DHUnplugged Podcast

Does anyone care about the data? Does the Data Matta?

Port Strike ENDED - for now

Hurricane Milton - Strong Cat5 going to hit West Coast of Florida...

Employment Report Update

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Reminder: Intel CTP is open!

Warm-Up

- Does anyone care about the data?Does the Data Matta?

- Port Strike ENDED - for now

- Hurricane Milton - Strong Cat5 going to hit West Coast of Florida...

- Employment Report

Markets

-Headwinds, Wars, Higher Rates, Higher Fuel Costs - Who Cares?

- Hurricane Impact - Oil on the move

- Yields moving higher

- Robotaxi Day!

Want to Bet?

- A federal appeals court on Wednesday refused to block a lower-court ruling allowing Americans to bet on the outcome of the 2024 congressional elections.

- This will be BIG - and a difficult thing to handicap

- Plenty of ways to eventually get into the betting craze 0 from sportsbooks to investors with binary style investments.

- Thoughts?

Hurricane Milton

- Nasty Storm hitting the Gulf Area

- Generac stock flying - up 8% Monday and 50% YTD

- Stock is down from $500 to $170 (from peak in 2021)

- Crude oil rallying - combination of Hurricane Milton and Middle East conflict

-- Follow-Up: Crude Dropping as HurcMilt not going to disrupt Gulf Oil

All Over

- Strike OVER!

- Tentative deal and back to work....after first strike since 1977

- Under the tentative new agreement, workers will earn a 61.5% raise over six years. That means the highest paid workers would make $63 per hour in the final year of the contract — up from $39.

- NO AUTOMATION - The union argues that technological advances could threaten the existence and value of union jobs, a concern that has persisted to varying degrees since the Industrial Revolution first introduced machines into the manufacturing space.

Budget Deficit - No One Cares

- The federal budget deficit was $1.8 trillion in fiscal year 2024, the Congressional Budget Office estimates.

- The estimated deficit for 2024 was $139 billion more than the shortfall recorded during fiscal year 2023.

- Revenues increased by an estimated $479 billion (or 11 percent).

- Revenues in all major categories, but notably individual income taxes, were greater than they were in fiscal year 2023.

- Outlays rose by an estimated $617 billion (or 10 percent).

- The largest increase in outlays was for education ($308 billion).

- Net outlays for interest on the public debt rose by $240 billion to total $950 billion.

Pfizer

- Starboard Value has amassed a roughly $1 billion stake in drugmaker Pfizer, according to people familiar with the matter.

- Starboard believes that Pfizer’s current leadership under CEO Albert Bourla has stepped away from its historically disciplined cost structure and investment in novel drugs, said the people, who requested anonymity to discuss confidential information freely.

- The stock is trading about 30% lower than it did in 2019.

Seriously?

- Two Democratic lawmakers are demanding that some of the biggest food and beverage companies stop engaging in “shrinkflation” — the practice of reducing product sizes while charging prices that are the same or higher.

- In pointed letters, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Rep. Madeleine Dean of Pennsylvania accused General Mills, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo of engaging in a “pattern of profiteering” through shrinkflation and by “dodging taxes.”

Employment Report

- Nonfarm payrolls increase by 254,000 in September

- Unemployment rate falls to 4.1% from 4.2%

- Average hourly earnings rise 0.4%; up 4.0% year-on-year

- Average workweek slips to 34.2 hours from 34.3 hours

- Yields Rocking higher - above 4% now..

Bulls and Bears - (TDI Podcast running now is Bull and next week is Bear - will be interesting divergence)

End of the Month - End of The Quarter

Seasonality features the Bulls

Fed Limericks!

NEW CTP ANNOUNCED!

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Warm-Up

- Bulls and Bears - (TDI Podcast running now is Bull and next week is Bear - will be interesting divergence)

- Strike Update - could be an issue

- Another Strike - different kind - Israel and Iran

- VP Debate tonight

Markets

- End of the Month - End of The Quarter

- Seasonality features the Bulls

- Good quarter - setting up for more gains?

