Click here: The Weekly Beacon – January 13 2023
We will be giving some macro economic market updates on a weekly basis. No equity recommendations will be given in this commentary, and we encourage you to contact us if you have questions regarding any observations.
Feel free to send in your pictures of lighthouses to be featured in our weekly commentary.
This weeks issue: Washington Power Struggle, Politics, Congress, Bills Passing, Washington and the Stock Market, IRS, Taxation, Commodities, Commodities Inventory, Metals Inventory, Energy Commodities, Steel Stocks, Russian Steel, Chinese Metal Demand, Covid Lock-downs, Exporters, Savings Rate, 1970s Inflation vs Today, CPI, Inflation, FED, Bank Forecast, Stifel, Flat Decade, Meme Stocks, Bed Bath & Beyond Stock, AMC Stock, GameStop Stock.
Gridlock Over
After 15 votes the U.S. House of Representatives finally elected a Speaker to succeed Nancy Pelosi. 20 Republicans held Congress hostage for 14 votes spanning 4 days last week as they constantly voted for a new Speaker. Those lawmakers had demanded, and the Republican party seemingly granted them their wishes going forward. We do not care about the politicization of this process or who was holding this up, we just want to mention that this is VERY on-brand for DC.
We also wanted to mention that the next 2 years will more than likely be uneventful in Washington which could be a good thing for financial markets. It is easier to predict gridlock than a one-party rule. For now, it looks like Speaker Kevin McCarthy will be the man to slow down President Biden’s agenda. Hopefully, this will slow government spending down.
The only Bill that has passed at this time in the House was Republicans reversing a Joe Biden-backed policy that hired 87,000 new IRS agents. We commented on this months ago when it first happened. We were puzzled then and puzzled now with what 87,000 NEW tax agents (armed with guns no less) would be doing but perhaps this summarizes “wasteful government spending” better than ever.
