Simple math suggests that tomorrow’s CPI report for May will likely continue to show high inflation. To compute CPI, the BLS measures gasoline prices during the first three weeks of the reference month. Thus, May CPI will capture gasoline prices from roughly May 1–21, when national averages were still running at recent peaks. The graph […]
New Fed Chairs are often tested early in their terms. For instance, two years after Bernanke took over the Fed, the Financial Crisis kicked into full gear. Janet Yellen was tasked with addressing stock market weakness as the Fed was navigating an exit from QE. Powell’s early test was a rate-hiking cycle that spooked markets […]
The headlines surrounding the SpaceX IPO seem mainly focused on how high the stock will go. There is a more important question stemming from the SpaceX IPO and other large deals that few seem to be asking: where will the money come from? SpaceX is targeting a $1.75-$2.00 trillion valuation and a capital raise of […]
“Never. No. We’re not sellers. We’re only acquiring and holding Bitcoin. That’s our strategy.” — Michael Saylor, Bloomberg, January 2022 Four and a half years later, Strategy’s founder Michael Saylor’s never-sell doctrine is dead. Between May 26 and May 31, Strategy sold 32 Bitcoin for roughly $2.5 million. The transaction is so small in dollar […]
At the start of the year, Wall Street voiced concern about Nvidia’s so-called Blackwell Cliff. The Blackwell Cliff is essentially an air pocket between demand for its current Blackwell chip generation and for its next platform, Vera Rubin. Specifically, the concern was that large hyperscalers would front-load Blackwell orders, leading to a pause in purchasing […]
Robinhood, the financial brokerage company, just introduced an AI credit card agent. The AI credit card agent can scan for the best prices, monitor availability, and make purchases automatically onto your credit card based on your instructions. Instead of spending hours researching and tracking prices and waiting for deals, your credit card agent will do the […]
One of the most underappreciated risks to the economic outlook is the historically low personal savings rate and its impact on personal consumption. At roughly 2.6%, the current savings rate is the lowest since 1960, excluding a few years before the 2008 financial crisis and a month or two during the pandemic. For context, the […]
We thought we were done with our recent stream on crude oil prices, consumer confidence, and their impact on bond yields, but the graph below and analysis from a client of ours is a great encore to the recent commentaries (LINK LINK). Our first commentary stated: “While we understand the fear, the reality is that […]
Yesterday’s Commentary led with a discussion of how bond yields have risen far more than bond market-implied inflation expectations. The fear of another inflation spike is negatively impacting bonds more than should be expected given implied inflation. While worrying about inflation, bond investors are not considering consumer confidence and how weaker economic activity due to […]