Does it make sense that a painting sells for $120 million in this economic environment?

You may have seen the recent headline that Edvard Munch’s painting, “The Scream,” sold for a record-breaking $120 million. It made us wonder what the implications are of an anonymous bidder forking over that kind of cash for a pastel on canvas just three years out from a horrible economic crisis. Does this mean happy days are here again? 

Placed in broad context, the high sale price for a work of art might be symptomatic of policymakers’ response to the economic crisis, according to The Wall Street Journal. When the economy began collapsing in 2008, governments around the world responded by cutting interest rates and flooding their economies with monetary stimulus. All this money sloshing around had to end up somewhere - and some of it might have found its way into hard assets such as commodities, precious metals, collectibles, and, yes, an Edvard Munch painting. 

There’s something called the law of unintended consequences, which means solving one problem might inadvertently create a new one. In this case, the massive stimulus in recent years propped up the economy in the short run, but it may have unintentionally masked the real problem and simply delayed a day of reckoning. 

With the following economic and political issues in play, that day of reckoning may be nearing:

• Eleven European countries have experienced two consecutive quarters of economic contraction.
• The unemployment rate across the eurozone has matched a record high.
• Job growth in the U.S. is slowing.
• The Chinese economy is slowing.
• The political situation in Greece is chaotic.
• France has a new Socialist president.

Sources: MarketWatch, The Wall Street Journal 

Now, the good news. In any economic environment, there will be winners and losers. As the steward of your financial life, we do everything we can to try and help you land on the winning side regardless of what the economy and markets throw in our way. 

Weekly Focus – Think About It 

“Nature is pleased with simplicity. And nature is no dummy.”

–Isaac Newton, English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist, theologian… yes, a really smart guy! 

Best regards, 

Jonathan K. DeYoe

LPL Registered Principal 

P.S.  Please feel free to forward this commentary to family, friends, or colleagues. If you would like us to add them to the list, please reply to this e-mail with their e-mail address and we will ask for their permission to be added. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC.  This newsletter was prepared by Peak Advisor Alliance.  Peak Advisor Alliance is not affiliated with the named broker/dealer. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The DJ Global ex US is an unmanaged group of non-U.S. securities designed to reflect the performance of the global equity securities that have readily available prices.  The 10-year Treasury Note represents debt owed by the United States Treasury to the public. Since the U.S. Government is seen as a risk-free borrower, investors use the 10-year Treasury Note as a benchmark for the long-term bond market. Gold represents the London afternoon gold price fix as reported by the London Bullion Market Association. The DJ Commodity Index is designed to be a highly liquid and diversified benchmark for the commodity futures market. The Index is composed of futures contracts on 19 physical commodities and was launched on July 14, 1998. The DJ Equity All REIT TR Index measures the total return performance of the equity subcategory of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) industry as calculated by Dow Jones. Yahoo! Finance is the source for any reference to the performance of an index between two specific periods. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance. Past performance does not guarantee future results. You cannot invest directly in an index. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision. 

Even the smartest guy in the room sometimes makes mistakes.

Jamie Dimon, CEO of the huge U.S. bank JP Morgan, has been called the smartest guy in the room for his ability to effectively steer the bank through the economic crisis. And, while most of the other big U.S. banks have tarnished reputations, Dimon’s firm was the one that stood out from the crowd. 

Unfortunately, that all changed last week. 

In a hastily arranged conference call with investors, Dimon revealed that the bank lost $2 billion in just the past six weeks on “bets aimed at shielding the bank from the market fallout of Europe’s deepening mess,” according to The Wall Street Journal. These “bets” lost money due to “unusual movements in the relationships between various derivative indexes focused on investment-grade and junk-bond corporate debt, both in the U.S. and Europe,” according to the Journal. 

