Media & Appearances
In The Press
Asbury Research Director of Research John Kosar is a sought-after commentator for a number of broadcast, online and print publications.
2008
NEW!
The Wall Street Journal - Market Beat (September
16, 2008)
The bounce in the Chicago Board Options Exchange volatility index —
which hit 33.70 during the session
— suggests that there has been a surge in fear amid all of the day’s issues.
Previous market trouble usually produced this type of reaction in the VIX, which
closed at 30.53 Tuesday. “If we can assume that the market will react to a
similar extreme in investor fear in the same way this time, then it would be
reasonable to expect the S&P 500 to establish a near term bottom anytime between
today and the end of next week,” writes John Kosar, analyst at Asbury
Research.
NEW!
Welling @ Weeden
(September 12th, 2008)
Acute Observations:
Asbury Research
"This
Week,
there are still a lot of mixed signals in the market, but they appear
to be more of a time frame issue. Combined, they suggest the potential
for a bounce higher into mid-month, followed by more weakness into
lateQ3 / early Q4 which should lead into a recovery through late 2008
/ early 2009. Specifically, near term technically oversold conditions
appear to be tying in to this morning's Fannie and Freddie-related
spike higher in the U.S. stock market which, according to intra-month
seasonal data, could extend into mid month."
continued...
NEW!
Reuters
(September 12th, 2008)
Having failed to reach deals to raise desperately needed
capital, Lehman goes into the weekend trying to sell itself or part of
its business. "Investor sentiment is braced for the worst news
possible," said John Kosar, market technician and president of
Asbury Research in Chicago. "When you have extreme circumstances
like we're having now it's very hard to try to figure out what to do
next."
Dow Jones Newswires
(August
29th, 2008)
For the past couple
of weeks, market participants seemed to shrug off big gains in the
July consumer and producer price indexes, focusing instead on a
slumping economy and tight credit conditions. "This may very well be a
trend that has overextended because of credit crisis-related issues,"
said John Kosar, director of Asbury Research.
Friday, Kosar said investors couldn't ignore data from the Commerce
Department showing a lofty inflation indicator that is closely watched
by Fed rate-setters. Core-personal consumption expenditures, which
exclude volatile food and energy costs, climbed 2.4% in July compared
to the same time a year ago. The Fed's definition of price stability
is a 1.5% to 2% range on an annual basis. Kosar noted that July's
core-PCE reading is also at the "high extreme" of this year's Fed
inflation projections. "There is really no more room for these numbers
to rise any further without the Fed having to concede that
inflationary pressures are becoming even worse than they thought
possible.
The
Guardian - UK
(August
25th, 2008)
The
spread between 10-year Treasury inflation protected securities and
conventional Treasury yields fell to 2.16 percent, not far from its
multi-year low from a week ago. "Wall Street either believes
there is no inflation problem in the United States, or that the Fed
will not address it by raising interest rates," said John Kosar,
analyst at Asbury Research.
Welling @ Weeden (August
22nd, 2008)
GuestPerspectives (access
requires subscription)
July PPI: Spread Between Inflation,
Interest Rates At Extreme
Reuters Business & Finance (August
20th, 2008)
Financial traders now see just a one-in-three chance that the Fed will raise
rates to 2.25 percent by year end from the current 2 percent. As recently as
July 23, the market was leaning toward a year-end rate of 2.5 percent.
"The market is clearly much more worried about slowing growth and the credit
crisis than it is about any monetary response from the Fed to try to fight
inflation," said John Kosar, analyst at Asbury Research in Chicago.
The Wall Street Journal (August
5th, 2008)
Some analysts believe that the stock market's gains will prove to be
short-lived. "The stock market is range-bound but volatile at the moment, which
tells you that people really aren't sure what to make of the risks out there,"
said research director John Kosar, of Asbury Research in Chicago.
