Last week, after months of will-they-won’t-they speculation, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) voted unanimously to hike the benchmark federal funds rate by 25 basis points at the conclusion of their September meeting.

This

Profit margins have historically been cyclical, but the recent performance of S&P 500 companies has many investors questioning whether this rule still stands. Structural changes in the composition of the index, and the higher margin profile that

Washington's inflation fight and Beijing's growth problem are pulling the global economy in opposite directions — and investors are repricing both at once.

The Federal Reserve (Fed) made something clear this week that marke

From the end of July through the middle of August, I set out on something closer to an expedition than a series of interviews. Across nearly 40 portfolio management teams spanning mutual funds, exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and separately managed acc

The S&P 500 index has seen impressive expansion in operating margins in recent years. Rolling back the clock, operating margins for the index averaged ~11.4% from 1991 through to 2009, with highwater marks set during the 90s and early 2000s notab

Friday’s slightly hot Consumer Price Index (CPI) report lifted the bond market’s odds of a rate hike from the Federal Reserve (Fed) this week to near 90%. The positive reactions from stocks and bonds were interesting, suggesting that perh

A compelling multi-year track record does exactly what it is supposed to do. It attracts attention, and ultimately garners inflows of new capital. This is not a criticism of successful managers but rather a description of the investment industry cycl

With so much attention focused on what the Federal Reserve (Fed) might do at its policy meeting next week, it’s a good time to look back at history to get a sense of how stocks might respond should the Fed hike rates as the market (barely) expe

August delivered the loudest bond market narrative in years, and almost none of it survived contact with the price action. Total public debt crossed $40 trillion on August 18. The 30-year U.S. Treasury yield reached 5.33% intraweek, a level last seen

In last week’s Beyond the Numbers, we made the case that free cash flow deserves a prominent place in investors’ valuation toolkits. Earnings can provide a useful measure of profitability, but free cash flow (FCF) gets closer to the centr