This debacle points to three important investment lessons: 

1. Keep it simple. Trading fancy derivatives or using complex black box trading strategies might give you an air of sophistication, but it may also lead to your downfall. As Leonardo da Vinci said, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” 
2. Pick and track your investments closely. In describing the trades that blew up, Dimon said, “The new strategy was flawed, complex, poorly reviewed, poorly executed, and poorly monitored,” according to Bloomberg. Clearly, in this ever-changing world, a “set it and forget it” investment strategy won’t cut it. 
3. 3.      Be humble. Even a smart guy like Dimon can trip up. One of the biggest errors in investing is self-deception – thinking and acting like you are the smartest guy in the room. It’s better to worry about what could go wrong – and plan for it – than think you’re invincible.  

The investment landscape is littered with formerly sharp investors who forgot these three lessons. We plan on keeping them front and center. 

Notes: S&P 500, DJ Global ex US, Gold, DJ-UBS Commodity Index returns exclude reinvested dividends (gold does not pay a dividend) and the three-, five-, and 10-year returns are annualized; the DJ Equity All REIT TR Index does include reinvested dividends and the three-, five-, and 10-year returns are annualized; and the 10-year Treasury Note is simply the yield at the close of the day on each of the historical time periods. Sources: Yahoo! Finance, Barron’s, djindexes.com, London Bullion Market Association. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.  Indices are unmanaged and cannot be invested into directly.  N/A means not applicable. 

Best, 

Jonathan K. DeYoe

LPL Registered Principal 

P.S.  Please feel free to forward this commentary to family, friends, or colleagues. If you would like us to add them to the list, please reply to this e-mail with their e-mail address and we will ask for their permission to be added. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC.  This newsletter was prepared by Peak Advisor Alliance.  Peak Advisor Alliance is not affiliated with the named broker/dealer. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The DJ Global ex US is an unmanaged group of non-U.S. securities designed to reflect the performance of the global equity securities that have readily available prices.  The 10-year Treasury Note represents debt owed by the United States Treasury to the public. Since the U.S. Government is seen as a risk-free borrower, investors use the 10-year Treasury Note as a benchmark for the long-term bond market. Gold represents the London afternoon gold price fix as reported by the London Bullion Market Association. The DJ Commodity Index is designed to be a highly liquid and diversified benchmark for the commodity futures market. The Index is composed of futures contracts on 19 physical commodities and was launched on July 14, 1998. The DJ Equity All REIT TR Index measures the total return performance of the equity subcategory of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) industry as calculated by Dow Jones. Yahoo! Finance is the source for any reference to the performance of an index between two specific periods. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance. Past performance does not guarantee future results. You cannot invest directly in an index. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision.

In his fascinating new book, Imagine: How Creativity Works, author Jonah Lehrer describes the creative process and what steps we can all take to be a little more creative. One of those steps is to talk to more people and expose yourself to new situations. By “colliding” more often with people who are not like you and throwing yourself into new environments (like a foreign country), your mind will come up with more new ideas than you could have thought of on your own.

And, while business owners may not like this, Lehrer’s research suggests, “The most important place in every office is not the boardroom, or the lab, or the library. It’s the coffee machine.” It’s those casual conversations with colleagues that generate new interactions and spark ideas.

This leads to an important point about investing.

Brian Uzzi, a professor at the Kellog School of Management, studied the instant messages (IM) sent by traders at a large hedge fund over an eighteen-month period. As reported in Lehrer’s book, these traders sent more than two million messages over that period and the average trader was involved in 16 different IM conversations simultaneously – talk about multitasking! Essentially, these traders were rapidly communicating with each other and trying to make sense of the latest news so they could profitably trade on it.

As summarized by Lehrer, Uzzi concluded, “The best traders were the most connected, and people who carried on more IM conversations and sent more messages also made more money.” Further, Uzzi said, “The act of investing is like solving a difficult puzzle. These traders are trying to connect the dots. Because the traders are listening to their network, they manage to accomplish what they could never have done by themselves.”

In essence, successful investing partly relies on “connecting the dots” of information that bombard us. While we’re not day traders like the people Uzzi studied at the hedge fund, the concept of connecting the dots still applies – albeit on a much longer timeframe. And, to connect the dots, we have a large network of colleagues who can help us separate the daily noise from what’s truly meaningful.

