A MARKET WITHOUT ANY HAPPY FOOD
There are two types of grocery shopping habits in our household. No list(s) for me. My wife on the other hand, you guessed it, lengthy, all-encompassing productions that starting at the top will lead you right through the store to the checkout. I can’t help but suggest that if you find yourself behind my wife closing in on checkout, and no registers are open, just mosey around for a while. You’ll thank me later. As it happens on this recent shopping extravaganza, I found myself wandering around, having been misdirected by my wife to find a certain item that we must have passed up while looking further down the list at that tasty item we eagerly look forward to each week and lovingly call our “happy food”. You’ve seen the boxes on the “happy isle”, right? There is one called Kazbars. The other, an orange, cream filled cupcake, both provided by Hostess.
OH SEE!!, you know them!
The problem is, I’m a distractable old man and I often find my mind wandering out in front of me. On this occasion, there was my silly old brain, looking down at the meat counter wondering how it could be that my last freezer full was substantially easier to fill based on the prices my wife was willing to spend. I’m the guy who just throws it into the cart and the aftershock turns into a shrug, but it’s that look from my wife that nearly kills me.
I collected my gray matter.
and put it back in its box. Then my sense meter kicked in and I remembered something in a Facebook post from a liberal friend touting the wonderful, he claims expected, upward trend of the stock market. These types of posts are much needed and wonderful news for the American economy, but only in my book if they are presented in context.
I suspect that those of you who politically lean in a conservative tilt and have read my editorial contributions in the past, know there is about to be a counter to “my liberal”, wait, never mind, let’s state it as it should be, “my socialist” friend. Socialists love “good news” they are not responsible for but certainly, always claim it for themselves.
They use it to throw jabs at many of us who hail good leadership that puts sound policy in place and hits the pause or delete buttons on strangling regulation. It is Bidenomics, they scream from some Washington monument they just toppled over, and that “Orange Hair”
insults everyone, and those lousy conservatives claimed our wonderful leaders’ policies were running on fumes.
The article to which I refer was placed in Newsbreak.com, from an original piece posted in the Alamogordo Conservative Daily on 12/14/2023 or 12/15/2023.
Titled: Dow Jumps To Record High Trump Claims Biden Administration “Running On Fumes”
I read the article. I thought I could not go wrong reading a “conservative” sourced information piece full of good news. It was, for all intents and purposes, full of good news. However, I found no context or possible pitfalls or reasons that might lead to pessimism.
Holy cow, my friendly Dow!
Well, Geez Louise, you’ll never fall again, um, unless Trump gets elected, then doom and gloom will return. He’ll jail all brokers and commandeer your portfolio, wait, hell with all that he says! A dictator for a day I will be. Prevail the Orange Hair must. (Thankyou Yoda, always good to hear from you)
But that is the lefts mantra these days, is it not?
I feel an obligation here, just in the name of community service mind you, to fill in what the author of the above piece left out, purposely or mindlessly, matters not which.
Bill Stone is the Chief Investment Officer of The Glenview Trust Company.
Louisville Trust Company | Glenview Trust
He also contributes to Forbes magazine online. He posted the piece just above on 11/12/2023. Go ahead, click on the link there. If you are not a stock guy or gal, or if maybe like me, a big spender in charge of minimal savings, that piece may come to you, hard to read. On the other hand, I’m a word guy and all it takes is a bit of research to discover the words Bill uses are descriptive of meaningful challenges ahead. Let’s dig in, shall we.
The so called “earning season” refers to the months of the year during which most quarterly corporate earnings are released to the public. Does it not seem odd to you that the good news sailor I referred to in the beginning, left out that “only 52 of the S&P 500 reported”, says our new friend Bill. Here are some other words he used that may interest (no pun intended) you. A “softer jobs report” seems to have allowed the Federal Reserve to hold off on rate increases. But apparently the market has a wisdom tooth and continues to price in increases and any rate cuts are being held up to witness the wobbly sea leg economy prior to The Fed taking additional action. If that dampens your enthusiasm for Bidenomics, you are not alone, nor am I done dampening.
The Magnificent Seven drug the S&P 500 higher. The dragging was a hard pull for sure. Those “Seven” are the monsters like Microsoft and Amazon
and as with the other seven, where expensive treats are found, sold and delivered around this time of year. When that spending declines in the new year, The Fed may reevaluate rates. What about the rest of the S&P 500, the smaller companies, your local utility, or your small-town savings and loan, and oh yes, any capital management “food bank” I may or may not have been walking around in.
I am NOT telling you where my wife shops, as a thoughtful service to you, “dontcha know”.
Bill Stone claims these companies huddle among themselves in interest rate sensitive sectors. I’m going to agree with him, but what does a wordsmith know.
For the moment, we all should be happy that the economy has finally shed the restraints of the Covid years and leapt into a growth season we all, liberal and conservative alike, are responsible for. There is one more thing, however, to wonder about. If Bidenomics is responsible for all the wonderment and joy during this Christmas season, in the financial world and inside the American pocketbook, why is the Biden administration putting the term back onto the political shelf? Why have the polls gauging the economy that many of you are enlisted to participate in show displeasure and hesitancy to approve of. I’ll tell you. It’s because you keep telling me,
Consumers changing eating, shopping habits as inflation pushes up prices (cnbc.com)
and I’m looking at it right here in the meat department. Click on the link there just above, see my big head. That’s not mine really, but it drives home the point, doesn’t it? The wallet stays slim, the house a bit cooler in the cold of winter, and freezers just can’t seem to get filled. Survivability is of utmost importance and it’s just harder to do these days.
I said to my wife after we circled the store several times to find each other, “Honey, being that bacon is “happy food”, I put the cupcakes back.” It’s as if Putin were in charge, the shelf in the pantry needs stocking, but then so do the Christmas stockings over the fire.
Then I got another of those “kill Bob” looks. OK, ok, bacon going back too. No happy food this month.
They can’t hide Bidenomics for long, and we can’t hide from it. We all feel it, we know it’s there, and we don’t like it.
Christmas, yes, the birth of Christ, just headed out to wait for another spending season in 2024. Make sure you stop to remember why we give the gifts to begin with.
I hope this 2023 Christmas was merry and blessed for you and all of yours. Have a delightful and prosperous new year. Whatever you do, please, do not take the ballot box for granted, it could be your last.
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