{"id":11962,"date":"2022-10-03T12:53:05","date_gmt":"2022-10-03T12:53:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/?p=11962"},"modified":"2022-10-03T12:53:06","modified_gmt":"2022-10-03T12:53:06","slug":"rising-rates-dont-always-mean-falling-stocks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/rising-rates-dont-always-mean-falling-stocks\/","title":{"rendered":"Rising Rates Don&#8217;t Always Mean Falling Stocks"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>At the Federal Reserve\u2019s September 20-21 meeting, officials voted unanimously to raise the benchmark fed funds rate by 75 basis points to a range between 3% and 3.25%. The rate hike was widely expected, but new projections for where rates would finish the year arguably caught the market by surprise.<sup>1<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the day following the Fed meeting, it was revealed that nearly every voting Fed member expected rates to finish 2022 at a range between 4% and 4.5%, which almost explicitly implies sizable rate increases at the November and December policy meetings. Any hope that the Fed may slow the size and pace of rate hikes was dashed, and stocks have endured sharp selling pressure ever since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><sup>______________________________________________________________________________________________________________<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><u><a href=\"https:\/\/go.steadyinvestor.com\/arrow-stock-market-outlook?source=website&amp;medium=blog&amp;term=motm_blog_2022_10_03&amp;content=stock_market_outlook_report\">Prepare Your Investments for Rising Interest Rates!<\/a><\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It\u2019s uncertain how the market will be affected in the next few months due to rising interest rates. But, instead of making daily decisions based on \u201cwhat if\u2019s\u201d, I am offering all readers our just-released Stock Market Outlook report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This report will help you keep an eye on economic data releases, earnings reports, and other key economic factors, such as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><em>View on equity markets<\/em><\/li><li><em>Zacks forecasts at a glance<\/em><\/li><li><em>Fundamentals that the U.S. stock markets are pricing in<\/em><\/li><li><em>What\u2019s next for the market?<\/em><\/li><li><em>And more\u2026<\/em><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have $500,000 or more to invest and want to learn more about these forecasts, click on the link below to get your free report today!\u00a0<br><br><strong><u><a href=\"https:\/\/go.steadyinvestor.com\/arrow-stock-market-outlook?source=website&amp;medium=blog&amp;term=motm_blog_2022_10_03&amp;content=stock_market_outlook_report\">IT&#8217;S FREE. Download the Just-Released October 2022 Stock Market Outlook<sup>2<\/sup><\/a><\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>___________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Many investors and market participants are starting to assume that as long as the Fed is hiking rates and upward pressure is being applied to longer-term interest rates (like the 10-year US Treasury bond yield), then stocks will continue to endure selling pressure. Higher bond yields adversely impact the value of future earnings, and they also give investors an alternative to stocks, the thinking goes. In this environment, investors are increasingly seeing bond yields and stock returns are inversely correlated, which makes the outlook for equities pretty bleak in the next 6-12 months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But this assumption does not line up with what\u2019s happened historically. Looking at weekly returns over the past 60+ years, the S&amp;P 500 index and 10-year U.S. Treasury bonds have a correlation of approximately 0 \u2013 meaning there is no clear relationship between the two. If stocks and bonds always moved in opposite directions, the correlation between the two would be -1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As far as the fed funds rate is concerned, we do not have to go back very far in history to find a time when the Federal Reserve was raising interest rates while stocks were also rising. As seen in the chart below, we had Fed tightening during the 2003-2007 bull market and again during the 2009-2020 bull market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"625\" height=\"242\" src=\"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Capture.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-11963\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Capture.png 625w, https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Capture-300x116.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 625px) 100vw, 625px\" \/><figcaption><strong><em>Source: Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis<sup>3<\/sup><\/em><\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>There is a fundamental flaw in thinking that as interest rates go up stocks will go down, and it\u2019s this: interest rates are not the only thing influencing business activity, consumer spending, corporate profitability, and the direction of the stock market. That\u2019s why throughout history, there are myriad examples of interest rates marching higher while stocks also posted gains \u2013 the relationship between the two is not as tight as many are assuming today. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In my view, we will likely see the stock market enter a new bull market while the Federal Reserve is still in tightening mode. To assume that stocks will only start to climb once the Federal Reserve cuts rates or pauses hikes is to assume that stocks move concurrently with economic news and Fed policy, which we know historically has not been the case. Stocks rarely wait for clear signals or good news to rebound.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Bottom Line for Investors<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Here\u2019s another reason not to wait for the Federal Reserve to cut or pause rate hikes before liking stocks again: Fed projections are almost always wrong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Remember, it was just one year ago when the Federal Reserve was talking about \u2018transitory inflation\u2019 and signaling to markets that interest rates would remain low for the foreseeable future. Just three months ago, Fed officials were projecting the fed funds rate would finish the year at 3.8%, and today it\u2019s up to 4.5%. These forecasts are simply not reliable enough for investors to hang their hats on. What I can say, however, is that stocks historically have rebounded <em>well before <\/em>there is clarity on the issues of the day, which in this case are inflation, recession, and the path of fed funds. Investors should not wait for these indicators to get better, knowing that stocks won\u2019t either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the meantime, I recommend that investors prepare their investments for what\u2019s to come. To help you get a better look at data that can help you protect your investments through market changes, I am offering all readers our\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/go.steadyinvestor.com\/arrow-stock-market-outlook?source=website&amp;medium=blog&amp;term=motm_blog_2022_10_03&amp;content=stock_market_outlook_report'\">Just-Released October 2022 Stock Market Outlook Report<\/a>, <\/strong>which contains some of our key forecasts and factors to consider such as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><em>Sell-Side and Buy-Side Consensus<\/em><\/li><li><em>Zacks Rank August Industry Tables<\/em><\/li><li><em>Zacks Forecasts at a Glance<\/em><\/li><li><em>What\u2019s Next for the Market?<\/em><\/li><li><em>And more\u2026<\/em><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have $500,000 or more to invest and want to learn more about these forecasts, click on the link below to get your free report today!&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Investors and pundits seem to assume that continued rate hikes mean stocks will keep falling\u2014but historically, that&#8217;s not true.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[63,71],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mitch-on-the-markets","category-private-client-group"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11962"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11962\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11965,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11962\/revisions\/11965"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacksim.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}