Posted on 12/27/2005 10:47:43 AM PST by rhombus
NEW YORK (AP) -- Stocks stumbled Tuesday as the bond market gave signals that in the past have preceded economic slowdowns.
The yield curve, the spread between the yields of short-term and long-term bonds, inverted for the first time in five years. That means short-term interest rates are higher than long-term interest rates. Investors have been watching the yield curve closely because, in the past, inverted yield curves have usually preceded a recession.
(Excerpt) Read more at biz.yahoo.com ...
Son, I have paid more in taxes on my profits this year alone than you have earned. And good fortune has nothing whatsoever to do with it.
But I guess the kind of minute performance that makes you giddy is less exciting to many others.
:^}
Fine, anything you want. In fact, if it's really that important to you I can also go and take back what I said about you being right and me being wrong and I'll grant that I was right after all and that means that I was right when I said I was wrong and that--
Now I'm getting dizzy.
Hey, I liked it better when you were fussing with Tball. How about you two having at it and giving me the rest of the day off.
May our 2006 be at least as much fun as 2005 has been. ;-)
But please please please don't take back the part about me being right just 'cause I was teasin' ya.
Take the rest of the day off, you deserve it. :^}
Thanks --I've got a bad habit of insulting people without trying and I'm working hard to quit-- so naturally I was glad to hear you were joking. I was worried you were in a bad mood about having to pay more in taxes than I get in profits --I know for sure that if I had to pay more taxes than I made in profits that I'd be in a really foul mood.
cheers!
As my Grandfather always said, "better days are coming". He didn't say when so I was never disappointed. :^}
I've been using the Amex as a quick'n'dirty small cap index. If you have the energy or interest, you can show a difference if you want to plot the AMEX and some official small cap index but that sounds like a lot of work to me....
It's actually pretty easy to do that on Yahoo (with a few limitations). What's not so easy is finding the appropriate indices. For an official small cap index, I found the Dow Jones US Small Cap Index (^DJUSS). Of course, a U.S. small cap index should be compared against an international small cap index. The best representative that I could find for the latter was the Fidelity International Small Cap Fund (FISMX) and the iShares MSCI Emerging Markets Index Fund (EEM). I also included a broad U.S. stock index (the S&P 500 Index) and an ETF that tracks a broad international stock index (the MSCI Europe, Australasia, Far East index). The following graph shows the returns for those indices and funds over the past two years:
If you can find better indices or representative funds, you can make changes to the graph at the following Yahoo page:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?t=2y&s=FISMX&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=EEM%2C%5EDJUSS%2CEFA%2C%5EXAX&c=%5EGSPC
Following is a description of all of the ticker symbols in the above graph, in the order of their return over the past two years, starting from the highest:
EEM - iShares MSCI Emerging Markets Index Fund ^XAX - AMEX Composite Index FISMX - Fidelity International Small Cap Fund EFA - iShares MSCI EAFE Index Fund ^DJUSS - Dow Jones US Small Cap Index ^GSPC - S&P 500 Index
Most all predictions are S&P up 11% minimum, DJ at 15000 before year end and overseas seeing records.....Looked WAY back for this. Dow at 12,500, S&P up 18.05%, and EAFE way up. Some predictions close, some spot on. Happy New Year.
Most all predictions are S&P up 11% minimum, DJ at 15000 before year end and overseas seeing records.....Looked WAY back for this. Dow at 12,500, S&P up 18.05%, and EAFE way up. Some predictions close, some spot on. Happy New Year.
For a moment I thought this was reporting on today's stock market -- today being Monday, January 15, 2007. This was especially baffling since I assumed the markets are closed for the holiday. Then I saw the date: December 2005. Then I exhaled.
Why does raising short-term rates cool the housing market?
Because historically long term rates followed. Not this time. Therein lies the problem for the Fed. It really wanted this housing slowdown and it didn't really get it. The slowdown so far has only popped the spec bubble. Regular folks who don't need to sell (flip) remain very able to afford housing at these rates. We may see the housing market come roaring back in 07.
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