Ukraine’s Dead Poets Society. — Howard Chua-Eoan.

Celebrities and tycoons jet to Indian billionaire heir’s pre-wedding bash
Those invited to Anant Ambani’s lavish pre-wedding celebrations received an elaborate schedule of events, including chartered jets for guests and a performance by Rihanna. Just imagine what the wedding will look like …

Iowa’s Caitlin Clark declares for the 2024 WNBA Draft
University of Iowa Hawkeyes basketball star Caitlin Clark announced she has decided to declare for the 2024 WNBA Draft. She’s also on the precipice of becoming college basketball’s all-time leading scorer.

PHOTOS OF THE DAY

Canadian, Texas, US
Aud the dinosaur survives the Smokehouse Creek fire
Photograph: David Erickson/AP

A fox jumps into the snow as it hunts near Bingöl, Turkey
Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

​​​​​​​Four-month-old brown bear cubs play while their mother eats in Finland. Brown bears generally give birth to two to three cubs and they live with their mothers for up to three years
Photograph: Mediadrumimages/Valtteri Mulkahainen
Market Closes for March 1st, 2024

International Markets

Bonds

Currencies

Commodities

Market Commentary:
📈 On this day in 1935, the first U.S. savings bond was issued. Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau aimed to encourage public participation in government financing by making federal bonds available in small denominations.
Canada
By Bloomberg Automation
(Bloomberg) — The S&P/TSX Composite rose for the second day, climbing 0.9%, or 188.73 to 21,552.35 in Toronto.
The move was the biggest since rising 1.6% on Feb. 15.
Today, energy stocks led the market higher, as 9 of 11 sectors gained; 171 of 225 shares rose, while 51 fell.
Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. contributed the most to the index gain, increasing 3.3%.
SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. had the largest increase, rising 11.4%.
Insights
* This quarter, the index rose 2.8%
* So far this week, the index rose 0.7%
* The index advanced 6.4% in the past 52 weeks. The MSCI AC Americas Index gained 29% in the same period
* The S&P/TSX Composite is at its 52-week high and 15.3% above its low on Oct. 27, 2023
* S&P/TSX Composite is trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.1 on a trailing basis and 14.7 times estimated earnings of its members for the coming year
* The index’s dividend yield is 3.1% on a trailing 12-month basis
* S&P/TSX Composite’s members have a total market capitalization of C$3.39t
* 30-day price volatility rose to 11.86% compared with 11.77% in the previous session and the average of 10.55% over the past month
================================================================
|Index Points | |
Sector Name | Move | % Change | Adv/Dec
================================================================
Energy | 65.6777| 1.7| 37/3
Materials | 42.3614| 2.0| 42/9
Financials | 25.5353| 0.4| 17/10
Information Technology | 22.5072| 1.2| 9/1
Industrials | 22.1741| 0.7| 19/7
Real Estate | 7.3129| 1.5| 19/2
Utilities | 5.2009| 0.6| 10/5
Health Care | 1.8031| 2.7| 4/0
Communication Services | 1.6600| 0.2| 4/1
Consumer Staples | -0.3725| 0.0| 5/6
Consumer Discretionary | -5.1379| -0.7| 5/7
================================================================
| | |Volume VS | YTD
| Index | | 20D AVG | Change
Top Contributors |Points Move| % Change | (%) | (%)
================================================================
Canadian Natural Resources | 23.9200| 3.3| 165.9| 12.5
Canadian Pacific Kansas | 11.3900| 1.5| -12.1| 11.6
Constellation Software | 10.2800| 2.0| -10.0| 17.3
TD Bank | -2.2980| -0.2| -7.7| -5.0
Waste Connections | -2.6460| -0.7| -33.3| 13.4
Magna Intl | -2.8470| -2.1| -68.2| -6.4
US
By Rita Nazareth
(Bloomberg) — The stock market powered ahead amid a renewed rally in technology companies, with traders also sifting through the latest remarks from a slew of Federal Reserve speakers for clues on the interest-rate path.
The S&P 500 topped 5,100 — hitting its 15th record this year.
Traders looked past weak economic data amid bets policymakers will be able to cut rates as soon as June.
US two-year yields sank as Fed Governor Christopher Waller noted he’d like a shift in the central bank’s holdings toward a larger share of short-term Treasuries.
“Market momentum remains intense, with any momentary period of weakness quickly bought by bulls,” said Mark Hackett, chief of investment research at Nationwide. “The bear case has come apart as the technical and fundamentals both support the rally, though elevated valuations and near-universal optimism are things to watch from a contrarian basis.”
The Nasdaq 100 climbed almost 1.5%, a gauge of chipmakers jumped over 4% and Nvidia Corp. led gains in megacaps.
Dell Technologies Inc. soared 32% on solid sales.
Boeing Co. is in discussions to acquire Spirit AeroSystems Holdings Inc.
Treasuries rose across the curve, with two-year yields sinking nine basis points to 4.53%.
Oil hovered near $80.
Bitcoin rose above $62,000.
With results out from nearly all S&P 500 companies, fourth- quarter earnings look stellar.
Growth was nearly 8%, compared with expectations for a 1.2% rise before the season started.
Those beats helped to offset macroeconomic uncertainty.
Over the past two months, traders have pushed back their bets on when the Fed will start to cut rates.
Fading hopes for easing monetary policy did little to aid equities at the start of the year just as earnings season came into focus.
Some 76% of firms surprised to the upside — outperforming the 10-year average of 74%, according to data compiled by Bloomberg Intelligence — prompting Wall Street to confidently snap up equities at a rapid clip.
Meantime, the frenzy around artificial-intelligence has blindsided Wall Street forecasters, spurring a race among strategists to keep up with a stock market rally that’s already blowing past their expectations when 2024 began.
Five Wall Street firms have already lifted their forecasts for the S&P 500, which is up over 7% to start the year after rising 24% in 2023.
In the past week alone, Piper Sandler & Co., UBS Group AG and Barclays Plc boosted their targets.
Two firms —Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and UBS — have done it twice since December.
The S&P 500 wrapped up February with a rally of over 5%, extending its winning run to four consecutive months.
Since 1950, whenever the gauge finished higher in both January and February, full-year returns for the index have averaged 19.8%, according to Adam Turnquist at LPL Financial.
“Can the winning streak continue?,” Turnquist said. “March has historically been a good month for stocks as the S&P 500 has posted an average return of 1.1%.
However, during election years, average March returns dip to only 0.4%, with notable historical weakness mid-month.”
A stock indicator from BofA that’s tracking Wall Street strategists’ average recommended equity allocations ticked higher last month, moving closer to flashing a contrarian “sell” signal than a “buy” for the first time since April 2022.
Still, the gauge remains in “neutral,” not “sell,” territory.
Equities managed to gain Friday despite data showing US factory activity shrank at a faster pace in February as orders, production and employment contracted.
Bond yields reached the lowest levels of the day after a large block trade in Treasury five-year note futures at a price consistent with a purchase.
However, the bulk of the move occurred earlier in the session, when weaker-than-anticipated data was followed shortly by comments by Fed Governor Waller in support of slowing the pace at which Treasury securities are rolling off its balance sheet.
He was among the several Fed officials speaking Friday.
Governor Adriana Kugler is “cautiously optimistic” that inflation will cool without a notable rise in unemployment.
Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic wants to wait to start cutting rates until inflation recedes further so the central bank doesn’t have to go back and reverse course.
His Dallas counterpart Lorie Logan noted it’ll likely be appropriate to start slowing the pace at which the Fed shrinks its balance sheet.
Chicago Fed chief Austan Goolsbee told CNBC officials should keep rates elevated until they’re convinced inflation is on track to return to the 2% target.
His Richmond counterpart Thomas Barkin said markets are pricing in fewer rate reductions this year in response to economic data, not because the central bank is winning a battle with investors.
In recent weeks, many policymakers have indicated that interest rates will remain at a 22-year high at least through the Fed’s next meeting on March 19-20, with the first cut likely later this year.
Officials are watching to see whether January’s surprise jump in consumer prices was a fluke or a roadblock on the way toward lower inflation.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell looks set to echo his colleagues in suggesting that rate cuts are likely to begin “later this year” in his testimony to Congress next week, according to Andrew
Hunter at Capital Economics. But with the downward trend in core inflation still looking intact, that doesn’t rule out a first cut in June, he noted.
US officials are likely to raise their 2024 projections for economic growth and inflation at their upcoming meeting this month, upping the chances the central bank might signal fewer rate cuts for this year, according to rate strategists at Bank of America Corp.
Apollo Management Chief Economist Torsten Slok said that a re-accelerating economy, coupled with a rise in underlying inflation, will prevent the Fed from cutting rates in 2024.
“The bottom line is that the Fed will spend most of 2024 fighting inflation,” Slok wrote. “As a result, yield levels in fixed income will stay high.”
Treasury yields could soon be heading back toward 5% if strong economic performance delays the Fed’s rate-cut plans, according to Capital Group Inc.’s Pramod Atluri.