Mr. Kosar remains worried about inflation. He points to recent University of
Michigan survey data showing strong expectations among consumers that the prices
of goods and services will be sharply higher throughout the economy a year from
now. He believes such sentiment could easily become self-fulfilling if companies
desperate to pass along costs interpret consumers' expectations of price hikes
as leeway to actually raise prices.
Dow Jones Newswires (July
28th, 2008)
It's difficult to argue that
long-term rates are going down if the Federal Reserve has "already conceded that
inflation is a problem," said John Kosar, director of research for Asbury
Research. Kosar noted that Friday's consumer sentiment report from data
provider Reuters and the University of Michigan revealed a very lofty one-year
inflation forecast, at 5.1% for the second month in a row. At stake for
the Fed, according to Kosar, is its credibility to fight inflation. "The Fed has
stated on numerous occasions that it needs to have credibility," Kosar said
The Wall Street Journal - Market Beat (July
21st, 2008)
The Financial Sector Select SPDRs exchange-traded fund didn’t mark major gains
on the day, but its increase was enough to put it at a close of 20.44, the
highest closing price for that index since June 26, before falling 15% in the
first two weeks of July. Furthermore, the price action in bellwether Goldman
Sachs Group Inc. suggests that investors are
again seeing the financials as a place to go and not run from — for
however long that lasts. Analysts at Asbury Research say the trading in
Goldman of late suggested more bearishness,
but the shares turned last week. “Failed bearish patterns are pretty rare, but
when they occur it indicates that the market has, for whatever reason,
aggressively changed its mind on future price direction,” they write. Goldman
shares ended the day down 1.1%.
Dow Jones Newswires (June 26th, 2008)
In their accompanying
policy statement, panel members said that "although downside risks to
(economic) growth remain, they appear to have diminished somewhat."
The FOMC also said that "upside risks to inflation and inflation
expectations have increased." "That's the phrase that
pays," said John Kosar, director of research for Asbury Research.
The Fed clearly implied that it had "shifted from having an easing
bias to a tightening bias," said Kosar. He played down
Thursday's action, which seemed to reflect market expectations that
the funds rate won't budge until this fall. "You're trying
to look at a ripple, instead of a wave. Markets go up and down every
day," Kosar explained.
Forbes.com (June 20th, 2008)
ANALYSIS-Technicians see Wall Street on thin ice
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The
technical picture of the U.S. stock market is deteriorating fast,
putting Wall Street on course to test its March lows in the coming
days and it could fall even further. "I think we are at a
near-term inflection point," said John Kosar, market technician and
president of Asbury Research in Chicago. "If there's any more
bleeding from here I think that will point to a re-test of the
first-quarter lows and maybe a breakdown through those lows in the
third quarter."
CNN Money (June 4th, 2008)
"The financials have to participate to a degree if you expect
some sort of sustainable rally. Financials are a big chunk of the
broader market," said John Kosar, director of research with Asbury
Research. Kosar said one troubling sign is that one of
the sector's leaders, Bank of America, has taken a notable turn for
the worse. The stock had been mainly trading in a narrow range of
between $35 and $40 since March. But it recently dropped below the $35
level and is now trading at about $32.50. "Bank of America had
been drifting sideways for a couple of months. And when stocks trade
sideways, it indicates investor indecision," Kosar said. "But when a
stock comes out of that range, one way or another, that means
investors have made their mind up." "The fact that one of
the biggest components in the financial sector is heading down does
not bode well for the rest of the group. BofA could be the canary in
the coal mine for financial stocks," Kosar added.
