The Buzz on Business for May 21^st, 2024

It was “Let’s All Give a Speech Day” at the Federal Reserve yesterday. At least six leaders of the US Central Bank gave speeches on Monday. As one might expect, pretty much nothing of consequence was said.

Indeed, Federal Reserve Board Vice-Chair Philip Jefferson said nothing while saying everything. “Inflation is bad. Bad, bad inflation.

He continued saying that he really needed to carefully assess the incoming figures before deciding to support interest rate cuts later this year.

“It’s too soon to tell if a disinflationary process in the US will be long lasting,” which is literally and logically incoherent but, to our ears, made more sense than anything else he said.

And then concluded by saying, in essence, “Don’t worry, we’re cutting rates in September.”

You know, we need to get us one of those Federal Reserve Board jobs. For real.

Federal Reserve Board Governor Michelle Bowman, said the quiet part out loud, in her speech Monday morning. “While the current stance of monetary policy appears to be at a restrictive level, I remain willing to raise the target range for the federal funds rate at a future meeting should the incoming data indicate that progress on inflation has stalled or reversed.”

We love that girl. Can we say that? We love that girl.

For almost twenty years now, the US economy has underperformed. It’s had a couple of good years and a couple of bad years but GDP growth in the US has averaged less than two percent. That’s despite nearly $20 trillion in borrowed money being pumped into the economy—or maybe because of.

The one bright spot, if you can call it that, has been that inflation has been low, at least until the last three years or so.

If inflation stays elevated or accelerates, as we believe it is primed to do, two percent growth will be aspirational.

Stock Market Report

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell back below 40,000 on Monday, while the rest of the broad market managed to post gains. But volume fell and decliners led advancers on the session.

• • The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 197 points. That's one-half of 1%, and it closed at 39,807.

• • The S&P 500 was up five points. That's one-tenth of 1% and it closed at 5,308.

• • The NASDAQ Composite had a pretty good day, it was up seven-tenths of 1%, that's 109 points on the NASDAQ and it starts the day today at a new, all-time, closing high of 16,795.

• • And the small cap Russell 2000 was up three-tenths. That's seven points, and it closed at 2,102.

Bond Market Report

Rates were up for the third straight day.

• • The yield on the 2-year treasury closed at 4.852%. That's up three basis points.

• • The 20-year was up two ticks and it closed at 4.685%.

Oil, Gold, and Bitcoin

• • Oil remains range-bound. It was off $0.32 a barrel and closed at $79.14.

• • Gold was up $10, even, and a troy ounce will now set you back $2,430.80.

• • And Bitcoin closes in on $70,000. It was up $2,526.88 and at 4:00 PM Eastern Time Monday stood at $69,551.08.

S[eeches, Speeches and More Speeches

Other than all the speeches, the Economic Calendar was blank on Monday.

The Giant Quote Machine reported the earnings of three companies, all three exceeded expectations. One of those, Palo Alto Networks, after exceeding bottom and top line expectations, sold off hard as the company guided expectations down for the second quarter, although guidance for the balance of the year exceeds consensus expectations.

Today, we get Lowe’s first quarter numbers. Tomorrow, NVIDIA, which is always interesting.

Oh, we also get six more speeches today. Because we care, we will listen, read, analyze, and report all of it to you tomorrow, here on the Buzz.