Corporate Highlights:
* Reddit Inc. is eyeing a valuation of as much as $6.5 billion in its initial public offering, according to a person familiar with the matter.
* New York Community Bancorp said its disclosure of “material weaknesses” in how it tracks risks won’t require additional reserves for future loan losses.
* Elon Musk sued OpenAI and its Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman, alleging they violated the artificial intelligence startup’s founding mission by putting profit ahead of benefiting humanity.
* Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. delayed its annual report and indicated that a “material weakness” in its internal controls won’t have a broad impact on earnings.

Some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
* The S&P 500 rose 0.8% as of 4 p.m. New York time
* The Nasdaq 100 rose 1.4%
* The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.2%
* The MSCI World index rose 0.8%
Currencies
* The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index fell 0.1%
* The euro rose 0.3% to $1.0837
* The British pound rose 0.2% to $1.2656
* The Japanese yen fell 0.1% to 150.15 per dollar
Cryptocurrencies
* Bitcoin rose 2.1% to $62,740.66
* Ether rose 2.6% to $3,439.08
Bonds
* The yield on 10-year Treasuries declined seven basis points to 4.18%
* Germany’s 10-year yield was little changed at 2.41%
* Britain’s 10-year yield declined one basis point to 4.11%
Commodities
* West Texas Intermediate crude rose 1.9% to $79.77 a barrel
* Spot gold rose 1.9% to $2,083.66 an ounce
This story was produced with the assistance of Bloomberg Automation.
–With assistance from Carter Johnson, Michael Mackenzie, Alexandra Semenova, Carmen Reinicke, Carly Wanna, Sagarika Jaisinghani and Jessica Menton.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone.

Be magnificent!
As ever,

Carolann
The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity.  The optimist sees opportunity in every difficulty. –Winston Churchill, 1874-1965.

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