HedgeWorld Blog (May 23rd, 2008)
Corrective Lenses
Here’s an interesting
oil price blog entry from the folks over at Asbury
Research. They took a look at Occidental Petroleum Corp., using
its stock price as a proxy for oil prices. In April, Asbury’s research
established a $100-per-share upside target for Occidental. That target
was met on May 21. The whole entry is worth reading, but here’s the
meat as I see it:
HedgeWorld (May 20th, 2008)
Credit the Fed for Low Inflation
Bill Gross, chief investment officer at Pacific Investment
Management Co., a bond investment firm in Newport Beach, Calif., is a
champion of this school of skepticism. He has said for years that
government inflation data cannot be trusted. In his view, it’s the
headline inflation and not the core figure that really matters in a
world characterized by globalization and growing appetites for oil,
food and commodities on the part of Asian countries. Taking note of
the apparent benign neglect of the Fed vis-à-vis inflation,
John Kosar, president of Asbury Research in Chicago, said: “The
latest survey-based measures of inflation expectations clearly
indicate that Main Street does not believe that inflation will
moderate like the Fed does, and suggests that Main Street may in fact
have lost faith in the Fed’s ability, or even its willingness, to
fight inflation.”
Forbes (May 8th, 2008)
The producer price index on a
year-over-year basis rose 6.9 percent in March, marking the sixth consecutive
month that headline PPI was above 6.2 percent. The last time that producer
inflation held at those levels for six consecutive months was in late in 1981,
when benchmark 10-year Treasury note yields were near 15.75 percent -- well
above the current yield of about 3.90 percent, according to John Kosar,
president of Asbury Research in Chicago.
The Wall Street Journal - Market Beat (May
6th, 2008)
John Kosar of the Logic over Emotion
blog says copper prices suggest reasonable strength in
economic growth. “Although recent price activity in copper has been very
positive lately, we note that it is still in the early stages of this bullish
breakout and not completely out of the woods yet,” he
writes. “We are closely watching the direction of copper prices
from here as not only an indication of copper’s longer term trend, but also a
leading indication of what to expect from both the US economy and US stock
market for the rest of Q2 and into the second half of 2008.”
Barron's (May 1, 2008)
Emotional Market
Sentiment Survey by Asbury Research
April 26: Investor-sentiment measures, as they pertain to the U.S.
dollar, have been uncharacteristically conflicting and inconclusive for most of
this year, indicating uncertainty on the future direction of the greenback,
while establishing its current level as a possible longer-term inflection point.
More recently, however, these sentiment measures have started to come back into
sync...and now suggest that the dollar's recent decline is likely to continue
for the near-term...[yet] this decline should ultimately lead into a much larger
rally in the greenback.
Dow Jones Newswires (April
29th, 2008)
A slowing economy was
only one half of what Asbury Research president John Kosar described as a
"two-headed monster." The other half was inflation, and consumers' expectations
for higher inflation, which Kosar said can be a "self-fulfilling prophesy."
Soaring prices for energy and other commodities heightened inflation concerns,
causing investors to substantially pare back rate cut expectations. Given
the inflation threat, Kosar believed fed-funds traders had priced in too much
Fed easing. "We thought the funds contract might be priced toward too much
accommodation," said Kosar.
The Wall Street Journal - Market Beat (April
22nd, 2008)
John Kosar of Asbury Research notes on his firm’s
blog that the Dow, having closed above 12768, was a positive signal, and
equities are now in the process of “building a base” for future moves. “The
forward-looking US stock market starting to price in a recovery in the US
economy,” he writes.
Reuters
USA (April
21st, 2008)
"The market is starting to understand that these inflationary pressures are --
as the Fed has said -- going to restrict how much more easing they can do, and
that has pushed prices on the front end of the curve down faster than in the
back end," said John Kosar, president of Asbury Research in Chicago.
Reuters (April
15th, 2008)
On Tuesday, U.S. crude oil futures hit record highs above $113 per barrel.
Separately, a government report on Tuesday showed that U.S. headline producer
prices accelerated to a 6.9 percent year-over-year rate in March. That's the
sixth straight month the year-over-year headline PPI reading has been above 6.2
percent and the last time that happened was in late 1981, Asbury Research
wrote in a note to clients.
