Hello again everyone. Sorry that this blog has taken an unannounced hiatus. We are back.

The markets had a solid week, with the Dow, S&P and Nasdaq all ending solidly higher: 1.28%,  .98% and 1.19% respectively. Capping off the week was the March jobs report. We saw 216,000 jobs created last month, compared to the expected 180,000.  The unemployment number came down as well, to 8.8%. That figure has declined a full percent over the last four months. It would seem that employment is gaining some real traction. We expect this trend to continue.

A trend that we are not so cheerful about is inflation. We’ve seen manufacturers across industries saying that they need to increase prices to match rising input costs. The Fed’s infusion of umpteen billions of dollars through their various programs puts more upward pressure on prices. A lot of attention from the media is focused here now, and we think it is something that needs to be watched closely.

Next week, we’ll be looking towards the consumer when consumer confidence numbers are announced Friday.  The other, always-important piece of the consumer’s confidence, continuing jobless claim numbers, will bear consideration as well.

This week’s factoid:  The radiation exposure associated with living within 50 miles of a nuclear power plant for one year is .09 μSv, which is slightly less than the radiation exposure associated with eating one banana (.1 μSv).