The Stock Market is a Market of Stocks

Brian Ransom, CFA, MBA, MS Research Director Signature Wealth Management Group Duh, Brian! It’s purposefully redundant to call the stock market a market of stocks. But sometimes I wonder if people truly understand what the “stock market,” is. By definition, the stock market is a basket of assets ranging from ~$500,000 in market value all the way up to $3.4 trillion. As of the end of 2023, there were approximately 55,214 stocks that could be purchased throughout the world. On any given day, those stocks move in a wide variety [...]

By |2025-03-13T16:42:26-04:00March 13, 2025|Insights, Investments|

Southern Company Update, 4th Quarter 2024

Below is the trend that Southern Company and other utilities are facing over the next 5-15 years. Electricity consumption is, for the first time in about 20 years, expected to increase. That’s the chart on the left. In the 1960-1990’s American homes saw significant technological developments including refrigeration, HVAC units, personal computing, television, etc. Each development required a significant increase in electricity generation. Since the turn of the century, however, residential electricity demand has been flat. Same with industrial electricity consumption. That is expected to pick up thanks to the [...]

Growth Scare

A “growth scare” by definition is a sudden fear the economic expansion is faltering.  With the S&P 500 and Nasdaq recently hitting one-month lows, signs of unease are appearing.  Many interconnected concerns are fueling this apprehension, from policy uncertainties in a new administration to deteriorating macroeconomic signals.  And this is happening at a time when the Federal Reserve is still focused on bringing down inflation.  The most recent inflation number reported by truflation.com is 2.33% (see below), so very close to the Feds target of 2%.  However, the Fed uses [...]

By |2025-03-04T16:17:52-05:00March 4, 2025|Economic Insights, Financial Planning, Investments|

“Ol’ Man River”

The expression “Ol Man River” has been in our vernacular as a moniker for the Mississippi River since it was introduced as a song in the Rogers and Hammerstein musical “Showboat” in 1929.  Now whether your memory takes you to Paul Robeson’s unworldly bass vocals in the movie version from 1936, or Chevy Chase’s clip singing to his family as they are crossing the “Mighty Mississip” in National Lampoon’s “Vacation,” will probably be generational.  But the visual I am trying to create actually comes from the duo “Indigo Girls” in [...]

By |2025-01-30T13:35:45-05:00January 30, 2025|Economic Insights, Insights, Investments|

Market Update: December, 23, 2024

Welcome to the Monthly Market Update from Signature Wealth Management. I’m Brian Ransom, Research Director from Signature Wealth and here’s what happened in the market this month. To end the year, the market had a strong rally following the results from the presidential election. But we have run into a bout of volatility in the middle of December. Causing the spike in volatility was a clear change in language and direction from the Federal Reserve that caused a sharp selloff in bonds and stocks alike. While the December [...]

By |2024-12-31T12:37:26-05:00December 31, 2024|Economic Insights, Insights, Investments, Videos|

Don’t Get Spoofed by Pig Butchering

In this article, we would like to address a topic other than investments and the markets. Recently, there has been a new scam in social media that takes advantage of individuals looking for investment advice. The scammer will impersonate a well-known individual in the investment community: Tom Lee, Josh Brown, Cathie Wood, and many others, luring people into WhatsApp groups via targeted advertising. Because it’s a sponsored advertisement, the post can look legitimate. The FBI calls it "spoofing". But the internet calls it by a more ominous name: "Pig Butchering". [...]

By |2024-11-05T12:13:24-05:00November 5, 2024|Investments|

Fed Pivot

So, we just saw the first rate cut since the Fed took an aggressive approach to taming inflation in the spring of 2022.  What was it that the Federal Reserve saw that gave them confidence in shifting their approach?  Well, if we look where inflation has come down from in the last few years via truflation.com, we have come a long way.  The US inflation index now sits at 1.52%, down from 11.5% at the peak of the recent crisis.   The Federal Reserve has two key mandates – maximum [...]

By |2024-10-07T12:56:57-04:00October 1, 2024|Economic Insights, Financial Planning, Investments|

The SWMG Opinion on the Election

We have none. Ah yes, another election year full of divisive, negative, and persuasive rhetoric from folks on both sides of the aisle. We all recognize the importance of such a year and the ability to have a vote in electing our leaders, but we cannot help feeling some level of dread and outright exhaustion as the process plays itself out. I (Ian) am sorry to disappoint you if you were hoping to discover Jim’s, Scott’s, Curt’s, or any of the rest of the team’s political opinions in this article. [...]

By |2024-09-03T10:16:43-04:00August 29, 2024|Economic Insights, Financial Planning, Investments|

Southern Company Update, 2nd Quarter 2024

Utility investing is typically a straight forward prospect with very little surprises, good or bad. This is why utilities are commonly considered “safe haven investments” by academics and investors when the economy turns South. Revenue and earnings growth are generally predictable and the dividend is generally predictable as a result which typically results in lower stock volatility when economic growth is waning. Artificial Intelligence seems to have changed that narrative, however. Because AI requires extensive computing power, data center demand for utilities throughout the country have increased substantially over the [...]

By |2024-08-27T10:58:45-04:00August 27, 2024|Economic Insights, Insights, Investments, Southern Company|

“Short Attention Span Theater”

The title of this newsletter refers to a comedy show which appeared on HBO, Cinemax, or Comedy Central (which are the only venues it could have reached me (Jim) as I’m too cheap to pay for premium TV content not related to sports or home improvement shows!) from 1989 to 1994.  For a while, it featured comedian Jon Stewart as host and the show consisted of brief clips from comics and (go figure!) upcoming HBO and Cinemax specials.  Admittedly, the title of the show stuck with me far longer than [...]

By |2024-07-01T11:18:14-04:00July 1, 2024|Economic Insights, Financial Planning, Insights, Investments|
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