Chicago Sun Times (April
13th, 2008)
John Kosar, president of Asbury Research, said the intriguing Dow
movements come as the market has gone through months of vacillation as investors
try to decide if the worst of the credit crisis and the economic slowdown are
past. He said another sign that the market could be ready for an advance is that
many measures of trader sentiment are way out on the bearish extreme. To
Kosar, that reminds him of a lesson from his days dealing contracts at
the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. "You look around the pit and when you
see all the traders' positions are one way, the market has to switch. It can't
possibly sustain itself," he said.
Reuters (April
11th, 2008)
The University of Michigan survey showed that expectations of higher inflation
are getting more "sticky." The five-year inflation expectation rose to a median
3.1 percent from 2.9 percent in March. Meanwhile, the 4.8-percent
inflation reading expected over the next 12 months was a 20-year peak, said
John Kosar, president of Asbury Research in Chicago. "If the Fed is as
concerned about these inflation expectations as they say they are, these latest
data should keep them up at night," Kosar said. "Inflation expectations are
already out of control by some measures."
Lipper HedgeWorld (April
9th, 2008)
“We’ve looked at investor sentiment
data and we’re seeing some of the hedge funds more bearish on long-term
Treasuries than they’ve been in years,” said John Kosar, president of Asbury
Research, a Chicago-based research firm, who looks at the direction of the
long-term government bonds. “At the same time, retail investors are very bullish
on long-term Treasuries. But retail investors are notorious for being the most
bullish at market tops, whether you’re talking stocks, bonds or corn flakes,” he
said.
Barron's Online (April
2nd, 2008)
You may be asking: Why the concern that interest rates will climb if the Federal
Reserve is focused on juicing the economy with liquidity? From the fundamental
perspective, the Fed may be acting as economy fixers with interest-rate cuts and
looser borrowing requirements, but Bernanke & Co. are starting to talk openly
about the risks of higher inflation and the need to fight it. So concludes
John Kosar, CMT, of the market analysis firm Asbury Research. Wording
in several recent speeches by Fed members this year has made a reference to
"inflation expectations" and how it will hamper their attempts to cut interest
rates further.
The Wall Street Journal - Market Beat (March
20th, 2008)
Gold futures are losing some of their luster, lately trading at $928.30 an
ounce, a sharp decline from the last close above $1,000, which was just Tuesday,
as the U.S. dollar rallies against the euro, Swiss franc and yen. Asbury
Research’s John Kosar asked today in his blog, Logic Over Emotion Investing,
whether the “collapse in gold” could help the dollar with an
overdue bounce.
Bill Barnhart Column - Chicago Tribune
(March 12th, 2008)
The clearest clue of an impending rebound was the miserable state of investor
sentiment as the week began, said technical market analyst John Kosar of
Asbury Research. All dozen sentiment readings he follows were strongly
negative. For example, nearly 52 percent of investors were bearish in the
latest weekly survey by the American Association of Individual Investors. The
long-term average bearish reading in the survey is 29 percent. "You've had
all investors on one side of the boat," Kosar said. "When everybody is expecting
the end of Western civilization, a piece of good news throws everybody off
kilter."
The Wall Street Journal - Market Beat (March
4th, 2008)
To some, the chip stocks are in danger of dropping further,
as the Philadelphia Stock Exchange
Semiconductor Index was lately traded at 339.34, not far from a 52-week low,
falling through support levels around 352. “These major support levels define an
important decision point for market-leading technology stocks - how these
indexes react will be seen as a key indication
of whether the recent broad market decline in the US will continue, or if a
corrective rebound will occur first,” note analysts at Asbury
Research.
