The Dividend Cafe - The DC Today - Tuesday, October 17, 2023

Episode Date: October 17, 2023

Today's Post - https://bahnsen.co/46UIS4q Today David Bahnsen is on day two of the annual TBG Money Manager Due Diligence trip in New York. This is an exciting time of the year as our investment committee dives deep into all the portfolio particulars and then surfaces with a plethora of content to share with our clients as well as some actionable portfolio items. I believe this is year 18 of this trip and something that I know (1) David greatly enjoys and (2) has a meaningful impact on how we manage capital for our clients. Thank you, David, and we look forward to welcoming you back for the Dividend Cafe on Friday. With that said, I, Trevor Cummings, will take the reigns today and walk you through the latest market happenings. Links mentioned in this episode: TheDCToday.com DividendCafe.com TheBahnsenGroup.com

Welcome to the Dividend Cafe, weekly market commentary focused on dividends in your portfolio and dividends in your understanding of economic life. Hello, welcome to DC Today. You have a rare sighting of none other than me, Mr. Trevor Cummings. Our two fearless leaders, David Bonson and Brian Zytel, are in New York. They're doing their TBG money manager due diligence trip. David does this every year and he might correct me, but I think this is 18 years he's been doing this.

So he heads to New York, meets with, I can't even tell you how many different managers, and basically just opens his brain for three or four days in a row, downloads as much as he can about what's going on in the world, synthesize that into something palatable that he can deliver to our clients, and then itemize that into actionable items that we're gonna do inside of our portfolio

based on those learnings. So I know it's one, something that David greatly enjoys, and two, I know it's extremely meaningful to our clients. So it's quite an exciting time of the year, which makes me happy to sit in and fill in for Mr. David Bonson and a great opportunity to say here on a recorded video, thank you. What David does and the sacrifices he makes, this trip being one of them is just huge. And all the benefits roll down to us that work here at the Bonson Group and clients that we serve on a daily basis. So thank you, Mr. David Bonson. He will be back Friday with

his normal dividend cafe, and you will be delighted to have me for the next few days filling in on DC today. So markets were boring today. That's an easy way to describe them. They're pretty flat. So the Dow was up about 13 points. That translates to almost no move, right? It's about 0.04%. The S&P was down 0.01%, so basically flat. And then the NASDAQ was down about a quarter of a percent. The top performing sector for the day was materials. Materials were up about 1%. Technology, the bottom performing sector, was down about 0.77%. If you go on to your Google machine and you're looking for finance news for the day, everything will be talking about retail sales. Retail sales came in at 0.7%.

That was on a forecast of 0.3%. What that means is it was a big surprise. So auto sales were up, internet retailers, a lot of sales there. Obviously, people were spending a little bit more at the gas pump. So this was a big surprise. So what does that mean? How do markets interpret that? Well, if unemployment's low, wage growth is decent, and people are still spending money. Does that give the Fed approval to continue to raise rates? That's what markets are curious about. So lately, it's been more exciting to watch treasuries than the stock market. It seems like they're leading the way.

So you saw the 10-year treasury was up, I think, about 12 basis points today, knocking on the door of 4.8%, looking at kind of a recent high that it hit earlier this month. So again, all eyes will be on how does the Fed respond when markets are decent, unemployment's low, and people are still spending money and there's a fear of inflation lasting longer. So that's what we'll be watching. Obviously, everybody listening to this knows that the world of real estate has been slow or non-existent. So today the NHB reported that it was down. The confidence index was down for a third month in a row. That was down four points, now at 40, which is a 10-month low. There is some correlation there with mortgage rates, right?

Mortgage rates as of last Thursday, national average was 7.57%. People are not eager to borrow money at 7.5% in a world where they've become familiar with 3%. So that will have an impact on people's choices to build new homes and people's choices to transact in the world of real estate. We're all sitting on our hands to see how that all plays out. Capitol Hill, Jim Jordan lost the speaker vote today, which was kind of a surprise. I mean, I think the assumption was that he wouldn't get enough votes, but he missed by about 20. So there was some talks that he'd go back and do another ballot immediately after. I think with that big of a spread, there might not be the eagerness as people were happy to oppose him on that vote. As you read in the news today, Joe Biden will head to Israel this evening amidst all of that conflict. I will encourage you to go to the written DC Today and you can see an Ask David piece that he posted in there. David recently wrote an article on the Dividend? And how do they go about seeking that? I thought David did a good job in his answer

showing the tension point that one, do those folks that are referenced in that question, want to pay for advice? And on the other end, is there somebody looking to get paid for giving that advice? But I thought some of the highlights he made about just financial organization, being able to clarify what your objectives are, and then designing a portfolio and plan to meet those objectives. So again, I encourage you to go to the written to read that Ask David section. I will be back with you tomorrow for DC Today. That will be Wednesday. We'll also be with you on Thursday. And again, like I mentioned, David will have his normal Dividend Cafe on Friday. And then again, he will be digesting all of those meetings, putting together his notes, sharing them with both clients and listeners to DC Today and Dividend Cafe. And then come January, he will be talking about

some actionable items on what we're going to do on the portfolio level based on a lot of these findings. So we appreciate you listening, and I will be back tomorrow to serve on the DC Today. The Bonson Group is a group of investment professionals registered with Hightower Securities LLC, member FINRA and SIPC, and with Hightower Advisors LLC, a registered investment advisor with the SEC. Securities are offered through Hightower Securities LLC. Thank you. Thank you. as tax advice or tax information. Tax laws vary based on the client's individual circumstances and can change at any time without notice. Clients are urged to consult their tax or legal advisor for any related questions.