Week Ending 04_25_2025 Stock Market Recap

It was a B.I.G. kind of week in more ways than one! How so? TUNE IN TO FIND OUT!

Episode Transcript

(00:37):
Hello and welcome to this week's edition of The Big Money Report. I'm
your host, David Boothe, President and Chief Investment Officer
at BIG Investment Services. That's B-I-G, Boothe
Investment Group. We're full service financial advisory based out
of Dover, Delaware, serving clients all across America. You
can read all about us at abigplan.com. That's www.abigplan.com. I

(01:02):
like to put the show together once a week just to give you a recap of the week behind
and a peek at the week and weeks to come, trying to keep you
up to speed with you and your money. And we're glad you're with us today. It is Friday,
April 25th, 2025. And I got
to start off with a huge, huge shout out
to some of the most awesome people in this country, on

(01:24):
this planet, and that would be our clients. What an awesome
week. We celebrated 20 years of BIG, had well over 100 some
people come out and spend some time with us on Wednesday, had some good food, some
good music, and nice hanging out with everybody in a little more casual setting
was fantastic. And then those that couldn't make it, we got hundreds and hundreds of
clients all over the country. They send emails and cards and gifts and

(01:44):
things like that. Well wishes. We just appreciate you all so very much.
We continue to work tirelessly to make sure your outcomes are
what you want them to be because we really, really super appreciate you.
That's what we do. What we do right to see your dreams come to fruition. And
we've seen it happen now, 20 some years. I've been doing this for 25. I've
seen little babies now graduated college and getting married and daydreams of

(02:06):
retirement become reality. Folks traveling the country doing what they want to
do. And we just love to see those outcomes come to fruition. So thank
you. Thank you so very much. So let's talk about the markets.
Solid, solid week for the markets this week, as we expected. Look, we
said last week the market was poised to go higher. We thought we were in the midst of
a pretty good rally here that would carry forward for a few weeks. And

(02:27):
so far, so good. Dow Jones up 2.5% this week. S&P
500 up 4.5%. The Nasdaq composite up 6.7%. And
the Russell small cap index up 4%. So all the major indices pushing
higher this week. The volatility index, as you might expect, down
quite a bit, down 16% on the week, coming in at a 24.8. So

(02:47):
down quite a bit there with the market moving higher. And then looking at
long-term bonds, they actually had a good week too, up 1.5% on
the TLT. So long-term bonds going up, interest
rates coming down. Market really liked to see that. That's a
positive as well. When you take a look at the sectors, what we saw
really doing well was the more growthy areas of the market.

(03:08):
Things like semiconductors up 10%. We had technology
as a whole up 8%. Consumer discretionary, things people
want, not what they need, but what they want, up 6.5%. Communication
services up 4.6%, all these things doing very
well. And then the more defensive areas of the market, things like consumer
staples, things people need, not what they want, but what they need, down

(03:31):
1.2. Utilities only up half a percent. So a little weakness there
in the defensives and a lot of strength there in the more growth oriented
areas of the market. Looking at the metals, gold down half
a percent this week, silver up 1.6. And let's talk a little bit
about gold. I think gold has had a blow off top. Okay.
Hidden record highs this past week. I think it's had a blow off

(03:52):
top and I think it's going to go lower. So we've got a gold mining company
in our portfolio. Kinross gold doing great for the year up
56% on the year has been fantastic, but I did do some selling today. I
trimmed back on that further just to take some of that profit out
because I think gold can push its way back down maybe around $2,800 an
ounce, give or take. When you look at the Fibonacci retracement levels, what's

(04:14):
that? Yeah, Fibonacci retracement levels. So Fibonacci, these
are patterns found in nature. And interestingly enough,
the stock market many times tends to follow these
same types of patterns. And it's just another tool that I
look at sometimes when it comes to how low can something go and
that sort of thing. I think gold can probably work its way down around that $2,800, $2,900 level. So Took

