Russ Koesterich Quotations

We're just winding down the year, ending the year with these sort of small, middling gains, which to me makes sense because you've had opposing factors this year. On the one hand you've had good earnings and a robust economy, but on the other hand, you've been fighting the Fed. The two canceled each other out.

There are still some significant headwinds out there, but I have to say, the market has held up pretty well. But ... we're still stuck in the same trading range we've seen for months, and it'll take better news to break out of it.

I think, overall, we're seeing some friendly economic data that helped the market out. That said, there's not a lot of catalysts out there that could take us much higher, unless oil drops $5 a barrel or the Fed comes out with amazingly clear language in its take on the economy, and neither of those are likely.

You have to ask yourself, if you sever the profitable part of a company from the part of the company that's less profitable, what do you have left? To me, this is an area that still has to develop, and I don't necessarily know if I would go forward with that.

The PPI number is one data point that suggests the Fed is going to go further.

Core inflation (excluding volatile energy and food prices) has stayed relatively contained.

Earnings are the most likely catalyst in the short term. The market is very concerned about inflation and the consumer rolling over because of higher prices. If the outlooks call for strong fourth-quarter sales, then you could see something good happen.

The selling you're seeing is nearly all on the tech side, and you're seeing resilience in other parts of the market. This tells me that people aren't panicking over Japan or anything else.

People are waiting to see what kind of change in policy language is going to accompany that statement. The question is, if the Fed is approaching (a neutral stance), how will its policy change in 2006?

You're having a little bit of digestion today. The Wal-Mart news is going to an issue that is concerning investors in 2006, which is namely the health of the consumer. Is consumer spending, which has really driven the economy, going to hold up?

It's not going to have much significance for most market participants. Institutional investors tend to focus more on the S&P 500 and some of the other indexes.

Things have been very distorted by how warm the weather was in January. To some extent, we're trying to get a handle on how it impacted the economy. It helped retail spending and housing starts, but has hurt energy prices.

The consumer is losing the ability to defend his lifestyle, and that means eventually he'll have to cut back on spending. Whether this will really come to a head in 2006 or 2007 is up in the air, but it's coming.

The market in general is not anywhere near the peaks it hit during the end of the bubble.

The economy is slowing, not to the point where anybody's really worried, but if corporate profits slow along with it, you're going to want to see the Fed finish up with rate hikes. But the Fed is going to err on the side of inflation. So the one catalyst that could move the markets out of this trading range doesn't seem to be there right now.

The market was a little oversold. I think this (the run-up) is mostly technical. I don't think you can read too much into it, since there weren't a lot of drivers.