😮 it be like that these days

let’s start with some good news: the july jolts (job openings and labor turnover survey) figures were posted at 10am today

• # of job openings were "little changed" at 11.2m

• likewise, "little changed" for hires (6.4m) and total separations (5.9m)

• so, this should be good news

  • this is economic data and evidence that the us economy is showing signs of resilience despite strong recession fears looming in the markets recently

• another positive sign was the consumer confidence index that came out today

  • after three consecutive monthly declines, the august number showed an increase, from 95.3 in july to 103.2 in august

why did the market go down today then? all because of powell & rates!

• the fed’s been continuously raising interest rates, and that’s been bringing the markets down lately

  • as for now, rates movement is the single most important thing that the market’s paying attention to, and it’s not looking pretty

• last friday, at the annual jackson hole symposium, powell said that the fed must continue raising rates even if unemployment rises and is anticipating that the action will "bring some pain to households and businesses"

  • he noted that that’s "the unfortunate cost(s) of reducing inflation" to prevent greater pain (aka failure to control inflation)

this is getting the overall market to think:

• powell’s words and the fed’s decisions will be a much more influential factor than most others for quite some time

  • imo: strong corporate earnings may not mean much as they used to be

• slight decrease in inflation won’t mean anything – we’ll need to see series of significant reductions in inflation observed via data

  • imo: only then the market (and the fed) will start to feel like the rate hikes will stop (or at least pause)

happy tuesday evening y’all!

💡 something im thinking about

that's all, folks 🐒

as always, i’m no financial advisor! (i’m no substitute for professional financial services)

buy me a coffee :)