- Question - Capital Gains??

- Inflation (PCE) Update

--- Fed Limericks ....And another  AI generated CoverArt - what do you think?

ANNOUNCING CTP for INTC

Market Selling Off

- Iran sending in missiles to Israel started a general concern

- VIX popped over 20 for a minute

- Markets down 1%++, but found reasons to try to come back mid day

Inflation

- Inflation moved closer to the Federal Reserve's target in August, easing the way for future interest rate cuts, the Commerce Department reported Friday.

- The personal consumption expenditures price index, a measure the Fed focuses on to measure the cost of goods and services in the U.S. economy, rose 0.1% for the month, putting the 12-month inflation rate at 2.2%.

- Excluding food and energy, core PCE rose 0.1% in August and was up 2.7% from a year ago. Fed officials tend to focus more on core as better measure of long-run trends. The respective forecasts were for 0.2% and 2.7% on core.

Euro Cars - Not Good

--- Blaming China....

- Stellantis on Monday trimmed its 2024 annual guidance on the back of deteriorating "global industry dynamics" and bolstered competition from China

- The French-Italian conglomerate, known for brands such as Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Maserati, warned of lower-than-expected sales "across most regions" in the second half of the year.

- Stock down 8% on the news

- UK-based Aston Martin Global Holdings PLC has signaled that it expects lower profits for FY24 due to supply chain disruptions and a decline in sales in China. According to its trading update, the company now expects its adjusted EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization) to be slightly below FY23 levels.

- In addition, it no longer expects to achieve positive free cash flow in H2 2024. Following the update, AML shares crashed by around 24% as of writing.

- Stock down 43% YTD

- What about RACE, Ford and others?

China

- WOW - Best Rally n Monday since... 1998?

- Shenzen and Shanghai index up 8% on the back of:

---China's factory activity contracted for a fifth consecutive month in September as the world's second-largest economy struggles to revive its growth momentum.

- China's industrial profits plunged by 17.8% in August from a year ago, the National Bureau of Statistics said Friday.

------ That followed a 4.1% year-on-year increase in July, the fastest pace in five months.

-------Industrial profits covers factories, mines and utilities in China.

-- While the data was better than expected, anything that shows weakness in the economy will be met with expections that there will be more easing....

-- Note: FXI (Hang Seng, up 2% - Could be time for short on parabolic move??)

Hang Seng

Interesting Tape

- Headline at 11:30am Monday : Israel tells US that it is planning a imminent ground operation in Lebanon, according to Washington Post

- Oil is steady

- Markets turn positive

- VIX falls abit

- No fear of further escalation?

Asia

- Getting weird

- Japan's Nikkei falls over 4%,

Finally Fed makes a move (they will not be done jabbering though)

Storms heading to Florida and Gulf Coast - Natural gas prices jump

COVID Shot Stocks - "fun" while it lasted

Confidence is waning.....

CHINA!

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Warm-Up

- Finally Fed makes a move (they will not be done jabbering though)

- Storms heading to Florida and Gulf Coast - Natural gas prices jump

- COVID Stocks - "fun" while it lasted

- Confidence is waning.....

- CHINA! Bazooka Time!

Markets

- All-Time Highs - Same saying Goldilocks conditions

- Seasonality favors the bulls starting next quarter

- Uranium starting to move as people warming up to nuclear energy again

- Trump Stock on the move

Need to Pick a new CTP

Exile

- A leading economist in China has vanished following critical comments about President Xi Jinping‘s economic policies.

- What Happened: Zhu Hengpeng, deputy director at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), was detained after allegedly criticizing Xi in a private WeChat group. Zhu’s remarks reportedly included veiled criticisms of Xi’s leadership and comments on China’s struggling economy, reported The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday.

- The investigation into Zhu coincides with the Chinese Communist Party’s intensified efforts to suppress negative commentary about the country’s economic health. Under Xi, dissent has been increasingly punished, with critics facing imprisonment or exile.