(04:37):
some profit out of that and happy to do so. It's done real well for us
year to date. Looking at everything else, listen,
this market's got a lot going on right now. It's being pushed a lot by
headlines. Earlier this week, President Trump said something about firing
Fed Chief Jay Powell. And on Monday, the market just
looked horrific. I was actually kind of surprised. I was like, wow, I thought the

(04:57):
market was looking pretty constructive. And it was an ugly, ugly day on
Monday. But then as we said, might happen, right?
Some more positive headlines are coming out regarding tariffs, a
deal here, deal there being worked on. Market responded very
positively to those things. And then there's some things being said that
I don't know how true they are, but the market wants them to be true. That's

(05:18):
for sure. So there was some comments made that we're talking
to China and the market loved to hear that. But
then China came out and said, no, we're not. We haven't heard from you. We've not
spoken at all regarding tariffs. So who knows?
Are we talking to China? Are we not talking to China? I don't know. I'm
not sure if anybody knows. But anyway, the market doesn't seem

(05:38):
to care at the moment. What I will say, when you're taking a
look at the economic data, the earnings, at the end of the day, you know,
that's what's most important. Economic data is sloppy, okay?
We're seeing some things that are a little bit better than expected, other
things that are not. So it's just a mixed bag and pretty sloppy. I think
a lot of the potential pain that is
going to come from everything that's happening here with tariffs, it's probably

(06:01):
not showing up yet. I still think that's not worked its way
into the numbers just yet. And then there's still US
federal layoffs and all kinds of things happening there that aren't going to show
in the numbers yet. So there's a lot going on there that I just don't think is
being reflected. And then there's the earnings of companies.
Now, earnings have been okay, and they should be.

(06:22):
Look, the worst of the tariffs, again, haven't worked their way into the numbers yet.
The year started off great, January, February. So
things really didn't start to deteriorate a whole lot till March. So first quarter numbers
for these companies have been okay. But here's the thing that concerns me.
Earnings expectations are declining at
a bigger rate than they have the last two quarters.

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We've talked about this phenomenon in the past. I work with Earnings
Scout, Nick Rake over there, great guy, really onto
something here in regards to the rate of
change on earnings, okay, the rate of change. So
if earnings expectations are dropping, you know, 10%, right, this quarter
and 10% the next quarter, And

(07:05):
then they drop again the third quarter, but only 5% instead of
10%. The market seems to key off of
that. It seems to move on the better rate
of change. And same with the other way around. If earnings expectations are
going higher. and they're going higher by 10%, but then they're only going
higher by six, and they're only going higher by three, the market tends to

(07:26):
react to that as well. While earnings expectations moving
forward are declining at the biggest rate that we've seen in
quite some time, that's concerning. That's concerning, because
that could spell some trouble for the market ahead, maybe into
the next quarter, when we start getting this next quarter's earnings a couple months
from now. So we'll have to kind of watch all that stuff pretty closely. Now,

(07:46):
on the good side of things, we have seen some signals.
from consumer sentiment and some other technical signals and indicators
that you only see when the market has bottomed out.
The bottom of 08, 09, the bottom of the 2000, 03 bear market,
the bottom of COVID. I mean, you only see these things at
the rock bottom of a market decline and looking out

(08:10):
12, 18 months ahead, historically, the numbers are fantastic. for
the market. We also got a breadth indicator. In other
words, market participation, right? All the stocks in the stock market,
how many are moving higher together? We got a breadth indicator this
week that has 100% track record of reflecting
positive, double digit positive returns looking 12 to 18 months

(08:31):
forward. So There's a lot to be said that
it's not all doom and gloom out there. And the market could really put
out some strong numbers here further down the road. But
I still think there's some wood to chop between now and then. And look, a bottoming of
a market is usually a process. It's usually not just
down and straight up again. It's not how it normally works. I

(08:52):
think very strongly that we're going to probably have another move
down at some point, a retest of those lows that we had
a few weeks ago on the S&P 500. Now, right now, the
market is looking constructive. The mark indicators reflect that
this can continue for maybe a couple few more weeks. The
S&P Oscillator looks a little rich, so maybe it's not going to move up as much

