On Monday, the markets continued to push higher on hopes that “lower interest rates (like St. Nick) soon would be here”.
If those hopes are dashed in any way including by the upcoming wording of the Fed’s meeting minutes, then things could go the other way. Apparently the next minutes are not due out until early January however.
On Monday the S&P 500 and Toronto were each up about 4.5%
Oil has recovered to $72.30 which is a positive for the Toronto market.
Costco continues to power ahead and was up another 3.4% to $681 and may well crest $700 before long. This company is a always a power house retailer but is expensive at 44 times trailing year earnings and 46 times forward forecast earnings. Those figures would seem to indicate modest expected earnings growth. There is also speculation of an increase in the member fee and that may or may not be reflected in the forward earnings.
All the preferred shares on our list have been updated. In general the dividends are attractive especially in taxable accounts. Their price action will depend largely on interest rate moves and expectations in most cases. In a few cases (most notably the Brookfield ones on the list) credit strength of the company is also a major driver.
Canadian inflation for November came out today and was about unchanged at 3.1%. I doubt the market will have much reaction to that although this is a little higher than expected. However the Bank of Canada governor Tiff Macklin continues to push back against the idea that rate cuts are in any way imminent. So that could cause some reaction in Canada. Canadian headline inflation will likely be lower in December with lower gasoline prices.