magazine archive


magazine archive

Russ Mould

One year to go: do markets need to care about who is the next US president?

Thursday 02 Nov 2023

It is a year to the 60th US presidential Election, on 5 November 2024, and although financial markets are more concerned right now about events in the Middle East, the oil price and inflation right now, they will soon start to take a keener interest in the race to the White House. Incumbent Joseph...

Discover the only chart which matters to investors right now

Thursday 19 Oct 2023

This column has no desire to be seen as a broken clock, stuck and chiming at the same time each day, but it remains convinced that the only chart that matters right now in financial markets is the one that shows the yield on the US 10-year Treasury, or government bond. The US 10-year’s vertiginous...

Is the buyback boom a help or hindrance for stock markets?

Thursday 05 Oct 2023

The FTSE 100 continues to paddle sideways and is barely any higher now than it was in spring 2017, some six-and-a-half years ago. Such a turgid capital return has at least been supplemented by dividends and also share buybacks, which have played an ever-greater part of shareholder returns in the...

Where next for markets? Here are three potential scenarios

Thursday 21 Sep 2023

Legendary American broadcaster Edward R. Murrow is known for many pungent epithets, but one of this column’s favourites is, ‘Anyone who isn’t confused really doesn’t understand the situation.’ Right now, investors feel confused because stock, bond, currency and commodity markets are giving out...

What should investors make of the big slump in small cap shares?

Thursday 07 Sep 2023

Making money from the financial markets is never easy – if it were, then none of us would be working and there would be no productive assets or companies in which to invest – but clear patterns are developing as 2023 works its way toward its conclusion. In simple terms, 2023 is looking like a ‘risk...

Is China about to face its Minsky moment as country’s property crisis intensifies?

Thursday 24 Aug 2023

Upon finding James Bond crossing his path for a third time in quick succession, in Miami over cards, Kent for golf and then Geneva, Auric Goldfinger finally senses trouble and tells 007, ‘Mr Bond, they have a saying in Chicago: Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it is enemy...

The US economy has kept powering ahead but can it continue?

Thursday 10 Aug 2023

Regular readers of this column will know (or even bewail) its status as a bit of a trainspotter, quite literally when it comes to transport stocks. Owners of planes, ships, trucks and trains are right at the front line of the economy, because when things are going well their services are in demand...

Why the US 10-year treasury yield is so important for investors to watch

Thursday 13 Jul 2023

With celebrations for the US Independence Day holiday of 4 July just dying down, it feels an appropriate time to revisit the US equity market. The timing fees particularly opportune as the S&P 500 is now in a new bull market, at least if you use the definition of a 20% gain from the last major...

Why real interest rates matter for the performance of shares

Thursday 29 Jun 2023

For all the wailing and gnashing of teeth over the Bank of England’s 13th straight interest rate hike last week (22 June), the nominal base rate of 5% is still some way below the post-1970 average of 6.4%. Even more tellingly, the real rate of interest – adjusting for inflation – is still minus 3.7...

Reasons why the market could be too pessimistic about oil demand

Thursday 15 Jun 2023

‘You cannot buck the market’ is taken as axiomatic by many investors and it may be that Saudi Arabia is finding this out the hard way, as it attempts to bend the oil price to its iron will. A fresh production cut from Riyadh, and an extension to the decreases initially agreed in April through 2024...

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