- AH would be have cement shoes if this happened in the USA

On The Other Hand - CHINA PROP IT UP

- China said it will allow institutional investors to tap central bank financing for stock purchases and is weighing plans for a market stabilization fund, sparking the biggest rally since 2020 for the nation’s beaten-down equities.

- The People’s Bank of China will set up a swap facility allowing securities firms, funds and insurance companies to tap liquidity from the central bank to purchase equities

- The CSI 300 Index, a benchmark of onshore Chinese stocks, surged 4.3% to cap its best day since July 2020. In Hong Kong, a gauge of Chinese shares was up more than 5% intraday.

- MCHI up 8%, FXI up 8.5%, YINN (3X) up 25%

M&A FOLLOW UP

- Buyout firms Vista Equity Partners and Blackstone are in advanced talks to acquire Smartsheet, in a deal that could value the collaboration-software maker at close to $8 billion, people familiar with the matter said on Monday.

- NEWS: Collaboration software maker Smartsheet on Tuesday announced it would be acquired by Blackstone and Vista Equity Partners in an all-cash deal which valued the company at $8.4 billion.

THE FED

- Cuts rates by 0.50%

-- Seems to have been looking to appease markets

- Initial reaction was blah... Unwinding of positions put on right before the decision

- Next day stocks soared

- “The Committee has gained greater confidence that inflation is moving sustainably toward 2 percent, and judges that the risks to achieving its employment and inflation goals are roughly in balance,” the Federal Reserve statement said.

- Last time Fed cut rates was COVID days , time before that was Financial Crisis of 2008

- The federal funds rate is now a range between 4.75%-5%

Meanwhile

- Consumer confidence in September suffers largest decline since August 2021

- The key takeaway from the report is that consumers' views of the current labor market situation continued to soften and became more pessimistic about future labor market conditions -- a sentiment that could weigh on consumer spending activity.

---- The Present Situation Index dropped to 124.3 from an upwardly revised 134.6 (from 134.4) in August.

Best week in a long time - markets popping!

Cats and Dogs - all anyone can talk about these days - DogCat Bounce anyone?

More back to work directives ....

Apple disappointing again.

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Warm Up

- Best week in a long time - markets popping!

- Cats and Dogs - all anyone can talk about these days - DogCat Bounce anyone?

- More back to work directives ....

- Apple disappointing again

- All of a sudden - Now the Biden-Harris administration

Market Update

- BIG week of central bank rate decisions

- Rotation - still a big item keeping markets in check

- Rates LOW - bond traders overconfident?

- Oil comes back after miserable 2 weeks

- TrumpCoin?

Central Banks

- The Federal Reserve’s highly anticipated two-day meeting, which gets underway Tuesday, is poised to take center stage.

- Elsewhere, Brazil’s central bank is scheduled to hold its next policy meeting on Wednesday.

- The Bank of England, Norway’s Norges Bank and South Africa’s Reserve Bank will all follow on Thursday.

- Bank of Japan will provide its rate decision Friday

--- Markets getting a bit more volatile ahead of this Fed rate decision

BACK TO WORK!

- Amazon is instructing corporate staffers to spend five days a week in the office, CEO Andy Jassy wrote in a memo on Monday.

- The decision marks a significant shift from Amazon’s earlier return-to-work stance, which required corporate workers to be in the office at least three days a week. Now, the company is giving employees until Jan. 2 to start adhering to the new policy.

One Day Later

- Oracle provide some really nice earnings and guidance that the market loved... (Discussed last week)

- A day later:

--- Oracle now sees at least $66 billion in fiscal 2026 revenue, around $1.5 billion more than analysts had expected.

---- Capital spending also will increase.

------The company plans for over $104 billion in revenue in the 2029 fiscal year.