Weekly Focus – Think About It

“Everyone who’s ever taken a shower has had an idea. It’s the person who gets out of the shower, dries off, and does something about it who makes a difference.”

–Nolan Bushnell, founder of Atari, Inc. and Chuck E. Cheese’s Pizza-Time Theaters

Best regards,

Jonathan K. DeYoe

LPL Registered Principal

P.S.  Please feel free to forward this commentary to family, friends, or colleagues. If you would like us to add them to the list, please reply to this e-mail with their e-mail address and we will ask for their permission to be added. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC.  This newsletter was prepared by Peak Advisor Alliance.  Peak Advisor Alliance is not affiliated with the named broker/dealer. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The DJ Global ex US is an unmanaged group of non-U.S. securities designed to reflect the performance of the global equity securities that have readily available prices.  The 10-year Treasury Note represents debt owed by the United States Treasury to the public. Since the U.S. Government is seen as a risk-free borrower, investors use the 10-year Treasury Note as a benchmark for the long-term bond market. Gold represents the London afternoon gold price fix as reported by the London Bullion Market Association. The DJ Commodity Index is designed to be a highly liquid and diversified benchmark for the commodity futures market. The Index is composed of futures contracts on 19 physical commodities and was launched on July 14, 1998. The DJ Equity All REIT TR Index measures the total return performance of the equity subcategory of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) industry as calculated by Dow Jones. Yahoo! Finance is the source for any reference to the performance of an index between two specific periods. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance. Past performance does not guarantee future results. You cannot invest directly in an index. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision.

The most important news last week may have actually happened this past weekend.

On Sunday, voters went to the polls in France, Greece, and Germany and the results could have a major impact on world markets. French voters sent incumbent president Nicholas Sarkozy packing and, instead, elected Socialist Party candidate Francois Hollande. Hollande “has pledged to shift the burden of economic hardship onto the rich and to resolve the protracted euro sovereign-debt crisis by softening the current prescription of austerity,” according to The Wall Street Journal. While his strategy is debatable, it will likely cause a rift with Germany and add uncertainty to recent eurozone agreements.

Greek voters also went to the polls and “delivered a stinging rejection of the two incumbent parties, with many people casting ballots for smaller, far-left and far-right parties,” according to the The Wall Street Journal. This, too, will likely result in more political and economic uncertainty. And in Germany, incumbent Angela Merkel’s party suffered some setbacks in state elections.

What’s leading to all the angst in Europe? Here are three things:

1. Recession fears – 11 European countries have now experienced two consecutive quarters of economic contraction.
2. Unemployment fears – the unemployment rate across the eurozone is at a record high.
3. Business confidence fears – April’s read on the manufacturing PMI for the eurozone – a measure of confidence among businesses – fell to the lowest since June 2009.

Sources: MarketWatch, The Guardian

The bottom line is citizens are voting for change, but “political realities will complicate even more what is an already delicate economic and financial outlook for Europe, the world’s largest economic area,” according to Mohamed El-Arian, CEO and Co-CIO of PIMCO, as reported by CNBC.

These elections show that the economic crisis that began in 2008 is still rippling throughout the world.

Notes: S&P 500, DJ Global ex US, Gold, DJ-UBS Commodity Index returns exclude reinvested dividends (gold does not pay a dividend) and the three-, five-, and 10-year returns are annualized; the DJ Equity All REIT TR Index does include reinvested dividends and the three-, five-, and 10-year returns are annualized; and the 10-year Treasury Note is simply the yield at the close of the day on each of the historical time periods. Sources: Yahoo! Finance, Barron’s, djindexes.com, London Bullion Market Association. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.  Indices are unmanaged and cannot be invested into directly.  N/A means not applicable.

