Whenever the S&P500 has been up more than 2% in January, the market was up for that year more than 87% of the time, with an 18.4% average rate-of-return. –Ryan Detrick, January 31, 2025
“I haven’t been everywhere, but it’s on my list.” –Susan Sontag
According to data from the Federal Reserve and the Employee Benefit Research Institute, just 3.2% of retirees have saved over $1 million. –Yahoo Finance, December 11, 2024
In 1986, 12 jurors got stuck in an Otis elevator on their way to hear a lawsuit against the Otis Elevator Company. –Simon’s Space, November 1, 2022
According to research, a full 60% to 90% of patients lie on their medical forms. One individual did the unthinkable: she told the truth. “I figured two glasses of wine a night, so that makes 14 per week,” she said. The doctor was horrified and suggested Alcoholics Anonymous. The patient was horrified and found a new doctor. –AirMail.News, January 7, 2025
A teaching experiment in Nigeria, where students used AI as an after-school tutor, just shattered expectations. The learning improvements at 0.3 standard deviations were striking. To put it into perspective, that is the equivalent of nearly two years of learning in just six weeks. –WorldBank, January 9, 2025
The Albuquerque 3-bedroom, 1-bath home of Breaking Bad’s fictional high school teacher, Walter White, is on the market for $4 million—more than ten times its Zillow estimated value of $350,000. – BusinessInsider, January 5, 2025
The 20+ Year Treasury ETF (TLT) fell 35% on a total return basis from the end of 2021 to the end of 2024. Over the same period, short interest for TLT has risen from 35 million up to 86 million shares, which represents roughly 14% of the 596 million shares outstanding as of 1/15/24.–MFS, January 21, 2025
In the 80 trading days following the Federal Open Market Committee’s first rate cut on 9/17 through 1/13, the yield on the 10-year Treasury increased on 50 out of 80 trading days. Since 1962, only four other periods saw such a high frequency of daily increases in the same span: September 1969, May 1984, May 2006 and March 2021. – MFS, January 21, 2025
“Ghost job” is a term used to describe an advertised position that an employer has no intent to fill. According to hiring platform Greenhouse, between 18% and 22% of jobs advertised in 2024 never got filled, and 70% of the companies using its platform in Q2 2024 posted at least one ghost job. –WSJ, January 12, 2025
Among graduates from some of the country’s top business schools (Duke, Harvard, MIT, Stanford, University of Chicago and University of Michigan), the average percentage of MBA graduates without a job three months after graduation increased from 11.9% after the 2023 school year to 19.3% after the 2024 year. In 2022, the average was just 6.8%. – WSJ, January 15, 2025
In 2024, the Magnificent 7 accounted for 53.1% of the S&P 500’s total return, which means the 25.02% return would have been 11.75% without them. –S&P Global, January 3, 2025
Adjusted for inflation the median net worth of people ages 35 to 44 was $130,380 in 1989. In 2022, that number was slightly higher, at $135,000. Those under 35 are also doing better, with a net worth of $39,040 in 2022, compared with an inflation-adjusted $18,740 in 1989. –BusinessInsider, January 9, 2025
“Isn't it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back, everything is different?” – C.S. Lewis andGoodreads
In 1842, the English author Charles Dickens was invited to meet President John Tyler at the White House. Dickens, “having twice rung a bell which nobody answered,” simply let himself in, entered the White House, and attempted to find the president on his own. –HistoryFacts
When stocks finish January in positive territory, the rest of the year sees gains 79% of the time, with a median increase of 11.5%. When January is negative, the likelihood of gains drops to 58%, and the average increase is just 2.4%. – Barron’s, January 2, 2025
Over the last decade, fueled by AI, US oil producers have pumped 60% more oil daily with 40% fewer workers. By extracting more oil while reducing expenses, they’re lowering the costs to drill profitably. In the Permian Basin, the break-even price for oil producers has fallen to $40 a barrel from over $90 in 2012. –The Barron’s Daily November 26, 2024
Gallup’s annual global survey of 146,000 people in 142 countries revealed that negative emotions declined for the first time in a decade, and positive emotions reached their highest level since before the pandemic, with an uptick in people feeling more well-rested, experiencing more enjoyment, and smiling and laughing more. –Gallup, June 25, 2024
Last year, products coming from China made up 14% of all imported goods, the lowest share in nearly two decades. Mexico (15.4%) became the largest source of U.S. imports, with Canada (13.6%) not far behind. –The Week, December 6, 2024
Gulf Coast towns from New Orleans, LA to Pensacola, FL received record amounts of snowfall last week. Milton, FL in the panhandle got 9.8 inches of snow, which shattered the state’s prior snowfall record of 4 inches set in 1954 (also in Milton). –CBS News, January 22, 2025
The $20.9 trillion combined market cap of the ten largest US companies now represents more than 70% of US GDP. The ten biggest US mega-caps are also now larger than China’s $19.5 trillion economy as well as the GDP of the world’s next five biggest economies combined (Germany, Japan, India, the UK and France). –MFS Beyond the News, January 27, 2025
Ichiro Suzuki was voted into baseball’s Hall of Fame on his first ballot with 393 out of 394 votes. Since 1936, the only player ever voted in on a unanimous vote was Mariano Rivera, and Derek Jeter is the only other player to miss a unanimous vote by just one. –The Spokesman Review, January 22, 2025
