The #Fed will have a hard time backing out of a December rate hike. That said, Yellen's capable of not doing anything, lol.

#Hilsenrath is really not indicating anything new and the Federal Reserve continues to push that it may raise rates at any time as they have been doing for years now. #Obfuscation or more simply lying is the path of this Federal Reserve. Don't pay attention to the gibberish and expect a miniscule raise in December which may even be taken off the table. Yellen will do nothing significant until it's too late. Then pray since the Federal Reserve can't drop rates substantially to head off even the mildest downturn.

"Investors should prepare their portfolios for a protracted period of rising prices and slowing growth.", there is very few ways to protect yourself from stagflation. Commodities are the best protection, although they can also fall. Precious metals work unless the government decides to confiscate it like the US did before.

The simple fact is that the Federal Reserve and other central bankers are playing a very dangerous game for arguably very selfish reasons.

Apple's stock decline was never that bad to start with. That said, future valuation will be based on earning growth or decline. Clearly, the market is still betting on growth decline and potential earnings decline in the next 5 years. I think we will know if they are right or wrong in the next 12 months.

The bet seems to be on longer near zirp rates and QE if things get uglier. This helps the market but doesn't do much for the economy as we have seen for the last few years. Still, more of the same seems in order until the results are so horrific the Federal Reserve must change. That will only happen when a big crash occurs which will then be too late. Then more QE and zirp rates will be in order although already used.

Hedge funds are silly. They market themselves on going against trends then look for the biggest trends to follow. In reality they are betting on the seasonal oil trend, however, their action just causes the trend to appear earlier and may in fact be ending already. LOL.

Actually the bounce up in early 2016 was quite amazing. That said, besides hauling oil to nowhere, global trade and business is weak and seems to be getting weaker. What is amazing is that the US market has held up for so long with respects to the cyclical downturn. That is expected somewhat because a down cycle begins with commodities which the US is not heavily into and then moves to consumer goods.

If it progresses farther then it will hit the US.

I am not sre regression to the mean will occur with constant zirp rates or near zirp rates. I look to Japan as a prime example. What tends to happen is the valuations stay high and earnings and dividends continue to drop. Eventually, even if stock prices drop, the valuations remain high against a backdrop of horrible things to put your money. The natural result is people trying to invest elsewhere which is called capital flight and is often solved by barring people from investing assets overseas. When this happens, the free market capitalism rose will be gone from the US. Hopefully, that will never happen.

I am not sre regression to the mean will occur with constant zirp rates or near zirp rates. I look to Japan as a prime example. What tends to happen is the valuations stay high and earnings and dividends continue to drop. Eventually, even if stock prices drop, the valuations remain high against a backdrop of horrible things to put your money. The natural result is people trying to invest elsewhere which is called capital flight and is often solved by barring people from investing assets overseas. When this happens, the free market capitalism rose will be gone from the US. Hopefully, that will never happen.

I don't see how its sustainable without the big pharma/drug companies rising significantly. Small companies often depend on big ones to buy them out, yet little is being done in the way of that compared to the past.

We will see how long they rule the roost. Tech is weakening after a very unusually long run. Tech cycles are usually briefer and are likely to be equally bloody. Given that the run up was not heavily in hardware, the blow-off will likely hurt other market segments.