Market Commentary for the week of December 19, 2016

The Markets

The tear Wall Street has been on since the presidential election was interrupted by falling stocks Friday after a Chinese Navy warship seized a U.S. underwater drone in the South China Sea on Thursday. Lower-than-expected revenue for Oracle Corporation, a multinational computer software company, dragged on the S&P and the tech sector. For the week, the Dow rose 0.45 percent to close at 19,843.41. The S&P fell 0.03 percent to finish at 2,258.07, and the NASDAQ lost 0.15 percent to end the week at 5,437.16.

Source: Morningstar.com. *Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Indexes are unmanaged and cannot be invested into directly. Three- and five-year returns are annualized. The Dow Jones Industrials, MSCI EAFE, Barclays US Agg Bond and S&P, excluding “1 Week” returns, are based on total return, which is a reflection of return to an investor by reinvesting dividends after the deduction of withholding tax. The NASDAQ is based on price return, which is the capital appreciation of the portfolio, excluding income generated by the assets in the portfolio in the form of interest and dividends. (TR) indicates total return. (PR) indicates price return. MSCI EAFE returns stated in U.S. dollars.

The Doctor Will Be in Shortly — Healthcare spending in the United States reached $3.2 trillion in 2015 (18 percent of the nation’s economy), equal to spending $9,990 per person. In 1995, 20 years earlier, per person healthcare spending in America was $3,788 (source: Health Affairs, BTN Research).

End of Life — Total Medicare spending in fiscal year 2016 was $595 billion. Of that total, 25 percent ($150 billion) was spent during beneficiaries' final 12 months of life (source: Medicare, BTN Research).

Employment Situation — U.S. employers added 178,000 new net jobs during November, bringing the YTD total to 1.982 million new net jobs, an average of 180,000 per month. Our country’s 145.1 million employees are split 85/15 between the private sector (i.e., non-government workers) and the public sector (i.e., government workers) (source: Department of Labor, BTN Research).

* The Standard & Poor’s 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is a price-weighted index of 30 actively traded blue-chip stocks. NASDAQ Composite Index is an unmanaged, market-weighted index of all over-the-counter common stocks traded on the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotation System. The Morgan Stanley Capital International Europe, Australia and Far East Index (MSCI EAFE Index) is a widely recognized benchmark of non-U.S. stock markets. It is an unmanaged index composed of a sample of companies representative of the market structure of 20 European and Pacific Basin countries and includes reinvestment of all dividends. Barclays Capital Aggregate Bond Index is an unmanaged index comprised of U.S. investment-grade, fixed-rate bond market securities, including government, government agency, corporate and mortgage-backed securities between one and 10 years. Written by Securities America, Copyright December 2016. All rights reserved. Securities offered through Securities America, Inc., Member FINRA/SIPC. SAI# 1666329.1