Third quarter earnings season gets underway this week (October 9–13) and it should be another good one. The S&P 500 Index has exceeded earnings expectations 33 straight quarters and we see no reason why the third quarter won’t make it 34. However, as seen in Figure 1, earnings growth should fall short of the stellar results and double-digit pace of the past two quarters. We don’t like to lead with the negatives, but some of the reasons earnings growth may slow down this quarter include:

Hurricane impacts. The most visible impact of the devastating hurricanes (Harvey and Irma) late in the third quarter can be

We originally wrote on the topic of buying at all-time highs in June 2015. At that time, markets were near new highs, causing some to ask if the stock market was at its peak and poised to move lower. With hindsight being 20/20, we can now say markets were not at a peak, as the S&P 500 Index has gone on to return a cumulative 17% since that time (6/22/15 – 6/22/17), not including the impact of dividends. As is common with markets, the path over the last two years has been rocky at times, with two 10% pullbacks (one in August 2015, and another in January of 2016), but markets recovered and are again hovering near record highs. Though volat

Last week’s tax proposal presented real progress. For much of this year we have been espousing what has felt like a minority view — that Republicans would reach some sort of tax agreement in early 2018. After last week, that view may have become the majority — even if only a slight one — as key tax policy players in Washington, D.C. put out a framework with more details. The plan is geared toward securing votes from the most conservative wing of the Republican Party and appears to have achieved its objective. Here we share some implications of that proposal and explore what some market-based barometers of tax reform sh

The third quarter of 2017 was in many ways a tale of three markets for fixed income investors. When comparing the 10-year yield at the beginning of the quarter (2.35% on July 3, 2017) to the end of the quarter (2.33% on September 29, 2017), it doesn’t look like much changed. However, this couldn’t be further from the truth, as Figure 1 shows. Yields were moving higher when the third quarter began, as markets digested better than expected economic data and a hawkish tone from European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi. The 10-year yield was basically flat for July, before falling in August and recovering in September.

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