• For the second consecutive week, US equity markets rallied as new Fed Chair Janet Yellen stated she would continue the policies set forth by her predecessor.
• Following Yellen’s statement that the proposed reductions to the QE program will continue as planned, yields on longer dated Treasuries moved higher for the week.
• For January, retail sales declined 0.4% and industrial production declined 0.3%.
• US initial jobless claims came in at 339,000, but higher than anticipated.
• US equity based mutual funds saw inflows of $3.3 billion for their 6th consecutive week of inflows.
• For the week, small-cap stocks outperformed large-cap stocks while large-cap growth and large-cap value stocks performed in line with one another.
• All 10 economic sectors were positive for the week, with health care and utilities as the best performing sectors and financials and consumer discretionary as the worst performing sectors.
• For the week ending 2/14/14, the S&P 500 gained 2.32% closing at 1838.63. The MSCI EAFE Index gained 2.44% closing at 1896.46 and the MSCI EM Index rose 2.13% to end the week at 957.31.