- Odd that  this was the next day

- Stock up 55% - 2nd best of tech companies just behind Nvdia

- Larry is now 2d richest person in the world behind Elon Musk

Economics

- August Retail Sales 0.1% vs -0.2% Briefing.com Consensus; prior revised to 1.1% from 1.0%

- August Retail Sales ex-auto 0.1% vs 0.2% Briefing.com Consensus; prior unrevised at 0.4%

- August Industrial Production 0.8% vs 0.1% Briefing.com Consensus; prior revised to -0.9% from -0.6%

- August Capacity Utilization 78.0% vs 77.9% Briefing.com Consensus; prior revised to 77.4% from 77.8%

--- Generally economy is speeding up again and looks like signs that manufacturing may be picking up

More Issues

- This is a bad apple

- The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), a top banking regulator in the United States, said on Thursday it has issued an enforcement action against Wells Fargo due to deficiencies in its risk management practices.

- There will be no penalties - but company is still in the penalty box due to past issues

China Apple

- Online retailers in China have slashed the prices of Apple’s new iPhone 16 series ahead of its official release, as consumers in the world’s largest smartphone market hold out for the release of the US company’s first on-device artificial intelligence (AI) software.

- They are blaming this on the delay of any significant AI features

Intel Gets $$$

- The Biden-Harris Administration announced today that Intel Corporation has been awarded up to $3 bln in direct funding under the CHIPS and Science Act for the Secure Enclave program. The program is designed to expand the trusted manufacturing of leading-edge semiconductors for the U.S. government.

August ends on the high side - (like July) and then gets knocked down hard (like August) and then Rips higher on Monday (like August)

Rate cut bets are in place

Market very skittish - September not the best month on average

VIX hits 25 last week

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Warm Up

- Another Rough Start to the month

- Apple Event - market was

- Last episode - ETF and Funds Education - lots of great comments on that!

- DEBATE TIME - right in the middle of our show! Someone needs to look at our schedule

Market Update

- August ends on the high side - (like July) and then gets knocked down hard (like August) and then Rips higher on Monday (like August)

- Rate cut bets are in place

- Market very skittish - September not the best month on average

- VIX hits 25 last week

- Yen Carry trade issue not fully resolved

- YIELD CURVE UPDATE

Big News

- Yield curve normalizes for 2/10's

- Yield curve is not normal - this is what happened  in 2001 and 2008

Apple Event

- Apple introduces Apple Watch Series X with a new design.

- Largest most advanced display ever with 30% more screen area.

- The display is larger than the Apple Watch Ultra.

- Display will be 40% brighter.

- Watch will be 10% thinner than Apple Watch 9.

- Background noise will be surprised on phone calls.

- Smart Stack will add widgets whenever you need them.

- Adding translate application.

-Apple Watch can track menstrual cycles.

- Apple Watch can alert users to sleep apnea.

- Starts at $399.

- A few incremental updates otherwise and talk of AI to come - one day someday

More Apple

- Europe's top court on Tuesday ruled against Apple in the tech giant's 10-year court battle over its tax affairs in Ireland.

- The Commission in 2016 ordered Dublin to recover up to 13 billion euros ($14.4 billion) in back taxes from Apple, at the time saying that the tech company had received "illegal" tax benefits from Ireland over the course of two decades.

- So is this final this time?

- How is this possible anyway - Ireland granted tax benefits for the purpose of benefiting jobs etc....

Apple Competition

- Huawei's tri-fold phone receives over 4 mln pre-orders ($2,800 per)

- Have you seen this?

- VERY COOL device

Palantir

-  Palantir Technologies hits best levels since early 2021 following inclusion in S&P 500

- +15% on the  news

Dell

- Dell also is added to the S&P 500

- Etsy and American Airlines out

Tech - Oracle Earnings

- Oracle beats on some metrics and has some great outlook

- Missed on EPS

- Partnering with Amazon

- The company said Oracle Database is thriving, and the multi-cloud agreements it has with Microsoft, Google, and now AWS make it easier for its customers to run their Oracle Databases in the cloud.

- Stock at ATH

NVDA

- WORST DAY EVER for a stock

- Slide last week took at $300 BILLION on market value in one day.

