The Senator from the Great State of Israel, I mean the Prime Minister from the State of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu gave his much ballyhooed speech to Congress on the subject of Iran and nuclear weapons. If BiBi could run for President of the United States, he would be swept into office.
Obama, Pelosi and Hillary Were Big Losers
In the meantime, three members of the Democratic Party shot themselves in the foot: President Obama for not attending or even watching the speech and then giving some lame answers to reporters’ questions, after the event; Rep. Nancy Pelosi who turned her back on Netanyahu while the rest of the audience rose for applause; and, Hillary Clinton for getting caught exclusively using her personal email for business when in the role of Secretary of State. The only winner for the Democrats was Sen. Menendez for his forthright speech at AIPAC.
Ronald Reagan once said that, “Latinos are Republicans, They just don’t know it yet.“ Had he been alive today, he would have said, “Jews are Republicans. They just don’t know it yet.” When you put it all together, there is very little doubt in my mind’ that the Jewish vote is going to migrate to the right, especially as the Roosevelt generation dies off.
Utilities Rebound
As for the markets, during the speech, oil prices were pushed higher and the stock markets were sent lower. At one point, the markets experienced their worst day since January. However, pushing markets around was easy given that many investors and traders were fixated on the speech. After the speech, the markets rallied, cut the day’s losses by about half and finished lower by around ½% at the closing bell.
There are indications that the correction in utilities, consumer staples and other high dividend stocks may be close to an end. Despite the pullback, February, being a popular month for dividends, shielded investors from the price declines. If you are looking to put money to work in the sector, I would suggest Southern Company (SO), Con Edison (ED) or the Utility Sector SPDRs ETF (XLU).
Congress did manage to vote on a clean, no strings attached funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security. It should appear on the President’s desk for signing today.
Now we are down to two events left to grapple with this week. One I added to my initial list from Monday is Thursday’s ECB meeting. Then Friday is the February jobs report. Today, Hump Day, a smattering of retailers will report results and the ADP Employment Report and Fed Beige book will also be released. This is enough to keep us on our toes, but for the most part, the real ammunition is being saved for Thursday and Friday.
While I was going to conduct a midday live chat, I am going to have to push that off as I have some meetings out of the office in the afternoon.
Finally, tonight begins the festival of Purim which PM Netanyahu discussed in his speech yesterday. Enjoy a few hamentashen.
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Disclosure: At the time of this commentary Scott Rothbort, his family and/or clients of LakeView AssetManagement, LLC was long ED and SO — although positions can change at any time.
Scott Rothbort is the President & Founder of LakeView Asset Management, LLC, a registered investment advisor specializing in high net worth private wealth management. For more information on investing with LakeView Asset Management, LLC call us at 888-9LAKEVIEW or request more information by clicking on the contact button on the top right hand corner of the website.
LakeView Management, LLC is a Nevada LLC, with its principal office located in Henderson, NV and branch office located in Millburn, NJ
Scott Rothbort is also the publisher of the LakeView Restaurant & Food Chain Report, a newsletter focusing in on food, restaurant, beverage and agricultural stocks. An individual subscription to the newsletter can be ordered at www.restaurantstox.com Furthermore; Scott is also a professor at the Seton Hall Stillman School of Business in South Orange, NJ.
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