April 10, 2025 Dear Clients and Friends:Re: Q1 Investment Review Another banner year for the S&P 500… This was our opening phrase in our last letter written in January. But as Warren Buffet has said many times, “be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful”. With all the benefit of hindsight,…

January 16, 2025 Dear Clients and Friends:Re: Q4 Investment Review Another banner year for the S&P 500 but not so much for our favorite stocks. Most everyone is aware ofthe role played in the success of the S&P by the “Magnificent 7” and other technology stocks,particularly those related to Artificial Intelligence or “AI”. In some…

Heightened uncertainty and fears about the Trump administration’s escalating trade war caused the S&P 500 to close down 1.4% at 5,521.52, more than 10% below its record close on Feb. 19. Read the full Barron’s article here.

Since its inception in 2003, Loudon Investment’s composite return after deducting management fees has been above appropriate equity and balanced indexes, with only two negative years along the way. And it’s registered these numbers in a conservative manner. The firm won’t buy stocks unless the income yield is above the market (nowadays about 2 percent)…

Dear Clients and Friends:Re: Q3 Investment Review Change may be happening in stock market leadership. In the third quarter, the S&P 500 produced the lowest return of the three equity indexes we follow. That hasn’t happened in many quarters since the bull market in technology stocks began over five years ago. The “Magnificent Seven” (the…

Dear Clients and Friends:Re: Q2 Investment Review What is Artificial Intelligence? From Wikipedia: Artificial intelligence (Al), in its broadest sense, is intelligence exhibited by machines, particularly computer systems. It is a field of research in computer science that develops and studies methods and software that enable machines to perceive their environment and use learning and…

Dear Clients and Friends:Re: Q1 Investment Review The first quarter of 2024 proved to be much better for the stock market than anyone anticipated. In the first half of the three-month period, the Magnificent 7 and their ilk led the rally upward. However, in the second half of the period, better performance was generally provided…

Dear Clients and Friends:Re: Q4 Investment Review The last quarter of 2023 produced very good returns from both the stock and bond markets. For the first time since the year began, the super high tech grouping known as the “Magnificent Seven” merely performed in line with other stocks. It remains to be seen if the…

Dear Clients and Friends:Re: Q3 Investment Review Over the first half of the year, all of our benchmark financial indexes did well with common stocks leading the way. However long-term interest rates began to rise substantively around the middle of the year. This continued through the 3rd quarter and the result was the negative results…

Dear Clients and Friends:Re: Q2 Investment Review Since the beginning of this year, the S&P 500 stock index has done extremely well in contrast to the terrible performance, top to bottom, that occurred in 2022. All of our benchmarks have shown “good” performance so far in 2023. Benchmark Index Total Returns Quarter Ending 6/30/2023 Year…