- New DOJ probe in anti-trust case

- The agency is asking questions about whether Nvidia makes it harder to switch to other suppliers of AI chips.

- Nvidia has over 80% of the market for data center AI chips, according to industry estimates.

Best Buy

- People are buying...

- Raising full year guidance

- Comparable sales declined 2.3% during the quarter, compared with a 6.2% decline a year earlier.

--- It is all about  the expectations...

Glasses - Again?

- Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon told CNBC the chip designer is working with Samsung and Google to explore a mixed-reality set of glasses linked to a smartphone

- Last year, Google, Samsung and Qualcomm struck a partnership to develop mixed-reality technology.

- This is supposed to be a smaller version of what is out the...

A show dedicated to the many questions of our listeners.

We focus on ETFs and Mutual Funds, contrasting and comparing the differences.

Financial Literacy is not just one month a year!

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Talking Financial Literacy

We are going to discuss details of what an ETF is and the differences from those investment vehicles and mutual funds.

ETFs are investment funds that trade on stock exchanges, holding a diversified portfolio.

ETFs offer instant diversification by allowing investors to buy a small slice of a variety of assets.

ETFs trade like stocks, with prices fluctuating throughout the trading day.

Popular for their diversification, lower costs, trading flexibility, and tax efficiency.

Types of ETFs include stock, bond, commodity, international, sector/thematic, and inverse/leveraged ETFs.

Downsides include market risk, tracking errors, liquidity issues, and the complexity of specialized ETFs.

Key differences with mutual funds include trading mechanisms, costs, management styles, and tax implications.

 

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Closest to The Pin for - United Healthcare (UNH)

Winners will be getting great stuff like the new DHUnplugged Shirts (Designed by Jimbo) -

PLUS a one-of-a-kind DHUnplugged CTP Winner's certificate..

 

FED AND CRYPTO LIMERICKS

JCD Score ()

See this week’s stock picks HERE

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Path Change - Once the air clears, how will markets react?

Cracking down on excessive "junk" fees

Cracking down on Unfree Speech?

Jackson Hole - big update about "The Path"

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Warm Up

-Cracking down on excessive "junk" fees

- Cracking down on Unfree Speech?

- Jackson Hole - big update about "The Path"

- Intel is nervous

Market Update

- Lower End Consumers Fueling Spend

- Big news this week - NVDA earnings

- Rotation ? Consumers are still spending (Discounters loving it!)

- Taxing Unrealized Gains?

Political rhetoric

- Taxing Unrealized gains - questions coming in

--- Realize this is for the ultra-rich and the potential to get this passed is not high

- BUT - Harris campaign wants to see about higher taxes - which are needed, but not a good thing

----- How else are we going to pay back this mountain of debt?

Jackson Hole

- Time to Change the Path of Rates

- Powell was clear and they are now pricing in a 100% probability of a 0.25% rate cut for September

- 0.50% will probably scare some people - so 0.25% is plan

- Odd ahead of election - but maybe Powell realizes he is behind the curve

Target

- Against the odds?

- Target beat Wall Street’s earnings and revenue expectations on Wednesday.

- Sales at the discounter grew as shoppers made more visits to Target’s stores and website and bought more discretionary items like clothing.

- Yet, the retailer struck a cautious note, saying it expects comparable sales for the full year to be in the lower range of its guidance.

- Target raised its profit guidance, however, saying it expects adjusted earnings per share to range from $9 to $9.70, up from the previous range of $8.60 and $9.60.

- Investors loved it! Stock moved from $135 - $169 on the news (back to $158)

---- Walmart near ATH and Ross Stores stock at ATH

SpaceX - Boeing

- So embarrassing for Boeing...

- Starliner is going to come back - Unmanned...

- Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, will return to Earth on a SpaceX vehicle early next year

Telegram

- Telegram messaging app CEO Durov arrested in France

- Pavel Durov, the Russian-born billionaire founder and owner of the Telegram messaging app, was arrested at Le Bourget airport outside Paris shortly after landing on a private jet late on Saturday and placed in custody.