Best regards,

Jonathan K. DeYoe

LPL Registered Principal

P.S.  Please feel free to forward this commentary to family, friends, or colleagues. If you would like us to add them to the list, please reply to this e-mail with their e-mail address and we will ask for their permission to be added. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC.  This newsletter was prepared by Peak Advisor Alliance.  Peak Advisor Alliance is not affiliated with the named broker/dealer. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The DJ Global ex US is an unmanaged group of non-U.S. securities designed to reflect the performance of the global equity securities that have readily available prices.  The 10-year Treasury Note represents debt owed by the United States Treasury to the public. Since the U.S. Government is seen as a risk-free borrower, investors use the 10-year Treasury Note as a benchmark for the long-term bond market. Gold represents the London afternoon gold price fix as reported by the London Bullion Market Association. The DJ Commodity Index is designed to be a highly liquid and diversified benchmark for the commodity futures market. The Index is composed of futures contracts on 19 physical commodities and was launched on July 14, 1998. The DJ Equity All REIT TR Index measures the total return performance of the equity subcategory of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) industry as calculated by Dow Jones. Yahoo! Finance is the source for any reference to the performance of an index between two specific periods. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance. Past performance does not guarantee future results. You cannot invest directly in an index. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision.

On Earth Day, a group called Occupy the Farm, who claims to be “philosophically inspired” by Occupy Wall Street (OWS), planted carrots, broccoli, and corn on land in Albany owned by UC Berkeley. These passionate farmers were protesting the university’s plans for the Gill Tract – a vacant lot on the corner of San Pablo and Marin. Said plans allegedly include a senior housing development, which I’m pretty sure won’t house the %, and a grocery store that may or may not be a Whole Foods, where most us in the 99% buy our organic kale.

Monday night a rampage through San Francisco’s Mission District, led by folks who’d just marched from an OWS protest at Dolores Park, left a trail of broken glass and spray paint on Valencia and Guerrero Streets. The victims of these acts of vandalism weren’t huge corporations or investment banks. They were small, locally owned “main street” businesses – many of whose owners are clearly part of the 99%.

Yesterday morning in Oakland, protesters participating in OWS’s May Day General Strike were met with tear gas and police in riot gear. “We are here because Capitalism has destroyed basic human need” declared one protestor, who I’m guessing was not wearing clothes he’d made himself from organic cotton grown on the Gill Tract.

I can understand why many of these folks feel angry, frustrated, and disenfranchised, and I’m sure most of them are well meaning. But to rally indiscriminately against Capitalism with a capital “C” dilutes the original conception of OWS, which was aimed at what should be more accurately termed the Cronyism practiced by Wall Street firms and the unprecedented government rescue of U.S. Banks deemed “too big to fail”.

In truth, the bailouts that occurred in 2008-9 were not Capitalism. Under a truly capitalist system, folks who made bad investments (including banks and the investors who owned bank debt), should have lost money for their bad investments or shut their doors for good – survival of the fittest being one of the fundamental tenants of Capitalism. Instead they were bailed out with tax payer money. The very notion of a “bailout” is the opposite of Capitalism.

Then the same culprits who benefited from these bailouts – and were never held accountable for their original bad investments or their systemically damaging decisions – paid themselves egregious bonuses while taxpayers suffered with a recession. These fat Wall Street cats were enabled by fat cat politicians who were either too stupid to see what was being done or (worse) compensated with campaign dollars for creating the opportunity for these banker profits. More Cronyism!

The first OWS protestors insisted that there should be some kind of clawback of any bonuses originally paid by Wall Street to Wall Street prior to the house of cards collapsing. I couldn’t agree with them more – especially if those dollars can be traced to the deals, trades, issues that eventually led to that collapse. If you follow the paper trail you’ll likely discover that some big bonuses were paid and then subsequently shared with the campaign committees, foundations, or families of politicians in an effort to get them re-elected and perpetuate the shenanigans. Those contribution dollars should be clawed back, as well. Of course, the fact that two years later these same over the top bonuses and political antics continue unabated only intensifies OWSers feelings that the game is rigged.

They’re right, of course. The game is rigged, and perhaps it has always been rigged. But this is where my empathy for the recent offshoots of the OWS movement ends. They claim it’s rigged against the 99%, whereas I think the game is rigged for the perpetuation of the banker class, the political class, and those with access to politicians. I do not believe it is rigged against anyone. There’s nothing to stop you, me, or one of my Berkeley clients from having a great idea, raising money, starting a company, hiring employees, expanding sales, becoming profitable, and entering the 1%.

