On October 29, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said, “[W]hat do you do if you’re driving in the fog? You slow down.” He was referring to the lack of economic data due to the government shutdown. The Fed and the

The S&P 500 peaked at a record high of 6890.59 on October 28 (chart). It is down 2.4% since then. It retested its 50-day moving average on Friday, falling slightly below it around noon. It then closed the day

Bond prices rallied and stock prices fell this morning on news that layoffs rose sharply, according to the Challenger Report, which was titled “JOB CUTS SURPASS 1 MILLION; HIGHEST OCTOBER TOTAL SINCE 2003. COMPANIES CITE COST-CUTTING, AI IN OCTOBER.” That

On Tuesday, investors sold AI-related stocks on news that Michael Burry had shorted Palantir and Nvidia. Today, investors realized that his most prominent short position by far is in Palantir, which currently has a forward P/E of 212.9. Nvidia

Hedge fund manager Michael Burry was portrayed in the film The Big Short. He bet big against the housing market before the 2008 crash and made a fortune. Now, he is taking another “big short” position against Nvidia and Palantir,

The Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth in Q3-2025 is 4.0% (saar) today, up from 3.9% on October 27 (chart). After this morning’s Manufacturing ISM Report on Business from the Institute for Supply Management, the nowcast of Q3

A big week of economic releases is coming up, but the government won’t be reporting them because it is closed for business. Nevertheless, the week ahead will still be a big one for private-sector economic data. On balance, they

S&P 500 earnings per share continue to beat expectations. Q3 earnings per share are on track to rise to a new record high. They are driving the S&P 500 stock price index to new record highs. The Magnificent-7 are

In his press conference today, Fed Chair Jerome Powell told financial market participants that today’s 25bps cut in the federal funds rate (FFR) might not be followed by another one on December 10, when the FOMC votes on monetary

Shares ofNokia soared by 23% today after the telecom equipment provider announced a billion-dollar partnership with artificial intelligence (AI) giant Nvidia. As part of the deal, Nvidia plans to invest $1 billion in Nokia in exchange for a 2.9% stake in the

Today was just another day in the stock market. The S&P 500 rose to another record high of 6875.16. Also closing at record highs were the Nasdaq, the DJIA, and the Russell 2000. Been there, done it! More record highs are

The week ahead will see central banks commanding the spotlight as the Federal Reserve, European Central Bank, Bank of Japan, and Bank of England weigh in on both interest rates and the balance of economic risks.  All eyes will be on

The major stock market indexes rocketed to new record highs on Friday. We are raising the odds of a meltup from 25% to 30%, reducing the odds of our bullish base-case scenario from 55% to 50%, while leaving the

The government shutdown continues to shut off the supply of many economic indicators. Tomorrow’s CPI inflation rate for September is an exception. It is widely expected to remain stuck at 3.0% on a y/y basis. Based on a few

A few weeks ago, we observed a bubble in fears of a bubble. The fearmongers see an “everything bubble” that will soon burst. The expression “the bubble in everything” began gaining traction during the tenure of Federal Reserve Chair

China’s economy is struggling with excessive debt, deflation, excess capacity, and a rapidly aging population. China continues to rely on exports to support economic growth. China has been increasingly accused of dumping its excess production in world markets. This

Apple’s stock price hit a new record high today on a report that sales of this year’s iPhone models had started strongly. Shares of the tech giant climbed 3.9%, closing at $262.24 and helping the company surpass Microsoft to

We’re entering yet another week of limited visibility on the economy thanks to the government shutdown. This leaves markets attempting to fill the statistical void with private surveys, comments from Federal Reserve officials, and the odd corporate report to

We’ve been monitoring the relationship between the S&P 500’s ytd performance versus its comparable average of the past 10 years (chart). This year, the index has been much more volatile than the average and has outperformed the average by about five percentage points since

“When you see one cockroach, there are probably more,” JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon said on the company’s earnings conference call earlier this week in relation to the First Brands and Tricolor Holdings fallout. These are two auto-related companies that have recently declared bankruptcy.

We first began writing about our Roaring 2020s scenario in 2020. So far, so good. Both the S&P 500 and the price of gold have been roaring ahead to new record highs this year (chart). We wouldn’t be surprised

Go Global has outperformed Stay Home so far this year. Based on FTSE data, the US stock market index (up 11.8% ytd) has underperformed the World index (13.4%) so far this year in local currency (chart). Its underperformance has

As the latest episode of the “Trump versus Xi” series airs this week, it’s perhaps fitting that the shuttered US government won’t be releasing most key data for September. What happened last month, after all, may matter little if the two biggest economies

Trump Trade Turmoil hit the stock market hard on Friday as President Donald Trump raised the US tariff on Chinese imports from 30% to 130% in retaliation for China’s imposing severe export controls on its exports of rare earth

Today, Oracle disclosed that its AI cloud business—particularly server rentals using Nvidia chips—is yielding very slim profit margins. That news weighed on the stock market, especially on technology stocks. Oracle’s stock price fell 2.5%. The Magnificent-7 declined 1.1%. Financial

Semiconductor stocks have certainly benefited from the AI boom. All those data centers being built will be filled with chips (chart). All those autonomous-driving vehicles will also be stuffed with chips, and so will humanoid robots. And they will

From time to time, we will review and update some of our good market calls. We hope this provides a helpful perspective on our approach to market forecasting. Today, let’s review and update our thoughts on the outlook for gold: (1) We first

This is a quiet week for key economic data releases, but it is even quieter due to the ongoing government shutdown. For financial markets, this informational void is equivalent to flying blind. That also applies to Fed officials who

We are raising our year-end S&P 500 target back to 7000. We started the year there, but lowered it earlier this year in response to Trump’s Tariff Turmoil. We began raising our forecast again during the spring, when we

The stock market is discounting the ongoing resilience of the economy and corporate earnings. It is discounting that the odds of a recession over the rest of the Roaring 2020s are low. The longer the economy is expected to