Articles authored by Sonu Varghese

The stock market has been on a tear for more than 18 months now, with the S&P 500 up 44% from December 31, 2022 to July 8, 2024. We’ve consistently maintained that momentum begets momentum, and my colleague, Ryan Detrick, has written time and again as to why there’s more than enough reason to be …

I’ve noted in the past how the US economy primarily relies on consumer spending, and since consumer spending is driven by income growth, the employment situation is pretty much the ballgame. And right now, things are getting a tad uncomfortable. We’re not quite worried yet, but simply recognize that risks are rising. What’s running strong, …

NVIDIA briefly overtook Microsoft last week to top the charts as the most valued company in the world measured by market capitalization. The stock has pulled back since then, but it was up 156% year to date through last Friday (June 21st). This amazing run comes on the heels of a 239% return in 2023, …

The title was actually a question I put to Professor Jeremy Siegel when Chief Market Strategist Ryan Detrick and I hosted him on a live Facts vs Feelings episode recently. (You can listen to the episode here.) Of course, the question assumes you need luck while investing, and I think a lot of you reading …

Fake news alert: Saudi Arabia is not going to stop selling oil in US dollars (USD), and they’re not ending any petrodollar pact. In fact, there is no petrodollar pact, secret or otherwise. So, there’s nothing to renew (or not renew). Nor is there any “paradigm shift” shift in global finance. The rather mundane truth …

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) report was a welcome “surprise” after a string of uncomfortably hot inflation reports. I put quotes around the word surprise, because in January and April, there was nothing within the inflation data or outside of it (e.g. inflation expectations, wage growth data) that suggested inflation was on a persistently higher …

Job growth continues to catch most people by surprise, rising 272,000 in May. That was well above expectations for a 180,000 gain. In fact, “whisper” expectations (as much as one can glean from online chatter amongst economists and strategies) seemed to be tilted to a downside surprise, perhaps close to 150,000. Mostly because we’ve had …

Poor consumer confidence has been bit of a puzzle recently, given historically low unemployment and easing inflation. In fact, the “misery index,” which is the sum of the inflation rate and the unemployment rate, looks quite normal. It sits at 7.3% as of April, which is below the historical average (1950-2023) of 9.3%. Meanwhile, consumer …

Hotter-than-expected inflation data in the first quarter led to a lot of concern that inflation is likely to rear its ugly head again. However, as I pointed out in several blogs over the first few months of the year (including two weeks ago), there was really no need to panic if you just peeked under …

Home prices and stock prices have risen to record levels, and as Ryan just wrote about, consumer balance sheets are in really good shape. Yet the title of this blog is likely quite controversial, especially since we just had the highest inflationary episode in over 40+ years and consumer sentiment suggests people aren’t happy about …