OWS did not spring up to protest this homegrown brand of success. Their beef is with success attained or maintained through system-rigging. This is a critical distinction, and one that is getting lost in the fray. Somehow “the 1%” has become the marketing scapegoat of a movement that has lost its center, and now means anyone that has achieved success, no matter how hard won.

And yet, if you sat down one-on-one with a protestor in Downtown Oakland and asked if she thought Steve Jobs deserved the wealth he’d earned from the great products he’d created, I bet she’d stop checking the e-mail on her iPhone long enough to say “Yes!” Few OWSers I’ve encountered truly begrudge the 1% their success. What they begrudge is success garnered through Cronyism and unfair means – and so do I.

I may think railing against Capitalism and some vague notion of the 1% is misguided, but I believe OWS is absolutely right about one thing: we should all protest the illicit affair between the banking system and our political system. Fortunately, you don’t have to March though tear gas in downtown Oakland to register your disgust. You can march into your stock broker’s office and tell him to sell all your bank stocks today. You can march into your bank, close your account, and move your money to the local credit union tomorrow. And you can march into your neighborhood polling station in November. See you there!

About DeYoe Wealth Management
Based in Berkeley, California, DeYoe Wealth Management is passionate about helping clients pursue financial independence on their terms. The firm offers access to comprehensive financial services, including customized asset management, holistic financial planning, and insurance solutions tailed to meet the needs of our clients and their families. Our objective is to help our clients maximize their Happiness Dividend, working towards financial independence while realizing their dreams. DeYoe Wealth Management uses a six-step process to make sure our clients’ investment strategies keep pace with their changing lifestyle, planning for current needs and future goals. For more information, visit www.deyoewealthmanagement.com.
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The opinions voiced in this material are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations to any individual. The opinions expressed in this material do not necessarily reflect the views of LPL Financial.

Jonathan K. DeYoe, AIF® & CPWA® is a registered principal with and securities and advisory services offered through LPL Financial, a Registered Investment Advisor – Member FINRA/SIPC.

According to a widely followed barometer of home prices in the U.S., the housing market still has the blues. The S&P/Case-Shiller Index is designed to show how home prices are performing in the twenty largest cities and last week’s report showed the index is at its lowest point since October 2002.

Since the peak of the index in 2007 through February of this year, home prices have lost one-third of their value-and that’s even with record low interest rates on mortgages. Unfortunately, tough employment conditions have kept many potential homeowners on the sidelines. Adding to that, obtaining a loan from a bank remains difficult without very good credit.

Even though home prices continue to decline, a silver lining might be emerging. According to the National Association of Realtors, an index that measures the number of agreements signed to buy previously owned homes rose in March to its highest level in two years.

The increase in interested home buyers is coming at a time when supply is declining. Inventory levels in many markets are at their lowest level in years. For example, according to The Wall Street Journal, at the current pace of sales, it would take only 1.5 months to sell all the homes in Sacramento, CA. Considering pickings are pretty slim, home builders have also benefited. New home sales in the U.S. are up 16 percent so far this year.

Unfortunately, this recent decline in available homes for sale may prove to be temporary because Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and other banks have been slow to list for sale hundreds of thousands of foreclosed homes. In fact, banks and other investors are believed to hold 450,000 foreclosed homes while an additional 2 million are currently in the process of being foreclosed.

Ultimately, the solution to the housing blues may be strong economic growth. And as last week’s GDP numbers show, that strong growth hasn’t started yet.

Weekly Focus – Think About It

“In order to get a loan you must first prove you don’t need it.”

