News and Commentary

Well, the rally from Q4 continued for all. The great thing to see this past quarter was some good participation from the dividend/value stocks and small companies. However, this could be short-lived if the Fed doesn’t cut rates for a while. Many of you know that I don’t expect the Fed to cut rates, or just can’t see any reason in the near future, more than once if at all this year. Long live the 5% money markets here… We will see where the summer goes with all this noise from the election, Iran, oil prices, and AI.  We will continue monitoring your game plan for the best outcome.  Here are the details on the quarter for you.

Onto 2024 and the election.  I don’t do this often, but going back to July this past summer, I wrote “we are heading into the 3rd year of the 4 year presidential term and this tends to be the strongest year historically!” We got the rally we were waiting on, starting in November into year end. The nice thing about this rally is that it included dividend stocks and bonds finally!!  All this came on the news the Fed quietly said they seemed content with inflation and interest rates and expected not to raise any further. The next anticipated Fed move would be a rate cut, yet this would come in the midst of a recession or financial event/shock. We will see if this happens, but the good news is the market has been a winner the 12 months after a Fed pause(October 2023) historically. Additionally, the election year tends to be a positive one for the markets, historically as well.  If and when the Fed begins it’s easing campaign, this could signal the start of a new “bull” market as well.  All of this and more can be found in our Janney Outlook 2024 piece on the website. We are cautiously optimistic about the year ahead and one where dividend stocks and bonds could possibly outperform the strong technology stocks or magnificent 7.  We will continue to monitor.Here are the details on the quarter for you: HereNews from the SWM team:Jeff has been healing and going to physical therapy consistently from his rotator cuff surgery in late October.  He plans on being ready for some March skiing and golf.  He and his wife still slipped away with some friends to see the band, U2, at the sphere in Las Vegas--Danielle celebrated the holidays and was able to gather all her girls in sunny Ft. Lauderdale— For Kevin and his family, 2023 ended with everyone on Santa's nice list!!Wes had a great holiday with his fiancé, his three boys and his step-daughter

What a summer we were having in the markets with the anticipation of the FED ceasing it’s activity and moving towards a “soft-landing” in the economy. Then September hit, and we had turmoil from the government shutdown, the Fed saying they may not be done, and rising yields.  Although the U.S. market index is still up nicely for the year, the average stock in the index is flat year-to-date.  Diversified stock portfolios with little or no technology stocks have struggled.  Bond portfolios had a tough quarter, yet yields continue to push over 5.5%.  On a positive note, corporate balance sheets are strong and earnings growth ahead looks promising.  We will continue to monitor our allocations for any opportunities that arise into year end. See this for more detail on the quarter: hereSWM News:Jeff just joined the advisory board of the Atlanta Community Food Bank. Check out their website and this wonderful organization: Atlanta Community Food Bank (acfb.org)Also, unfortunately he is having rotator cuff surgery, AGAIN, but on the left arm in late October. Danielle attending the Janney summit in Philadelphia for associates where she learned about our new planning tools coming, Janney’s community service efforts, and exchanged best practice ideas amongst peers.