It was a week chock full of news on a variety of fronts, including the busiest week of the Q2 earnings season. While there were some high-profile beats that were quite encouraging (Facebook, Caterpillar and McDonald’s) there also were some bad misses (Amazon.com, Alphabet and General Dynamics). On balance, Q2 earnings seem to be on

The Federal Reserve has spoken, and it’s done so today via the Federal Open Market Committee’s (FOMC) decision to leave interest rates unchanged. And while any change in the benchmark fed funds rates from the current range of 1% and 1.25% wasn’t expected, what was highly anticipated was language in the FOMC statement signaling how

I am writing to you this week from Las Vegas, where I am doing a few presentations at the annual FreedomFest conference. Given my tight schedule, this week’s Hotline will be briefer than usual. Still, I wanted to let you in on an anecdote from the conference that happened just this morning, as I think

Find out about our latest recommendations, and all of the most recent market-moving news, in the newest issue of Successful ETF Investing that has just been completed. I invite you to download the issue as soon as you have a chance. As a valued subscriber, we want you to have this information as quickly as possible. Please

The concept of freedom may seem easy to understand, as it basically just means the absence of coercion from others. In political terms, it means the absence of coercion from government. In economic terms, freedom means the absence of government intrusion on the free exchange of money, ideas, goods and services conducted by individuals, companies,

Since my Babson College days in the early Sixties, I’ve reviewed dozens of sage investment tomes, scholarly papers, and journals, along with hundreds of investment newsletters. But one book remains on my desk today, 54 years later: Ben Graham’s Security Analysis. I find zero need to go beyond Ben’s original base of dividends and the miracle of compound interest. I do all my own research, and do not work with Wall Street or waste a minute contacting corporate CEOs and financial officers. And never in my own portfolio have I taken a significant loss.

In this issue, I lay out my early history at Model Roland & Co. with my favorite client, Wellington Management, and how America’s dean of international monetary experts, Edward M. Bernstein, helped put my very first currency reports on the map. You’ll also find my favorite quotes about compound interest I’ll also present two rosters of all-star books that I have benefited from reading through the years—one of books with financial, political, and historical topics, and one of nutrition and health books—and a list of the top articles you can read today at richardcyoung.com. Rounding out the issue is a historical look at what the framers of the Constitution had in mind with the powers of Congress and the Presidency, and what good ideas I thought they gave up when they abandoned the Articles of Confederation.

We’re knee-deep into July, and the first full trading week of the month can be characterized as very bullish… and quite “risk on.” By risk on, I mean we saw capital flowing into many of the market’s biggest year-to-date winning segments. Tech stocks, including large-cap internet stocks and semiconductors, led the bull charge this week,

  What to Watch in Second-Half 2017 ETF Talk: A Fund that Grows with the Economy Your First-Half ETF Scoreboard The Greatest Jefferson Idea Ever **************************************************************** What to Watch in Second-Half 2017 I recently was asked by a subscriber if I could provide him a “short-hand” characterization of what happened in markets during the first

The Fourth of July fireworks are over, and now markets have stepped into the real second half of 2017. To be certain, there were plenty of bullish fireworks in the first half of the year. Through the first six months of 2017, the Dow jumped 8.02%, while the S&P 500 was up just slightly more

Ladies and gentlemen, halftime is over. I hope you enjoyed your Fourth of July respite, because now it’s time to get back on the field and start playing the second half of 2017 in the markets. Before we attempt to determine where this market is going for the rest of the year, it’s probably a