Cruel to Be Kind

Straight Talk

By OOH TODAY believes all voices, not just the loudest, must be heard Last updated May 22, 2023

OOH …Here’s One Thing

by Jim Johnsen,
Managing Director, Johnsen, Fretty & Company

Short and sweet this week folks. I happened to sneak in the backdoor of a hedge fund a few years back (they actually thought I had money so they dropped their minimum for me…or maybe they were actually desperate and gave me a good headfake…anyone’s guess) and as a result are privy to their quarterly investor updates. Here is a snippet from one I received a couple weeks back:

“An apt phrase to describe today’s market sentiment is “Unsettled Aftermath”. After the mostly steady conditions of the past 15 years characterized by low growth, disinflation and miniscule interest rates, we are dealing with the boomerang effects in the aftermath of the pandemic. Markets are volatile, disjointed, and unclear; with constantly changing economic indicators- sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. While opinions of the market prognosticators range across the board, they seem largely weighted in bear territory with the relatively fewer bulls climbing the proverbial wall of worry.

The SVB bank failure, stubborn inflation, historic rise in Fed funds rate, a deeply inverted yield curve and global tensions are fuel for the “Unsettled Aftermath” sentiment. And yet the market has trended higher in the first quarter of 2023 with the S&P 500 rising over 7%.”

Some interesting and eloquent insights there alpha male (there is a reason these smart hedge fund guys are able to scrape 2 and 20 while the rest of us live on table scraps)…but please break it down for this simple minded brain that would have rather picked “Red Red Wine” then the title to this little post. Aka give it to me straight. Are we or are we not toast in the near term? I am a little sick and tired of this most anticipated recession in my lifetime.

But I digress. The real reason for this rant is to ask if anyone else feels like I do of late? Post pandemic, politically corrected correct, does anyone give straight talk any longer? If anyone else feels like mowing the bush down rather than beating around it, please give me a holla. As I love to say in my business, a quick “no” is incredibly refreshing after a series of mind numbing maybes.

“Oh, I can’t take another heartache
Though you say you’re my friend, I’m at my wits’ end
You say your love is bona fide but that don’t coincide with the things that you do”
https://youtu.be/b0l3QWUXVho

Go forth and speak frankly this week 🙂