Investment "Logic"

This will be my last portfolio summary posting for the year due to the holidays and my focus around organizing a year in review posting. I expect to be back to my normal schedule by January 8. This was quite the interesting week, that's for sure.  It bubbled and boiled for the first two days in anticipation of the announcement out of the Fed.  On Wednesday, we had our crescendo as stocks launched off of the actual announcement, and then things fizzled out and fell off the table on Thursday and Friday, only for the major indices to  end up lower on the week by 0.3%.  Fortunately, my portfolio fared a little better, ending the week up 1.6% thanks mostly to Honewell and Isis Pharmaceuticals.  Honeywell surged higher early in the week off of their investor conference call.  Honeywell's in-line guidance for 2016, while other companies, like 3M, are guiding lower.  The improved price from ISIS came from no new news, while they did announce the start of a phase 2 study for thei

It's been a disastrous week for this average Joe's portfolio.  As the market has taken quite a hit, with the S&P 500 down 3.8%, my portfolio has taken a 5% hit.  The biggest losers were Isis Pharmaceuticals, Citigroup, and Honeywell.  Before I get into those particular holdings, let's talk about the overall market.  The hit the market is taking is very much in line with the strong November employment numbers we got last Friday.  The numbers were so strong that since then, we've heard various Fed members making comments that we are as good as assured to see a rate hike - likely a quarter point - resulting from Wednesday's Fed meeting.  It's these realities, in combination with the downturn in the energy markets (primarily oil) that the market is reacting to.  A raising rate environment is a whole new investing environment than I've been working with for the last 5 years.  A rising rate has a number of impacts.  First, the US Dollar typically gets stro