Today’s big news is the jobs report. It is the single most informative and important economic report there is. As such, it always gets a great deal of attention. In general, the news this month is quite good—but not perfect.

January was another great month for the markets. All three U.S. indices were up by at least 5 percent, as were international markets. There was a bit of a pullback at the end of the month, as interest rates moved up to levels we haven’t seen in years. Indeed, fixed income took a bit of a hit on these higher rates.

There is a market adage that states, “as goes January, so goes the year.” We certainly should hope this is the case for 2018, as January was another month of great stock market returns. The U.S. indices were up by 5 percent or more, while international markets—both developed and emerging—did the same. The news was not all good, of course, as markets pulled back at month's end. Given the strong gains up to that point, however, it looks likely to be just profit taking, rather than a harbinger of something worse.

Over the past two days, we have had the first sell-off in quite a while. With the Dow falling more than 500 points, is it time to stock up on canned goods and supplies? I don’t think so.

With President Trump scheduled to give the annual State of the Union address tonight, I thought it would be a good time to consider the economic state of the union. As usual, of course, I am going to pass on the politics and instead take a big-picture look at the economy. 

The government reopened quickly after a brief shutdown, so last week’s economic data was released after all. It included big-picture news from across the economy, with the signals remaining positive overall despite some weakening in several areas.

One of the dominating economic headlines of late has been the weakness of the dollar. These stories have been exacerbated by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s comment that the “dollar is not a concern of mine.” Reading through the news, there is certainly a great deal of concern over whether a weak dollar is a sign of trouble ahead and whether the decline could get even worse. So, should we as investors or as citizens be worried? In a word, no.

When investors look at their final statements at year-end, there is bound to be lots of discussion about how their portfolios performed. And, as has become usual in the past couple of years, there will be questions about and comparisons between the U.S. stock indices and that performance. In other words, how can the Dow or the S&P be up by that much and I am “only” up by X?

With the news that President Trump has imposed tariffs on solar panels and washing machines (an interesting combination), the prospect of a trade war has moved to the front of the risk parade. What do these tariffs mean for your investments and the economy? Should we be worried? Despite the headlines, the answer is “not yet.”

With the market surging and expectations high, I want to look at the actual corporate earnings numbers for 2017. Of course, it is early in the season to do any definitive analysis. But we can certainly set some context, which will be particularly useful for this year.