April 27, 2026
Despite many of us thinking that the stock market is just plain wrong (what about the war in Iran, rising inflation, and governmental incompetence?), stocks continued to rise last week. Both the Standard & Poor’s 500 and the Nasdaq Composite Index closed out the week at record highs, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average finished just about 2% below its record.
But why? We are facing so many challenges.
Well, as one economist on t.v. said: there are other things going on. We are in the middle of earnings season and companies are performing well. Oil and gas are rising in price due to the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, but energy companies are profiting. Inflation is hurting American families, but higher prices are contributing to corporate coffers. See a trend here? It’s a good reminder that the stock market is not the economy, and companies operate for the benefit of their owners (shareholders), not the public.
More examples of this: large layoffs were announced last week by Meta (Facebook), Nike, and Microsoft (which is offering voluntary retirement to thousands of workers). And of course there are the airlines. Spirit Airlines is near a deal with the federal government to receive $500 million in exchange for a 90% share of the airline once it emerges from bankruptcy. Does the benefit to Spirit passengers outweigh the cost to taxpayers? And once this deal was publicized, along came a group of other budget airlines, including Frontier and Avelo, who are seeking $2.5 billion in government assistance in exchange for warrants that could be converted to equity ownership. Airlines are in trouble due to the doubling of the cost of jet fuel.
Retail sales rose 1.7% in March, largely due to the war-driven increase in gas prices. When excluding gas-station sales, retail sales rose 0.6% for the month. Which leads us to the Federal Reserve (all roads lead to the Fed). The Department of Justice has dropped its inquiry into Fed Chairman Jerome Powell, which leaves open the possible confirmation of Kevin Warsh to be the next Fed Chair. But the door is not completely closed on the Powell inquiry, so it remains to be seen what Powell will do. He has the choice of leaving the Fed next month, or staying on the until 2028, although not as chairman. As for the Fed’s Open Market Committee meeting this week, all experts expect no move on interest rates.
According to CNN, consumer sentiment, as measured by the University of Michigan, hit a record low this month. “That means the average person says they feel worse about the economy today than they did in the depths of Covid, the Great Recession, 9/11 or any other time in the post-WWII era.” Yikes. Objectively, things are not worse now than they were then, but the fact that people feel that they are is a sign of the K-shaped economy, in which rich people get richer, and poor and middle-class people struggle.
But according to Goldman Sachs, the K-shaped economy will really hit us in the second half of the year. Yikes again.
And speaking of inflation, the average price of a cocktail in the U.S. is now $13.61. But in places like New York, cocktails can top $30. As a result, partiers are now “pre-drinking” before they hit the bars to save money. And flasks are making a return.
For the week ending on April 24th, the S&P closed at 7,165, the Nasdaq at 24,836, and the Dow at 49,230. The yield on the ten-year Treasury yield finished at 4.310%. West Texas crude oil cost $96.34 per barrel, while international Brent crude cost $107.88 per barrel. New York gold was bid at $4,705.35 and one Euro was worth $1.17.
Elizabeth E. CookPartner,
Diastole Wealth Management
News and information presented here was gathered from sources believed, but not guaranteed, to be reliable, including (but not limited to) Morning Brew, Yahoo Finance, Barron’s, USA Today, The Hill, Axios, Bloomberg, CNN, Business Insider, CNBC, The Wall Street Journal, Brookings, Fortune, Reuters, and The Guardian. If you have questions, please call Diastole at 203.458.5220, or email me, Liz Cook, at ecook@dwinvest.com. Thank you for reading!
In 2005, the average American spoke 16,632 words each day. As of 2019, that was down to 11,900. That’s a 28% decline in speaking. Apparently what we used to say, we now type. Or else everyone is suddenly very very shy.
And in a related story, for $349 you can buy a Poetry Camera, which will spit out an AI-generated poem instead of a picture each time you click. For $349, I’ll write you a poem, and we’ll read it out loud together so as not to lose more words.