CNBC.com (March 3rd, 2008)
Inflation pressures have indeed become a significant issue for
the bond market in a short amount of time and could exacerbate
problems for the consumer and confound the Fed. For example, the
break-even point for the 10-year Treasury inflation-indexed security
-- a widely-followed gauge of inflation expectations -- rose to 2.45
percent at the end of February, matching a high from early November
2007, according Reuters EcoWin. "This means that the
public's inflation expectations, which Fed Chair Bernanke has
mentioned three times since January 17th as being key to the Fed's
ability to continue easing interest rates, have gone from being a
non-factor to a big potential problem in just the past month," said
John Kosar, president of Asbury Research, in a note.
The Wall Street Journal - Market Beat (March
3rd, 2008)
John Kosar of Asbury Research says inflation
is getting worse, too. “As much as the Fed is seemingly diverting our
attention away from inflationary pressures as it desperately tries to
keep the economy vertical via printing money, the inflation monster is
alive and well - and is growing and gaining momentum,” he
writes.
Bill Barnhart Column - Chicago Tribune
(January 31st, 2008)
The Fed cut rates because it can. This is another persuasive point, described in
detail in a report Wednesday by technical market analyst John Kosar of Asbury
Research. Kosar observed that recent surveys of the public's concern
about inflation are growing ominous. Likewise, market-based indicators of
inflation expectations seem poised to jump higher. But at the moment, survey and
market indicators of inflation fears are relatively benign, allowing Federal
Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke to assert that inflation expectations are
"well anchored."
International Herald Tribune (January
30th, 2008)
"The Fed understands that it needs to make hay while the sun shines by pumping
as much liquidity into the economy now, while it still can, before the public's
inflation expectations catch up with reality," said John Kosar, president of
Asbury Research in Chicago.
Reuters (January 8th, 2008)
"Looking at the big picture, I think there's more downside to go. I think we're
in for a bigger decline," said John Kosar, market technician at Asbury
Research in Chicago. "The market is pretty afraid of economic weakness
here."
Interview
Welling @ Weeden (March 2008)
John Kosar was interviewed by Kate Wellingfor
the March 2006 issue of Welling@Weeden. Welling@Weeden is an insightful and irreverent journal of
investment news and analysis that is widely read by professional money
managers worldwide. It is written by former Barron's
associate editor Kate. Welling for
Weeden and Company's client
base of more than 1,500 institutional investors.
Kate is renowned for her in-depth interviews
of some of the biggest names in the financial industry, including
George Soros, Walter Mintz, Robert Wilson,
Mario Gabelli, Lee Cooperman, Julian Robertson, Bill Gross, Ron Baron,
Ralph Wanger, Peter Lynch, Art Samberg, and Jim Rogers.
We thank Kate for her interest in our work. VIEW THE PDF
On The Air
2007
June 4th, 2007
John Kosar
appeared on Bloomberg Television's Morning Call at 7:00 AM ET with host
Carol Massar. John and Carol discussed the a 35-year secular trend of
declining long term US interest rates.
April 9th, 2007
John Kosar
appeared on Bloomberg Television's Trend Watch at 6:35 AM ET with host Brian Sullivan.
John and Brian discussed the direction of US
interest rates.
March 19th, 2007
John Kosar
appeared on Bloomberg Television's Morning Call at 6:35 AM ET with host
Matt Nesto. John and Matt discussed the VIX and its implications for
direction of the US stock markets.
February 8th 2007
John Kosar hosted Bloomberg's "Thursday
Night Technicals" series from 3:30 to 5:30 PM CT at Bloomberg's Chicago training facility at 111
S. Wacker Drive, which is two blocks from the Chicago Mercantile Exchange in
Chicago's "Loop". John displayed and discussed a series of charts
that detailed Asbury Research's outlook for the US financial markets in
2007.
January 22nd 2007
John Kosar
appeared on Bloomberg Television's Trend Watch at 6:35 AM ET with host Brian Sullivan. The topic covered was the direction of US
interest rates in 2007.
October 23rd, 2006
John Kosar
and Lehman Brothers' Jeff DeGraff appeared on CNBC's Morning Call
with host Mark Haines to discuss the US stock market.
