It's been a fascinating year in global markets. And we're not even done with March...!
On a related note, we are fortunate here at Hedgeye to have our own cartoonist, the inimitable Bob Rich who has done a masterful job capturing it all in his daily cartoon. If you'd like to receive his free daily cartoon in your inbox, click here and we'll email it to you each day.
Below are a handful of some of Bob's beauties summing up the past 3-4 months.
#1
It was a rough start to 2018 for stock market bears.
#2
The stock market kicked off the year with a bang.
#3
In fact, January 2018 was the best start to a year in more than three decades. Then, something changed...
#4
Heading into 2018, we warned our subscribers that optimism about the "globally synchronized recovery" narrative would yield to "global divergences."
(Pssst ... we were right.)
#5
After a remarkably quiet 2017, volatility woke up.
#6
Investors freaked.
#7
An all-out brawl ensued. Stocks peaked at the end of January. Bearish investors came out of the woodwork proclaiming victory.
#8
We took a deep breath ... and reiterated our calls long U.S. stocks.
#9
... We stayed bearish on China.
(the Shanghai Composite is down -8.2% from its year-to-date peak)
#10
... We stayed bearish on Europe.
(the German DAX is down -9.4% from its year-to-date peak)
#11
... We stuck with short Bitcoin.
(Bitcoin is down -56% from its December all-time bubble high.)
#12
Meanwhile, Jerome Powell took over Janet Yellen's seat as head of the Fed.
#13
Investors speculated the Fed would finally make due on its more rate hikes promise.
#14
The January jobs report bolstered the rate hike narrative.
Wage growth accelerated to 2.9% year-over-year (the highest reading since May 2009). The 10-year Treasury ultimately hit a 4-year high of 2.956% on the news.
#15
We think wage inflation fears are overdone (and called for "Reflation's Rollover").
#16
While the US's best economic and profit growth days may be behind it, corporate profit data has helped support the recent resurgence in U.S. equities, particularly in our favorite area, Tech stocks.
(Aggregate year-over-year Nasdaq 100 sales and earnings growth was up 13.1% and 16.4% in 4Q 2018.)
#17
Despite the recent selloff, the Nasdaq is still up 26% in the past year.
