23 Quotes by Alfred Kugel

Since we don't have a lot of economic data, the most important will be durable goods.

People were worried the financial companies wouldn't have a strong earnings trend because of the flat yield curve, but now it's been flat for a while, and the earnings are still coming through.

I would guess this will be another weak report and that, I think, will keep the Fed on its path of easing, ... In a perverse way, the market will like it because they'll think the Fed will make another cut at the next FOMC meeting.

have been beating the drums about worrying about higher inflation, and so far, other than energy, we haven't had higher inflation. (But) I would say earnings are doing quite well, so I think that's helped to keep the market from having another bad week.

Some of the things that worried people, that the economy was slowing too much, that inflation was rising too much, have been assuaged here by the numbers we got this morning.

We have a lot of cross currents right now and so it's very difficult for investors to pick out the proper path. People like myself think that things are in fact slowing down some, that inflation is not a significant problem, and that while the Fed may tighten policy once in the next couple of months, they really probably don't need to.

You don't bet the farm but you need to be putting some money in as you find stocks that look attractive.

We've now changed the valuation of the stock market quite a bit, ... If anything, the earnings estimates have been going up and stocks have been going down. The price-to-earnings ratio on forward earnings is now down to about 15 times, which is very low relative to interest rates and inflation at the present time.

Unemployment claims were OK. I suspect we're still in for low volatility sliding up to the close tomorrow. I don't expect any big moves in either direction. That's disappointing, given that the week between Christmas and New Year's is what we call the Santa Claus rally, and so far all we've gotten is a lump of coal.