Thoughts {Halloween Edition}

These late night Cubs games are killing me.  In case you don't know or care the Cubs held on to win a nail biter 3-2.  Game was not decided till the last out.  That's around midnight here folks and then you have to let the adrenaline calm down.  Tired today!

Markets seem to have digested the new Clinton email revelations over the weekend.  Markets are set to open flat with a slightly positive bias today.  The election seems baked in now.  I'm going to do one more electoral college update later this week just to check the numbers out but I think it's going to be very difficult for Mr. Trump to mount a push with only eight days left that denies Mrs. Clinton the Oval Office.  The real races now are the so called "down ballot" Senate and House races as these will determine not only who controls Congress but how much of a mandate Mrs. Clinton is likely to have assuming she wins.

More mergers today.  Baker Hughes and GE are going to combine their oil and gas businesses and Century Link is buying Level 3 Communications.  You know my views on mergers.  If not, see here.

While driving to Cleveland last week for the World Series I listened to an interview conducted with Anthony Scaramucci of Skybridge Capital discussing investor thinking regarding markets and volatility.  He said, and I am quoting him loosely here because I was driving and couldn't write it exactly down, "Individual investors are long term investors until confronted with short term losses".  I thought that is a great read into most investor's minds.  Today this is just food for thought.  I'm going to have more to say about this in the future.

I'm also beginning the outline of a book I want to write for Millennial's.  More on that in the future as well.  

Finally back to the markets.  Probably suggests we are dead in the water here until the election is over, although an argument could be made that we may begin to move more decisively as the likely results are discounted.  We seem to lurch from event to event these days.  Next thing on the docket will be whether the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates after the election.  

Fly the "W".  Go Cubs!

*The stocks mentioned in this article are components of various ETFs we own for clients and in personal accounts.  These positions can change at any time without notice here or in any other form of electronic media or communication.

Finally A Happy Halloween to all the little ghosts, witches, Olafs and Elsas on Ashland Avenue and to everybody else as well!