Juneteenth
Recently made a national holiday, Juneteenth has closed our Stock Market so yesterday was the end of the Market week. It’s kind of unusual to have these holidays occur on a Friday. It always seems to me that Fridays are when we see a lot of market down turns. So we miss that this week, and that’s ok with me! But Juneteenth in a US only holiday which means that markets in other countries are still open. I guess we will catch up on Monday. That means that Monday will be a little crazier than usual. Goodie.
More Iran craziness
It was announced last week that they would be signing a MOA during the week to open the Strait of Hormuz for both us and Iran. That means that oil and natural gas (and other things) can start flowing again. The price of oil has gone down because of that and so have my oil stocks. But I would rather that than staying at war. They all signed the MOA (which is NOT a peace deal, just a list of talking points) and talks were supposed to start up today, or the first of next week.
I woke up this morning to the news that Isreal continued with their attacks on Lebanon overnight (our night) and now the talks have been postponed. The Vice President who was supposed to fly out to Switzerland to start the talks has cancelled his flight plans. So has the negotiator of Iran which means that nothing is going to happen. But since ships have started to get through the Strait of Hormuz, no one knows yet if that will continue or if there will be another blockade.
Iran is suffering from the blockade as much as we are, and I’m hoping that things continue to move through and we start seeing some relief. It will not be “normal” for a long time. All the countries have used up their stockpiles of oil and need to replenish them. I am guessing that it will take at least 2 to 3 months for any effect to be seen on any of the markets, but in the meantime the stock prices are going down in expectation.
What about Ukraine?
It appears that Ukraine has really stepped up their operations and are hitting more targets in or near Moscow. I have friends who are from Ukraine and they have a whole community around them. I feel for all of them. I also have friends from Russia and to be honest, they get along great with my friends from Ukraine. That’s because we are just people and not government leaders. We just want to live our lives and expect our governments to make that easy for us!
But it seems that Ukraine is getting drones through to Moscow and that will bring the war to their doorstep rather than just being something that is happening “over there” making it more urgent that something be resolved. At least, I hope so.
So much devastation.
Every day, it seems that the US has been hit with something crazy. Floods like you wouldn’t believe in one area, Tornados in another with wildfires happening more and more as well. I would have thought that this is what the government should be working on. The president should be going into these disaster sites and trying to find ways to get life back to normal for them. Instead, he’s spending our money on a gold-plated ball room and a reflecting pool that is worse off now than it was before. He keeps trying to expand our borders, talking about taking over Cuba, Greenland, Venezuela, Panama and who knows where else?
These events have been getting worse and worse and no one in the government seems to be paying attention. Yes, I know that Elon just became our first Trillionaire and I’m happy for him. I have no problem with that, but it doesn’t do anything for the person who just had to be rescued from their own house because it was going underwater, or the homes that burn in wildfires out west and even in Florida near Miami. Or the entire towns destroyed by the whirling winds of tornados.
I know the president is trying to make Washington DC look pretty for visiting dignitaries so they will say how wonderful he is making it so grand. But what if we send those visitors to Louisiana ar Mississippi? Get your waders on! Or put them up in a house with no roof in Illinois or Iowa.
What has this to do with Stocks?
This has seemed to be a bit off topic I guess, but ALL the news is relevant to the way that the economy is running and that will affect the market. I haven’t mentioned AI once in all of this because although it is still the major drive in the way the market is going, there are other things that make the market go up and down.
But I am happy with my portfolio and have not made any real changes recently. I’m a little afraid to move too much. I have been doing a lot of planning though. I need to adjust for a better cash flow position. With inflation and the new FED chairman and the cost of living going up so fast, I need to reassess what I do so I can build a better income. Being retired, I don’t really have income except Social Security and to be honest, it wasn’t all that bad for a while but now it’s getting rough.
I will be reviewing all that here shortly. Do some of my thinking out loud, so to speak. I just wanted to record some of the crazy things that have been happening.
