They are close first cousins although it doesn't seem obvious at first. The stock market should go down when the economy is doing poorly and the companies are reporting poor results. Right? Wrong! Stock prices respond to many seemingly unrelated things such as Fed bond buying. The Fed is buying $85B of bonds per month to keep borrowing costs low to stimulate the economy. When are they going to stop? Well, when unemployment dips or inflation rises. Inflation has been below 2% and we added an anemic 169,000 jobs last month, below the minimum threshold of 200,000 that the economists want. Also, more people have stopped looking for work so the drop in unemployment to 7.3% is not meaningful.
Although all of this is bad news, it is actually good for the stock market which falls when bond yields rise, making bonds more attractive. So every time the traders think that the Fed might be ratcheting down bond buying, the market dips.
Now imagine that you are an every day investor buying REITs for fixed income dividends. These are the first stocks that get hammered in this scenario, although the underlying real estate hasn't changed in value and the REIT isn't being overly incompetent in running its business. Things are really stacked against the regular investor trying to score a return in the stock market. No surprise that many retail investors are staying away from the market. It's a black box dancing a complex jig. Not something the ordinary mortal can follow.
Click to view all the articles.
If you are an investor, sign up to receive weekly research letters and download a FREE whitepaper on "Critical mistakes in Real Estate investing and how to avoid them".
If you are Real Estate professional, sign up with HomeUnion ReaLoyalty program where qualified professionals will be paid for all investor referrals that they bring. Investment sales make up 30% of all sales in the market.
Comments(2)