–Murphy’s Law

Best regards,

Jonathan K. DeYoe

LPL Registered Principal

P.S.  Please feel free to forward this commentary to family, friends, or colleagues. If you would like us to add them to the list, please reply to this e-mail with their e-mail address and we will ask for their permission to be added. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC.  This newsletter was prepared by Peak Advisor Alliance.  Peak Advisor Alliance is not affiliated with the named broker/dealer. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The DJ Global ex US is an unmanaged group of non-U.S. securities designed to reflect the performance of the global equity securities that have readily available prices.  The 10-year Treasury Note represents debt owed by the United States Treasury to the public. Since the U.S. Government is seen as a risk-free borrower, investors use the 10-year Treasury Note as a benchmark for the long-term bond market. Gold represents the London afternoon gold price fix as reported by the London Bullion Market Association. The DJ Commodity Index is designed to be a highly liquid and diversified benchmark for the commodity futures market. The Index is composed of futures contracts on 19 physical commodities and was launched on July 14, 1998. The DJ Equity All REIT TR Index measures the total return performance of the equity subcategory of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) industry as calculated by Dow Jones. Yahoo! Finance is the source for any reference to the performance of an index between two specific periods. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance. Past performance does not guarantee future results. You cannot invest directly in an index. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision.

What is the costliest fruit?

How about an apple, as in Apple, Inc.? With more than $500 billion in market capitalization, Apple is the world’s most valuable company, according to Reuters. Last week, the company reported quarterly earnings that easily trumped analyst forecasts and this helped propel the S&P 500 to a 1.8 percent weekly gain. But it’s not just Apple that’s doing well. According to FactSet, a robust 78 percent of the S&P 500 companies that have reported earnings so far this quarter have beaten analysts’ forecasts.

Last week’s gains came despite some disappointing economic news which included the following:

• A weaker than expected reading on U.S. gross domestic product (GDP), the broadest measure of all goods and services produced in our country.
• A downgrade of Spain’s government debt—perhaps not surprising since the country now has a debilitating unemployment rate of 24.4 percent.
• A second consecutive quarter of negative economic growth in the U.K., indicating they have slid back into recession.

Sources: The Wall Street Journal, Yahoo! Finance, Bloomberg

Overall, the economy continues to chug along at a modest pace. Not quite fast enough to signal “all clear” and not quite slow enough to signal “recession ahead.”

Notes: S&P 500, DJ Global ex US, Gold, DJ-UBS Commodity Index returns exclude reinvested dividends (gold does not pay a dividend) and the three-, five-, and 10-year returns are annualized; the DJ Equity All REIT TR Index does include reinvested dividends and the three-, five-, and 10-year returns are annualized; and the 10-year Treasury Note is simply the yield at the close of the day on each of the historical time periods. Sources: Yahoo! Finance, Barron’s, djindexes.com, London Bullion Market Association. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.  Indices are unmanaged and cannot be invested into directly.  N/A means not applicable.

Best regards,

Jonathan K. DeYoe

LPL Registered Principal

P.S.  Please feel free to forward this commentary to family, friends, or colleagues. If you would like us to add them to the list, please reply to this e-mail with their e-mail address and we will ask for their permission to be added. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC.  This newsletter was prepared by Peak Advisor Alliance.  Peak Advisor Alliance is not affiliated with the named broker/dealer. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The DJ Global ex US is an unmanaged group of non-U.S. securities designed to reflect the performance of the global equity securities that have readily available prices.  The 10-year Treasury Note represents debt owed by the United States Treasury to the public. Since the U.S. Government is seen as a risk-free borrower, investors use the 10-year Treasury Note as a benchmark for the long-term bond market. Gold represents the London afternoon gold price fix as reported by the London Bullion Market Association. The DJ Commodity Index is designed to be a highly liquid and diversified benchmark for the commodity futures market. The Index is composed of futures contracts on 19 physical commodities and was launched on July 14, 1998. The DJ Equity All REIT TR Index measures the total return performance of the equity subcategory of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) industry as calculated by Dow Jones. Yahoo! Finance is the source for any reference to the performance of an index between two specific periods. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance. Past performance does not guarantee future results. You cannot invest directly in an index. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision.

Earlier this year the European Central Bank (ECB), Europe’s equivalent of our U.S. Federal Reserve, responded to the fear surrounding the European debt crisis by offering unlimited three-year loans with a 1.0 percent interest rate to European banks. According to The Wall Street Journal, at least 800 banks across Europe responded to this offer by borrowing over $1.3 trillion. As planned, the banks then took a good portion of that money and bought government securities that paid a higher interest rate. It sounds like a great deal to the banks – borrow money at a 1.0 percent rate then turn around and buy government securities that pay a much higher rate and pocket the difference. 