(09:13):
and as quickly as it has this past week, but I do think things continue
to look constructive in the short term. There are some key levels that
we're watching. I mentioned 5500 to you on the S&P 500 maybe
last week. Well, we got over that today. 5525 is where
it closed. Not only did it close across this threshold that I thought
was the first key threshold it had to get over, But it also

(09:34):
got over this downward sloping trend line that
we've been in since February. That's a very good sign. The
next level is the 50-day moving average. That's 56.46 on the
S&P, so about 3% or so higher from here. But
then we start to get into territory that's going to be very difficult. It's
a hurdle that's going to be hard for the S&P to cross. It's right in

(09:55):
the mid 5,700s on the S&P, right around that 200-day moving
average. That's going to be pretty challenging. And at this
point in time, until proven otherwise, I think this is probably a
bear market rally. And I would expect the market to fail somewhere
between 5,600 and 5,700 and change on the S&P
and probably work its way back down again. So what does that

(10:15):
mean for us? It doesn't mean anything. We're sitting great right now. Look, we did a
lot of buying, bought a whole bunch of stocks at the lowest points
there a couple of weeks ago when the market was so down and out, S&P
4,800 and change. And we're still sitting on cash. We still have a nice position
in cash and we're going to wait to see if this
market heads back down to do this retest. And if it gets

(10:36):
worse than that, if we slip into recession, I think I told you last week, even
if we slip into a recession, I don't think the market goes a whole lot
lower than where it was a few weeks ago. I think 4,600 is probably
the lowest this market will get to if it really blows up. So
we're sitting on this cash, and when we go back down, if and
when we go back down, we're going to buy pretty aggressively. And if we

(10:56):
don't, if we clear the hurdles, fine. We'll find opportunities. Look, there's opportunities
in individual names all the time. I'm not worried about that at all. Look, we're doing great. We're
back to positive on the year. I just love how
everything's working out for us at the moment. We raised cash at really
good times here. January 3rd, we took money out of the market. March
31st and April 1st, we raised up a ton of cash. And then we put some of that right back to

(11:17):
work again just a couple of weeks later in a downward move of
this market. So I think we're in a great position. We're just gonna kind of hold
tight. Let things play out. And
when they say play the cards, they come out of the deck, right? So that's what
we will do. And that's what I've got for you. We got a lot more earnings coming out next week.
We'll be watching those pretty closely. Some of these companies could give us a little bit more indication on
the market. We've got things like Caterpillar and UPS going

(11:41):
to be watching those things pretty closely and we'll see what they've got to say. And
we'll continue to watch these headlines on tariffs and see how the market reacts to all
that. But between now and next week, meet, as you're thinking about your future,
your long-term goals, all the things you want to do with you and
your money. Maybe just take that big trip to Las Vegas
and watch the Eagles at the Sphere. I've been

(12:02):
told emphatically that is a show you don't want to miss if
you are an Eagles fan, and maybe you don't want to miss it even if you're not. Hey,
maybe you want to retire a little early, buy that second house. You know what your goals are. Don't
just think about it. Think big. Think B-I-G. And
Thank you for listening to this week's edition of the Big Money Report with
your host, David Boothe, President and Financial Advisor at

(12:25):
BIG Investment Services. For more information on BIG and
how you can access their planning and investment management services, visit
them at abigplan.com. That's abigplan.com. Or
call them toll free at 866-946-PLAN. That's 866-946-7526. The

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foregoing content reflects the opinions of David Boothe and Boothe Investment Group,
Inc., and is subject to change at any time without notice. There's no
guarantee that the statements, opinions, or forecasts provided herein will
prove to be correct. Content provided herein is for informational purposes only
and should not be used or construed as investment advice or a recommendation regarding
the purchase or sale of any security. All investing involves risk, including
the potential for loss of principal. There is no guarantee that any investment plan