M Notes: Mon, 10-27

LAST WEEK:

Markets:  New highs… again.  Markets have been shrugging of concerns over the Shutdown and Tariffs.  

S&P roller coaster last week:  Up a lot, Flat, Down, Up, and Up a lot.  

Deficit:  The US Government’s fiscal year ended, for 2025, on September 30th.  Here are the Deficits for the last five fiscal years:  2021: -$2.77 T; 2022: -$1.38 T; 2023: -$1.70 T; 2024: -$1.83 T; and 2025: -$1.78 T.  The numbers for 2025 include a +$164 B… Surplus in September, the final fiscal month.    

Fed Balance Sheet:  $6.590 Trillion. 

Housing:  Existing Home Sales were up +1.5% in September, and were up +4.1% Y/Y.  New Homes Sales numbers were not reported yet, due to the Government Shutdown.

Inflation:  Consumer Inflation (the CPI) was up +0.3% in September, and was up +3.0% Y/Y (up a touch from +2.9% in August).

Jobless Claims:   The numbers were not reported yet, due to the Government Shutdown.  

National Debt:  $37.918 Trillion.   

Shutdown:  Almost four weeks.  It appears the key date is now Saturday, November 1st.  That’s when the enrollment for period for the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) begins.  Democrats are saying the numbers are going to go way up… unless Republicans agree to extend the subsidies.  But as I shared in last week’s MNotes, while Healthcare may be their focus, it looked like Democrats were trying to reverse the impact of most of the cuts the Trump Administration has implemented this year.  $1.5 T in new (replacement) spending... to just negotiate short-term.  It’s tricky politics.  Shut down the Government (some Ds are now admitting that), to put the focus on Healthcare, while not paying non-essential government workers.  That could put Rs in a difficult place.  But it puts Ds in a difficult place to.  And do D’s realize they are admitting, 15 years after the legislation was passed, that the Affordable Care Act… is not so affordable?   

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THIS WEEK:

Focus of the week:  The Fed Meeting.  It takes place Tuesday and Wednesday this week.  The Meeting’s Announcement comes out at 2pm on Wednesday, followed by the Jerome Powell’s press conference.  Expectations are the FOMC will reduce the Fed’s Interest Rate by ¼%.   

Calendar:   Durable Goods Orders (Mon); OFMC Meeting Announcement, Fed Chair’s press conference (Wed);  the first read on Q3 GDP, Jobless Claims (Thu); and the PCE (Fri).

Earnings:  Some of the companies reporting this week:   Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Boeing, Caterpillar, Chevron, CVS, Eli Lilly, Exxon Mobil, Mastercard, Merck, Meta, Microsoft, Shell, Sherwin Williams, Starbucks, UnitedHealth, UPS, Verizon, and Visa.

* 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 Dow Jones Industrial Average is a price-weighted index of 30 actively traded blue-chip stocks.  The NASDAQ Composite Index is an unmanaged, market-weighted index of all over-the-counter common stocks traded on the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotation System.  Yahoo! Finance, the Wall Street Journal, Investor’s Business Daily and Barron’s are several of the sources used for financial information. 

* The National Debt figure comes from usdebtclock.org.   

* Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice and are not intended as investment advice or to predict future performance.  Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision.  You cannot invest directly in an index.   Past performance does not guarantee future results. No strategy can assure a profit or protect against a loss.  Investments in the securities markets involve risk, such as loss of your principal.