March 8, 2021 Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Tangents:
1913 – US income tax begins.
1917 – Russian revolution begins.
1965 – The United States landed about 3,500 Marines in South Vietnam.  Go to article »
1983 – President Reagan calls USSR an “evil empire.”
2014 – Malaysia Airlines Flight MH 370 with 239 people loses contact and disappears, prompting the most expensive search effort in history and one of the most enduring aviation mysteries.

Is this really the “ugliest” Rolls-Royce in history?

Some sea slugs cut off their own heads and grow new bodies.

The best bagels are in … California?  Tejal Rao, the California restaurant critic at The Times, based in Los Angeles, reports that West Coast bakers are driving a bagel boom, producing some of the most delicious versions around.  Our critic is also a former resident of New York City, where Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe introduced the bagel in the early 1900s, so she knows whereof she writes. But she also concedes that “bagels are personal.”  The bagels at Boichik Bagels, she reports, makes a version loosely based on the New York version that the baker remembers eating as a child. They “are some of the finest New York-style bagels I’ve ever tasted,” our critic writes. “They just happen to be made in Berkeley.”

On March 8, 1822, Lord Byron wrote to Thomas Moore:
I am really a great admirer of tangible religion; and am breeding one of my daughters a Catholic, that she may have her hands full.  It is by far the most elegant worship, hardly excepting the Greek mythology.  What with incense, pictures, statues, altars, shrines, relics, and the real presence, confession, absolution – there is something sensible to grasp at.  Besides, it leaves no possibility of doubt; for those who swallow their Deity, really and truly, in transubstantiation, can hardly find anything else otherwise than easy of digestion.
  I am afraid that this sounds flippant, but I don’t mean it to be so; only my turn of mind is so given to taking things in the absurd point of view, that it breaks out in spite of me every now and then.  Still, I do assure you that I am a very good Christian.
Byron’s daughter Allegra, whose mother was Claire Clairmont, the half-sister of Mary Shelley, died, aged five, in a  convent school near Ravenna a few weeks after this letter. –from The Book of Days.

PHOTOS OF THE DAY

This is the incredible moment a crafty penguin escaped a pod of hungry killer whales by leaping into a dinghy full of tourists – to rapturous applause. The wily creature was caught on camera repeatedly jumping out of the water in a dramatic chase that circled the tour boat before it managed it flung itself aboard and stood proudly surrounded by the beaming holidaymakers. Travel blogger Matt Karsten and his wife Anna were taking a tour through icebergs in the Gerlache Strait, Antarctica, when a large group of orcas swam up to their Zodiac boat.
CREDIT: EXPERT VAGABOND/KENNEDY/NEWS

An aerial view shows a hockey rink after a match on the ice of Lake Baikal, organized to draw attention to the environmental problems of the lake, in the village of Bolshoye Goloustnoye in Irkutsk region, Russia
CREDIT:REUTERS/MAXIM SHEMETOV

Pope Francis addresses people from the podium at the square near the ruins of the Syriac Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception (al-Tahira-l-Kubra), in the old city of Iraq’s northern Mosul
CREDIT: ZAID AL-OBEID/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
Market Closes for March 8^th, 2021

International Markets

Bonds

Currencies

Commodities

Market Commentary:
     On this day in 1817, the New York Stock & Exchange Board, ancestor of the NYSE, was formed when 24 brokers agreed on a “constitution” that fixed commissions at 0.25% and set a fine of at least six cents for talking out loud about other subjects while stocks were being traded.
Canada
By Michael Bellusci
(Bloomberg) — Canadian equities rose as investors rotated away from technology stocks. The S&P/TSX Composite Index gained 0.4%, with nine of 11 sectors advancing. Tech and materials lagged. Oil fell the most in a week as the dollar strengthened and investors shrugged off an attack on the world’s largest crude terminal in Saudi Arabia. A rapid souring in financial markets on Monday highlights how even the most positive news for the world economy is no fillip to risk assets weighed down by the anchor of the global bond market.
Commodities
* Western Canadian Select crude oil traded at an $11.25 discount to West Texas Intermediate
* Spot gold fell 1% to $1,681.19 an ounce
FX/Bonds
* The Canadian dollar fell 0.2% C$1.2679 per U.S. dollar
* The 10-year Canada government bond yield rose 2 basis points to 1.53%

By Bloomberg Automation:
     (Bloomberg) — The S&P/TSX Composite rose for the second day, climbing 0.4 percent, or 76.82 to 18,457.78 in Toronto. The index advanced to the highest closing level since Feb. 24. Today, financials stocks led the market higher, as 9 of 11 sectors gained; 138 of 219 shares rose, while 79 fell. Royal Bank of Canada contributed the most to the index gain, increasing 1.7 percent. Mullen Group Ltd. had the largest increase, rising 8.0 percent.
Insights
* This quarter, the index rose 5.9 percent
* The index advanced 14 percent in the past 52 weeks. The MSCI
AC Americas Index gained 29 percent in the same period
* The S&P/TSX Composite is 0.7 percent below its 52-week high on
March 8, 2021 and 65.2 percent above its low on March 23, 2020
* The S&P/TSX Composite is up 0.9 percent in the past 5 days and rose 0.7 percent in the past 30 days
* S&P/TSX Composite is trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of
27.2 on a trailing basis and 16.7 times estimated earnings of its members for the coming year
* The index’s dividend yield is 2.8 percent on a trailing 12-month basis
* S&P/TSX Composite’s members have a total market capitalization of C$2.85t
* 30-day price volatility little changed to 16.02 percent
compared with 16.01 percent in the previous session and the average of 14.30 percent over the past month
================================================================
| Index Points | |
Sector Name | Move | % Change | Adv/Dec
================================================================
Financials | 77.7685| 1.3| 26/0
Consumer Discretionary | 12.6192| 1.7| 9/4
Industrials | 11.8835| 0.5| 20/8
Communication Services | 11.3713| 1.3| 6/1
Real Estate | 11.1154| 1.9| 25/1
Consumer Staples | 7.0396| 1.1| 10/1
Utilities | 6.9779| 0.8| 12/4
Energy | 5.2804| 0.2| 6/16
Health Care | 0.7039| 0.3| 5/4
Materials | -15.3724| -0.7| 14/35
Information Technology | -52.5521| -2.9| 5/5
US
By Andreea Papuc and Lynn Thomasson
(Bloomberg) — Tech shares tumbled anew, sending the Nasaq 100 Index down 11% from its all-time high, as investors fled high-valuation stocks for companies whose fortunes are closely tied to the economic cycle. The benchmark for megacap tech dropped 2.9% and is now at the lowest since November. The S&P 500 ended lower after rising as much as 1% as tech shares in the gauge dropped 2.5%. Financial firms and materials producers kept losses from being worse. The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit an all-time high before settling for a 1% gain, buoyed by rallies in banks and Walt Disney Co. Tesla Inc. pushed its five-day rout past 20%.
Blank-check companies backed by Chamath Palihapitiya tumbled. The 10-year Treasury rate jumped toward 1.6%, while the dollar strengthened. Brent crude briefly traded near $70 a barrel before pulling back. Gold slumped and Bitcoin traded above $51,000. Investors embraced the prospect for a surge in global economic growth as vaccine distribution improves and the U.S. heads toward passing a $1.9 trillion spending bill.
The risks associated with rising Treasury yields remain an overhang amid fears that government aid programs could overheat economic growth. “You will see a lot of volatility in markets,” Kim Stafford, Asia Pacific head at Pacific Investment Management Co., said on Bloomberg Television. “We believe that confidence is improving, especially with vaccines coming online, so we will see an uptick in growth globally. There are a lot of reasons to be confident in the market, but a lot of this is also priced in.” There are also questions about whether equity valuations have become excessive, especially in speculative tech shares. The Nasdaq 100 Index has fallen about 8% since early February.
Here are some key events to watch:
* The annual session of China’s National People’s Congress continues in Beijing.
* Japan GDP is due Tuesday.
* EIA crude oil inventory report is due Wednesday
* The U.S. February consumer price index will offer the latest look at price pressures Wednesday.
* The European Central Bank holds its monetary policy meeting
and President Christine Lagarde is set to do a briefing Thursday.

These are some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
The S&P 500 Index fell 0.5% as of 4 p.m. New York time.
The Nasdaq Composite Index fell 2.9%.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 1%.
The MSCI All-Country World Index fell 0.3%.
The Stoxx Europe 600 Index rose 2.1% to the highest in almost three weeks.
Currencies
The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index rose 0.5% to 1,150.02, the highest in 16 weeks.
The euro declined 0.5% to $1.1850, the weakest in 15 weeks.
The Japanese yen depreciated 0.5% to 108.88 per dollar, the weakest in nine months.
The British pound dipped 0.1% to $1.3829, the weakest in more than three weeks.
Bonds
The yield on 10-year Treasuries rose three basis points to 1.59%.
Germany’s 10-year yield gained two basis points to -0.277%, the highest in more than a week.
Commodities
West Texas Intermediate crude declined 2.1% to $64.71 a barrel.
Gold futures depreciated 1.1% to $1,679.20 an ounce.
–With assistance from Cormac Mullen.
Have a great night.

Be magnificent!
As ever,

Carolann

You can’t use up creativity.  The more you use, the more you have.
                                                       -Maya Angelou, 1928-2014

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
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www.carolannsteinhoff.com