The bond market has done an about-face over the past three days. The iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond (TLT) as well as the five- and 10-year Treasury yield charts are all at potential inflection points. After a large rally in bonds from October 2023 until late December, bonds have sold off in a consistent manner, with TLT remaining in a falling channel and yields in rising channels.

Sustainable Impact Investing, or ESG investing, is gaining traction not only with Argus Research clients but also with the global investment community. BlackRock CEO Lawrence Fink, who oversees approximately $9 trillion in assets, announced in January 2020 that his firm would be investing in companies that are making progress on sustainability. He doubled down in his January 2021 letter, calling on company managements to disclose their plans for making their businesses "compatible with a net-zero economy" by 2050. As assets have flowed in over the past 40 years, Sustainable Impact Investing has evolved. The discipline, originally known as Socially Responsible Investing, focused at first on excluding companies that conducted business in South Africa, or participated in industries such as tobacco, alcohol, and firearms. Performance of these initial strategies lagged, and the approach has been modified. Now, instead of merely identifying industries to avoid, the discipline promotes "sustainable" business practices across all industries that can have an "impact" on global issues such as climate, hunger, poverty, disease, shelter, and workers' rights.

Walmart is the world's largest retailer. In the fiscal year ended January 31, 2024, revenues were $648 billion (compared with Amazon's $574 billion of total revenue). The company has three segments: Walmart Stores, which accounted for about 68% of sales; Sam's Club, a membership warehouse chain, which comprised 13% of revenue; and the International segment, which generated 19% of sales. The company, based in Bentonville, Arkansas, ended fiscal 2023 with about 10,600 retail units in 19 countries. The company had about 1.05 billion square feet. Groceries are the largest product category in the U.S. market, at approximately 60% of sales. Health and Wellness, another stable category, is 12%. General Merchandise is 26% of sales. Global e-commerce sales were approximately $100 billion in FY24. The fiscal year ends on January 31 for U.S. and Canadian operations. Other operations generally are consolidated using a one-month lag on a calendar-year basis.

Stock markets gave back most of Thursday morning gains. The Dow hit a record 40,000 before closing lower. All indices closed slightly lower. The Dow closed down 0.1%, the S&P 500 0.2% and the Nasdaq was down 0.3%. The Russell 2000 was down 0.6%. The 10-year Treasury bond closed at 4.376%, its highest level in three days. Crude oil traded above $79 per barrel and gold declined $10 to $2384 per ounce.