Rising bond yields are a worry

ALTHOUGH stock market movements are supposedly random and uncertain, there are a few observations about the current state of equities that we can make with a reasonably high degree of certainty.

The first is that although the Dow Jones Industrial Average has managed to stay above 18,000 for most of last week and the S&P 500 hit a new all-time high on Thursday, both moves are not particularly convincing.

Wall Street appears to be unsure of itself and what its drivers should be - for a while it looked like bad economic news was desirable because it meant interest rate hikes would be delayed, then last week it looked like the opposite held true, although Thursday's rally was reportedly because of low inflation numbers.