- Free speech under fire? Or is this more than just a Twitter alternative.

- Supposedly 900M Daily Active users???

Junk Fees

- FTC trying to crack down on "junk fees"

- Last year, 15% of restaurant owners added surcharges or fees to checks because of higher costs, according to the National Restaurant Association

- Inflation fee, credit card fee, health-care fee, house fee

- Restaurants are fighting back as they want the fees to add to bottom line and increase profitability and benefit staff.

- Makes the entire idea of going out to eat an expensive proposition.

What is this?

- Microsoft said Friday it will hold a conference in September for cybersecurity firms to discuss ways the industry can evolve following a faulty CrowdStrike software update that caused millions of Windows computers to crash in July.

- Microsoft will meet with CrowdStrike and other security companies at its campus in Redmond, Washington, on Sept. 10 to discuss how to prevent similar issues in the future

--- Wasn't this already something that was not supposed to happen?

- The executive said participants at the Windows Endpoint Security Ecosystem Summit will explore the possibility of having applications rely more on a part of Windows called user mode instead of the more privileged kernel mode.

- Software from CrowdStrike Check Point,

Jackson Hole ECO Confab (this week)

Live Nation is in trouble

Icahn get a slap on the wrist

Gold - ripping - where to next?

PLUS we are now on Spotify and Amazon Music/Podcasts!

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Warm Up

- Jackson Hole ECO Confab (this week)

- Live Nation is in trouble

- Icahn get a slap on the wrist

- Gold - ripping - where to next?

- Price Controls - 3rd Rail?

Market Update

- Nearing all-time highs again - Buy the Dips!

- Yields under 4% on 10-Year - Yen still in control

- Back to Overbought again - still thinking not out of the woods

- Lowe's and Home Depot Outlook - POOR (But stocks are up)

Jackson Hole

- Aristocrats line up to speak

- Big doings as often a platform for Fed and other central bankers to make policy adjustments

- Powell scheduled to speak at 10am Friday

--- With all of the latest data and market push - what will he do??

- Before that - Wednesday we will see the July FOMC minutes

GOLDDDDDDDD

- Gold hit all-time high last Friday ($2,509.65) !!!!NOW $2,563!!!!!

- WHY? Discussion ranges from Fed Reserve, Election, Middle East, India Buying....

- Gold has been a better GOLD then Bitcoin - just saying...

Monopoly - Finally!

- Ten Additional States Join Justice Department’s Suit Against Live Nation-Ticketmaster for Monopolizing Markets Across the Live Concert Industry

- Today, the Attorneys General of Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, New Mexico, South Dakota, Utah and Vermont joined a civil antitrust lawsuit filed by the Justice Department, 29 other states and the District of Columbia against Live Nation-Ticketmaster for monopolization and other unlawful conduct in violation of Sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act.

- Stock does not seem to care - or believe anything adverse will happen

AMD buys ZT Systems

- $4.9 Billion

- What is ZT Systems? The company engages in full rack deployment -- a block filled with servers, storage, switches, etc. -- for hyperscale data centers. ZT also commands a data center infrastructure manufacturing business, for which AMD announced it would seek out a strategic partner to offload this part of the company.

- Clearly the company does not have a CHIP or infrastructure  ready for a major AI play at this time.

Carl Ichan - Hand Slap

- Carl Icahn and his publicly traded company Icahn Enterprises settled with the SEC over allegedly failing to disclose billions worth in stock-backed borrowing.

- Icahn and IELP will pay a combined $2 million in fines, without admitting or denying wrongdoing, over the failure to disclose as much as $5 billion in margin loans that were backed by Icahn’s stake in the company.

- Icahn, a well-known activist investor, had been facing pressure from another activist short seller in 2023. (Hindenburg which is still short the shares)

Circle K 11?

- Canada's Alimentation Couche-Tard (Circle K) has sounded out Japan's Seven & i (7-Eleven) about a potential takeover, the two companies said on Monday, making the 7-Eleven owner the largest-ever Japanese target of a foreign buyout.