The primary objective of this emergency lending was to indirectly allocate money to European governments who are heavily indebted. The ECB thought that making cheap money available would help lower interest rates in these troubled countries and “buy” them more time to work out their economic problems. 

How’s it working? 

Initially, interest rates in troubled countries dropped dramatically as banks bought the high-yielding government securities and fears of a collapse eased. Unfortunately, The Wall Street Journal says many of the banks who borrowed money from ECB may have already exhausted most of those funds – leaving little money left to keep pushing interest rates down. As a result of this fear, interest rates are rising again, particularly in Spain and Italy, and, like a leak in a dike, it’s hard to stop a rise once it gets going. 

Will the ECB step in again and help European banks and governments avoid a Greek-style default? It’s too early to tell, but either way, we’ll be closely watching this tug-o-war between positive corporate earnings in the U.S. and negative headlines out of Europe. 

Stay tuned… 

Weekly Focus – Think About It 

“There are no shortcuts to any place worth going.”

–Beverly Sills

Best regards, 

Jonathan K. DeYoe

LPL Registered Principal 

P.S.  Please feel free to forward this commentary to family, friends, or colleagues. If you would like us to add them to the list, please reply to this e-mail with their e-mail address and we will ask for their permission to be added. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC.  This newsletter was prepared by Peak Advisor Alliance.  Peak Advisor Alliance is not affiliated with the named broker/dealer. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The DJ Global ex US is an unmanaged group of non-U.S. securities designed to reflect the performance of the global equity securities that have readily available prices.  The 10-year Treasury Note represents debt owed by the United States Treasury to the public. Since the U.S. Government is seen as a risk-free borrower, investors use the 10-year Treasury Note as a benchmark for the long-term bond market. Gold represents the London afternoon gold price fix as reported by the London Bullion Market Association. The DJ Commodity Index is designed to be a highly liquid and diversified benchmark for the commodity futures market. The Index is composed of futures contracts on 19 physical commodities and was launched on July 14, 1998. The DJ Equity All REIT TR Index measures the total return performance of the equity subcategory of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) industry as calculated by Dow Jones. Yahoo! Finance is the source for any reference to the performance of an index between two specific periods. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance. Past performance does not guarantee future results. You cannot invest directly in an index. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision. 

Move over European debt headlines, corporate earnings have something to say.

Even though troubles are brewing again across the pond in Europe, corporate earnings season in the U.S. is stealing the spotlight. Why? According to CNBC, more than 100 companies in the S&P 500 have reported earnings and 8 out of 10 have delivered better than expected results – and that’s grabbed investors’ attention. 

Each quarter, publicly traded companies update investors on how their businesses fared over the previous three months. And, according to the updates we’re seeing, business is still looking okay. The news helped push the S&P 500 higher by 0.6 percent on the week. 

Now, like all statistics, there’s more than one way to interpret the earnings numbers. While 8 out of 10 companies have beaten expectations, the “expectation” was pretty low. In fact, earnings increased only 3.7 percent from the year ago quarter, according to Zacks. For the remaining S&P 500 companies that are set to report, Zacks expects those companies to report slightly negative earnings growth compared to the year ago quarter.  

Over in Europe, Spain and Italy saw the borrowing rate increase on their government debt, which suggests their debt problem is far from over. And, the International Monetary Fund released a report that stated the obvious – if the European debt crisis can’t be contained, it would negatively impact global economic growth in a severe way. 

At the moment, the U.S. markets seem fixated on corporate earnings and have put the European problem on the back burner. But, in this interconnected world, problems overseas may eventually find their way to our shores. 

