Well, Santa certainly doesn't appear to be making an appearance this year. Maybe Rudolph's nose, which normally lights his path, wasn't working, or Santa's sleigh was flagged for not being ESG-compliant. In any case, unless there's a powerful surge later this week, it sure looks like 2022 will weakly limp to the finish line, disappointing the many bulls who had hoped for a Christmas miracle.

With only three trading days left in the year, the S&P 500 is on pace for its first annual decline since 2018 and its worst performance since the Global Financial Crisis (2008).

From my perspective, my indicators have remained unfavorable and weren't expecting much, if any, upward movement during the year-end dash. It has been relatively quiet as many either left early for the holidays or are away from their desks. I thought for my last Whispers of the year I would share some of the discussions/observations from the last week of client interactions.

Very few are outright bullish. However, there are some who subscribe to the Fed will be "lower for shorter" ideas, which my research hasn't supported. That said, the overall portfolio weightings of strategic managers do not appear to be overly defensive despite having more cash than normal. When looking at tactical accounts that I...

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