4 August 2024, 09:45
By David Buik
Since the turn of the year, the focus for US equity investors has been in the world of technology and the growing influence of AI to not only this sector, but also to business development across the spectrum.
‘The Magnificent Seven’ – Amazon, Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Meta, Tesla, Nvidia’ - have captured the imagination of investors – short and long-term.
This frenetic activity provided sufficient momentum to carry the S&P500 index of leading US shares to hit an all-time high valuation of $47 trillion! The flight to quality was there for all to see. The 10-year US Treasury suffered its biggest weekly fall since the start of the year.
Away from tech, activity on the ‘Street of Dreams’ has been eerily and worryingly somnolent. However, the main US indices made steady progress up to the end of June 2024, though the performance of the 30 constituent stocks in the DJIA has been sluggish.
Investors, at the same time, have kept their beady eyes on the performance of cryptocurrencies, especially Bitcoin, which has ‘bobbed about like a cork in a bath’ during the last three months - $71k in May to $57k on 7th July to $67k on 29th July to $61k on 2nd August.
In June a few sages from........