Good morning. Early indications point to a higher opening this morning … noting things can deteriorate at any moment as reports from the Middle East hit the news. If you are worried about the Iran-Israel effect on equities, Mike Wilson of Morgan Stanley … looking at market moves following 20 previous geopolitical events … gave the view that initial selloffs “fade fast” … although a prolonged spike in oil prices could force him to worsen this comforting scenario. And while news on the Fed has taken a back seat in recent days, one regional bank head (Atlanta’s Raphael Bostic) sees present calls for lowering rates to be unnecessary and tells Reuters that with price hikes expected, the Fed should wait a bit longer … something of which Jerome Powell agrees … and presently feels a one-time move made sometime towards the end of the year should be the best course of action. Are prices really going up? Yep … it seems highly likely … on some things. I read that electricity costs are rising greater than inflation and this gap could widen as demand is increasing. In fact, Pennsylvania is doing something interesting … that I am not excited over … as I just received a bill from the commonwealth telling me I owe $200 this year as a “Road User Charge” … since they don’t grab gas tax money from electric vehicles. Let’s see … since the state adds 57.5 cents per gallon for gasoline it comes out to the same as if I purchased 347 gallons of gas. Is this fair? Yes … I guess … but I don’t like it regardless of the fairness. Meanwhile, my phone died yesterday morning … and I was met with the “black screen of death” … and need to take care of that today. The problem? I forgot my Apple password … delaying things by quite a bit … and discovered I have so many things with “two step verification” … which means my inability to read messages basically shut me out of many (many) sites yesterday. I’ll be back at the Apple store when it opens in less than an hour. To top it all off, my electricity was “out” for a few days … as falling trees completely disrupt things around here when landing on above-ground wires. So, the first thing I did when returning from a trip to Maine was to toss out most of the food in my fridge and freezer … meaning I will spend a good deal of time (and money) later today at Costco. I think the generators are in aisle 12. The trip up north was quite interesting … as Maine has become a favored destination during the summer months … and I gladly spent time with my brother who really loves it there in his hideaway along the coast. You know, when he was younger … and trying to “find himself” … he actually thought long and hard about becoming a monk … but he never got the chants. Have a great day, Joseph G. Witthohn, CFA Have any questions? Please contact info@teamemerald.com
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