Notes: S&P 500, DJ Global ex US, Gold, DJ-UBS Commodity Index returns exclude reinvested dividends (gold does not pay a dividend) and the three-, five-, and 10-year returns are annualized; the DJ Equity All REIT TR Index does include reinvested dividends and the three-, five-, and 10-year returns are annualized; and the 10-year Treasury Note is simply the yield at the close of the day on each of the historical time periods. Sources: Yahoo! Finance, Barron’s, djindexes.com, London Bullion Market Association. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.  Indices are unmanaged and cannot be invested into directly.  N/A means not applicable.

Best regards, 

Jonathan K. DeYoe

LPL Registered Principal 

P.S.  Please feel free to forward this commentary to family, friends, or colleagues. If you would like us to add them to the list, please reply to this e-mail with their e-mail address and we will ask for their permission to be added. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC.  This newsletter was prepared by Peak Advisor Alliance.  Peak Advisor Alliance is not affiliated with the named broker/dealer. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The DJ Global ex US is an unmanaged group of non-U.S. securities designed to reflect the performance of the global equity securities that have readily available prices.  The 10-year Treasury Note represents debt owed by the United States Treasury to the public. Since the U.S. Government is seen as a risk-free borrower, investors use the 10-year Treasury Note as a benchmark for the long-term bond market. Gold represents the London afternoon gold price fix as reported by the London Bullion Market Association. The DJ Commodity Index is designed to be a highly liquid and diversified benchmark for the commodity futures market. The Index is composed of futures contracts on 19 physical commodities and was launched on July 14, 1998. The DJ Equity All REIT TR Index measures the total return performance of the equity subcategory of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) industry as calculated by Dow Jones. Yahoo! Finance is the source for any reference to the performance of an index between two specific periods. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance. Past performance does not guarantee future results. You cannot invest directly in an index. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision.

The “shove it” indicator (as highlighted by CNBC) made a noteworthy gain in February, suggesting consumer confidence may be increasing. You’re probably wondering, “What in the world is the ’shove it’ indicator?” Well, every month the government conducts a Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, or “JOLTS” for short. One of the data points in the JOLTS report is the number of workers who quit their job as opposed to being laid off. And, in February, for the first time since September 2008, the quitters were in the majority. 

What does this mean? Generally speaking, people who quit their job are typically more confident that there is another job waiting for them when they voluntarily leave a position. Nicholas Colas, chief market strategist at ConvergEx Group says, “Quits go hand-in-hand with consumer confidence.” 

This positive JOLTS data point follows a disappointing government jobs report for the month of March where only 120,000 new jobs were created. Also, the preliminary March reading of the University of Michigan’s consumer confidence survey showed a decline from the previous month. Analysts had expected confidence to stay flat, according to International Business Times. 

This conflicting economic data gave the bulls and the bears ample ammunition to bolster their respective case. And, conflicting data like this may lead to a continuation of the yo-yo as investors try to predict which direction the economy is headed. 

Weekly Focus – Think About It 

“Expectation is the root of all heartache.”

–William Shakespeare 

Best regards,

 Jonathan K. DeYoe

LPL Registered Principal 

P.S.  Please feel free to forward this commentary to family, friends, or colleagues. If you would like us to add them to the list, please reply to this e-mail with their e-mail address and we will ask for their permission to be added. Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC.  This newsletter was prepared by Peak Advisor Alliance.  Peak Advisor Alliance is not affiliated with the named broker/dealer. The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The DJ Global ex US is an unmanaged group of non-U.S. securities designed to reflect the performance of the global equity securities that have readily available prices.  The 10-year Treasury Note represents debt owed by the United States Treasury to the public. Since the U.S. Government is seen as a risk-free borrower, investors use the 10-year Treasury Note as a benchmark for the long-term bond market. Gold represents the London afternoon gold price fix as reported by the London Bullion Market Association. The DJ Commodity Index is designed to be a highly liquid and diversified benchmark for the commodity futures market. The Index is composed of futures contracts on 19 physical commodities and was launched on July 14, 1998. The DJ Equity All REIT TR Index measures the total return performance of the equity subcategory of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) industry as calculated by Dow Jones. Yahoo! Finance is the source for any reference to the performance of an index between two specific periods. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance. Past performance does not guarantee future results. You cannot invest directly in an index. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision.