November 4, 2020 Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Tangents:
On Nov. 4, 2008, Barack Hussein Obama was elected the 44th president of the United States, as the country chose him as its first black chief executive. Go to article »

1922: King Tut’s tomb found.
1946: UNESCO founded.
1916: Walter Cronkite Jr., journalist b. 1916.

Here are the best TV shows and movies hitting streaming services this month. –NYT

This 5-minute meditation routine will calm you down.  For whatever is stressing you out today. –CNN.

The mysterious radio signal is coming from inside the galaxy. -Bloomberg.

Giant swimming prehistoric paper clip lived 200 years.-Bloomberg.

PHOTOS OF THE DAY

Kosovo artist Alkent Pozhegu works on the final touches of an image made with grain and seed, depicting the portrait of Joe Biden, the US Democratic presidential nominee, in the town of Gjakova.  The United States started voting on November 3, 2020, in an election amounting to a referendum on Donald Trump’s uniquely brash and bruising presidency, which Democratic opponent and frontrunner Joe Biden urged Americans to end to restore “our democracy.” 
CREDIT: ARMEND NIMANI/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

An osprey rests on a dead piece of wood near the Quhe River in Quzhou City, east China.
CREDIT: COVER IMAGES

A spectacular ‘wave’ of knitted poppies is lighting up a church in Callington as Cornwall, UK, launches its annual fundraising appeal. The display at St Mary’s Church features around 9,000 knitted poppies, alongside figures of soldiers and wooden crosses placed in the ground.
CREDIT: JAMES DADZITIS/SWNS
Market Closes for November 4^th, 2020 

International Markets

Bonds

Currencies

Commodities

Market Commentary:
Yields on 10-year Treasuries rose to as high as 0.94% shortly after polls closed on the East Coast. As it became obvious that some form of divided government is far more likely than polls had implied, yields tumbled back to as low as 0.78%.
Canada
By Michael Bellusci
(Bloomberg) — Canadian equities rose for a third straight session Wednesday as investors awaited the final outcome of the U.S. presidential election.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index rose 0.4%, with tech shares leading the way. Lightspeed POS Inc. and Shopify Inc. both rose more than 5%. It was a mixed session with five of 11 groups closing lower. Materials and some marijuana shares, including Aurora Cannabis Inc., dropped.
Oil surged by the most in a month, swept up in a broader market rally as a tightly contested U.S. presidential contest suggested even a new administration would be restrained from enacting its most ambitious objectives.
The search is officially on for a new senior deputy governor at the Bank of Canada. With Carolyn Wilkins moving on when her term ends May 1, the Ottawa-based central bank published the job posting Wednesday.
Commodities
* Western Canada Select crude oil traded at a $10.00 discount to West Texas Intermediate
* Spot gold fell 0.3% to $1,902.75 an ounce
FX/Bonds
* The Canadian dollar rose 0.1% to C$1.3129 per U.S. dollar
* The 10-year government bond yield fell 7.2 basis points to 0.617%

By Bloomberg Automation:
(Bloomberg) — The S&P/TSX Composite rose for the third day, climbing 0.4 percent, or 60.21 to 15,999.36 in Toronto. The index advanced to the highest closing level since Oct. 27.
Today, information technology stocks led the market higher, as 6 of 11 sectors gained; 121 of 223 shares rose, while 100 fell.
Shopify Inc. contributed the most to the index gain,
increasing 5.4 percent. Finning International Inc. had the largest increase, rising 11.6 percent.
Insights
* This year, the index fell 6.2 percent, heading for the worst year since 2018
* The index declined 4 percent in the past 52 weeks. The MSCI AC  Americas Index gained 12 percent in the same period
* The S&P/TSX Composite is 11 percent below its 52-week high on Feb. 20, 2020 and 43.2 percent above its low on March 23, 2020
* The S&P/TSX Composite is up 2.6 percent in the past 5 days and fell 1.2 percent in the past 30 days
* S&P/TSX Composite is trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.5 on a trailing basis and 21.8 times estimated earnings of its members for the coming year
* The index’s dividend yield is 3.2 percent on a trailing 12-month basis
* S&P/TSX Composite’s members have a total market capitalization of C$2.45t
* 30-day price volatility fell to 14.45 percent compared with 15.69 percent in the previous session and the average of 14.90 percent over the past month
================================================================
| Index Points | |
Sector Name | Move | % Change | Adv/Dec
================================================================
Information Technology | 71.9905| 4.7| 9/1
Financials | 38.6597| 0.8| 19/7
Communication Services | 11.3674| 1.4| 7/0
Real Estate | 7.2719| 1.4| 24/3
Consumer Staples | 5.9591| 0.9| 11/0
Energy | 3.0254| 0.2| 9/14
Consumer Discretionary | -0.5437| -0.1| 9/3
Health Care | -2.4873| -1.5| 5/5
Utilities | -2.8661| -0.3| 2/13
Industrials | -21.8249| -1.1| 15/13
Materials | -50.9593| -2.0| 11/41
US
By Claire Ballentine and Kamaron Leach
(Bloomberg) — After a wild election night sowed confusion across U.S. markets, investors frantically bid up stocks Wednesday, sending major averages to the biggest rallies in five months, as they grew more confident that the tightly contested outcome would ensure key elements of the bull market remain intact for years to come.
A narrow victory by either Democratic challenger Joe Biden or President Donald Trump, coupled with a split legislature,will make it unlikely that Trump’s 2017 corporate tax cuts – an important driver to stock gains — are rolled back, as Biden has pledged to do. The failure by the Democrats to clearly sweep Congress and the White House does pare back bets that traders had made on a massive fiscal stimulus package, though some aid remains likely this year. At the same time it adds to pressure on the Federal Reserve — another crucial force behind the bull market — to pump money into an economy that was throttled by the pandemic.
The fading prospects for a multitrillion-dollar package also prompted investors to bid up Treasury bonds amid a diminishing of inflationary pressures, sending yields lower by the most since April. The Nasdaq 100 surged more than 4% in its
best rally since April. Financial and industrial shares lagged behind as investors turned from companies that are most closely tied to the economy’s prospects. “Part of what is going on is tech is rallying strongly, which is pushing the market up, and the reason tech is rallying is because it sold off, it was uniquely exposed to higher yields, higher taxes,” said Alicia Levine, chief strategist at BNY Mellon Investment Management. “That created a viscous reversion trade into cyclicals with the expectation yields were
moving up with the prospect of further stimulus.”
The 10-year Treasury yield tumbled below 0.80% as traders cheered the prospects for less debt-funded spending. Still, a private payrolls report on Wednesday fell short of estimates and the services sector expanded at the slowest pace in five months. With millions of votes in battleground states still being counted, and close contests in several key states, the presidential outcome may not be decided for days, or longer. The Trump campaign said it is suing in Pennsylvania and Michigan to halt vote counts that were trending toward Biden. It’s clear that the election is turning out to be messier and more drawn-out than Wall Street had hoped.
“There will be very little cooperation on fiscal policy, very little cooperation relative to policy related to containing COVID, very little cooperation on infrastructure, or basically anything that will stimulate the economy,” said George Pearkes, Bespoke Investment Group’s global macro strategist. “If that’s the case, then what we’ve got is a repeat of the last recovery, almost to the letter.”
Meanwhile, Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc. jumped after California voters approved a measure to protect the companies’ business models from efforts to reclassify their drivers in the state as employees. Back in global markets, the dollar weakened against many of its major peers, while gold slipped. In Asia, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. tumbled 7.5% in Hong Kong after China halted the initial public offering of Ant Group Co., in which Alibaba owns about a one-third stake.
Follow along here for our real-time news updates and analysis.
     These are some key events coming up:
* Federal Reserve policy decision on Thursday.
* The key U.S. non-farm payrolls report is due Friday.
* Earnings are due this week from companies including Bristol- Myers Squibb Co., AstraZeneca Plc and Nintendo Co. on Thursday; Macquarie Group Ltd. and Toyota Motor Corp. are set for on Friday.

These are some of the main moves in global financial markets:
Stocks
*The S&P 500 Index jumped 2.2% to 3,443.53 as of 4:00 p.m. New York time, the highest in more than a week on the largest surge in five months.
*The Nasdaq 100 Index surged 4.4% to 11,777.02, the highest in almost three weeks on the biggest jump in seven months.
*The Dow Jones Industrial Average increased 1.3% to 27,849.84, the highest in more than a week.
*The MSCI All-Country World Index climbed 1.9% to 579.11, the highest in more than a week on the biggest increase in 20 weeks.
*The Stoxx Europe 600 Index rose 2.1% to 363.31, the highest in more than two weeks.
Currencies
*The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index decreased 0.2% to 1,164.53, the lowest in more than a week.
*The euro was little changed at $1.1717, the strongest in a week.
*The Japanese yen was little changed at 104.52 per dollar.
Bonds
*The yield on two-year Treasuries declined two basis points to 0.14%, the lowest in more than two weeks on the largest decrease in almost 10 weeks.
*The yield on 10-year Treasuries sank 13 basis points to 0.77%, the lowest in more than a week on the biggest tumble in more than seven months.
*The yield on 30-year Treasuries decreased 14 basis points to 1.55%, the lowest in almost three weeks on the largest tumble in
almost seven months.
*Germany’s 10-year yield fell two basis points to -0.64%, the biggest fall in more than a week.
Commodities
*West Texas Intermediate crude gained 3.4% to $38.94 a barrel, the highest in more than a week on the largest rise in more than four weeks.
*Gold weakened 0.2% to $1,904.85 an ounce.
–With assistance from Casey Wagner and Vildana Hajric.

Have a great night.

Be magnificent!
As ever,

Carolann

Gratitude is one of the least articulate of the emotions, especially when it is deep.
                                                                      -Felix Frankfurter, 1882-1965

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