Job numbers. Most of the economic data was weak. That includes the ISM Manufacturing, pending and existing home sales and personal income. But these were all very much expected. The Fed’s move back in January (“we’re patient”) looks exactly right. It's not often that expectations and results are so finely tuned. But this time we knew the tax cuts would run out of steam and uncertainty around China, Europe, trade and government shutdowns would lead to lower numbers. Jerome Powell repeated them all in his talks with Congress last week.

Two points. First, slowing, not a recession. A recession is not two quarters of declining GDP. It’s a far more complicated run of data that includes GDP, employment, claims, hours worked and trade sales (full list here). And those are not flashing red. Second, this should keep rates low for a while. The 10-Year Treasury is at 2.75%, only 20bps higher than two years ago.

It’s been a stunning start to the year. In the first two months, the S&P 500 is up 11.5%, small and mid caps up 15%, China up 27% and Europe up 11%. We'd like to see a pause but would remind ourselves that markets do not correct by going sideways. So having some protection in place seems fine.

As 2009 begins to run off the 10-year returns , we’d like to celebrate that the 10-year compound rate of return in stocks is now 16.75%.

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