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Weekly Update for the week ending September 5, 2025

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September Slump: Will This Year Be Different?
September has a bit of a bad reputation on Wall Street. Historically, it’s the weakest month for stocks – a pattern often called the “September Effect.” Unlike other market drops tied to clear events, this is more of a seasonal trend. Some say investors pull back after the summer rally to lock in profits. Others point to mutual funds and big institutions rebalancing portfolios ahead of year-end, which adds selling pressure. Add in traders returning from summer holidays with a cautious outlook, and September has often leaned negative.

History has delivered some painful reminders. In 2008, during the financial crisis, the S&P 500 plunged nearly 9% in a single September. In 2001, the 9/11 attacks triggered a steep selloff. More recently, in 2022, the index slid almost 10% as rising interest rates rattled investors.

So, what could make this September another challenging month?

Weekly Update for the week ending August 22, 2025

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Bigger Slices of the Pie: Understanding Share Buybacks
While going through the latest batch of quarterly reports, I noticed quite a few companies announcing share buyback programs. If you’re new to investing, that might not sound like much, but buybacks can actually be a very shareholder-friendly move. So this week, let’s talk about what they are and how they can benefit us as investors.

Weekly Update for the week ending August 15, 2025

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Paying to Play: What Nvidia and AMD’s China Access Means for Investors
The Trump administration has struck a highly unusual deal with Nvidia (NASD: NVDA) and AMD (NASD: AMD) to sell certain artificial intelligence (AI) chips to China – Nvidia’s H20 and AMD’s MI308 – the companies must hand over 15% of those sales to the US government. In return, they get the export licenses needed to ship the chips to China. This effectively reopens a market that had been closed off under earlier restrictions..
While it might sound like a simple trade-off – a cut for the US, access for the companies – it sets a dangerous precedent.

Weekly Update for the week ending August 8, 2025

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An Ominous Start to a Historically Volatile Month
Well, August didn’t waste any time making waves. Both the Canadian and US markets opened the month with sharp declines on August 1, but the storm clouds actually started forming the day before. President Trump signed an executive order imposing new import duties, ranging from 10% to 41%, on about 90 countries. Canada was hit with a hefty 35% rate, alongside India, Taiwan, and others. The tariffs didn’t take effect until August 7, but the announcement alone rattled markets, fuelling worries about renewed trade tensions and rising inflation risks.

Then came Friday’s US jobs report, which landed with a thud. Payroll growth in July came in roughly 25% below expectations, and to make matters worse, May and June were revised down by a combined 258,000 jobs. That raised fresh concerns about a slowing economy.

Weekly Update for the week ending August 1, 2025

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Liberation Day, part 2

President Trump kicked off a new wave of tariffs this week, reigniting global trade tensions. The move came just days after progress with the European Union (EU) and Japan had boosted market optimism – but that optimism is now giving way to concern.

The latest action includes a sweeping 35% tariff on Canadian goods not covered by CUSMA, which caught many by surprise. It also targets exports from Brazil, India, and other trading partners, with tariffs ranging from 10% to 25%. These new duties hit a wide range of products, from industrial parts and electronics to everyday consumer goods, raising fears of a broader trade war.