- While the value of the offer has not been disclosed, the bid is the latest example of the growing interest in Japanese companies by Western investors, who have been drawn by the country's push for better governance.

- News of the deal sent shares of Seven & i surging by almost 23% in Tokyo

Chicken and the Egg

- Chicken prices are going up

- Perdue Foods is recalling more than 167,000 pounds of frozen chicken nuggets and tenders after some customers reported finding metal wire embedded in the products.

- According to Perdue and the U.S. Agriculture Department’s Food Safety and Inspection Service, the recall covers select lots of three product...

Cut taxes on SS and Tips?

President decides rates?

China - inflation ticking up

YEN volatility - NOT OVER

PLUS we are now on Spotify and Amazon Music/Podcasts!

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DONATIONS ?

Warm Up

- Cut taxes on SS and Tips?

- President decides rates?

- China - inflation ticking up

- YEN volatility - NOT OVER

- Announcing the WINNER for the UNH CTP

Market Update

- CRISIS AVERTED

- August doldrums - but big week of Eco Data

- Market Punishing earnings misses - more than usual

- Same old  = going back to the Mega-Cap trade while pulling other sectors down

- PPI out - changing direction

Crisis Averted

- Monday (last) Yen plunge then pick up - Come on

- Japan markets fell 12% then rallied 10%  - intervention anyone?

--- Clearly there is an invisible hand at work here

---- Plus Japan officials waled back their "hawkish" comments

---- 17 years of ZERO or NEGATIVE rates, markets don't want to give that up

--- Do you know why this is all happy pappy now? How did they resolve the 2 day crisis? (Hint - $$$$)

- Japanese markets have recovered ALL of the losses since last Monday - ALL

Volume/Vacations - August

- Volumes are down across the board. Aside from a couple of days when markets moved lower

- Will probably continue to see slow markets (unless some outside shock) through Labor Day

- However  - big week of ECO data

- - CPI, PPI, UMich, Import/Export prices, Retail Sales (no one has a clue what the trajectory is from here)

Month to Date

MTD

IWN

iShs Russell 2000 Value ETF

-7.87%

IWM

iShs Russell 2000 ETF

-7.10%

IWO

iShs Russell 2000 Grwth ETF

-6.15%

IWD

iShs Russell 1000 Val ETF

-2.45%

IWB

iShs Russell 1000 ETF

-1.68%

IWF

iShs Russell 1000 Gwth ETF

-1.00%

Really?

- Former President Donald Trump this week repeated his plan to eliminate taxes on Social Security benefits for seniors.

- The Republican nominee called for "no tax for seniors on Social Security" during a "Fox & Friends" interview Wednesday

- Of course Harris/Walz also want to cut taxes on SS now...

***** Some "experts" say that this will hurt the solvency of SS and Medicare even more - now expected to run out in 2035

--- Oh - let's eliminate taxes on TIPS

---- The Waiters & waitresses workforce and tipped in service industry are about 4 Million people (1% of population

Where do we stand on this..

- Presidents having a direct say - or vote - on Fed decisions?

Switcher-rooo

- Chipotle Mexican Grill announces that Brian Niccol, Chairman and CEO has accepted the role as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Starbucks (SBUX) and will be leaving the Company effective August 31, 2024

- -On the news, SBUX up 17% and CMG down 10%

China

- China's consumer prices rose by a more-than-expected 0.5% in July from a year ago, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics released Friday.

- Analysts polled by Reuters had expected a slight pickup in the consumer price index to 0.3% in July from a year ago, versus 0.2% in June.

- Is this good news or bad?

PPI

- July Core PPI 0.0% vs. 0.2% Briefing.com consensus; prior revised to 0.3% from 0.4%

-- Disinflation is speeding up - nearing DEFLATION concerns

- Tomorrow - CPI

Another one...

- Home Depot on Tuesday topped quarterly expectations, but cautioned that sales will be weaker than expected in the back half of the year as high interest rates and consumer uncertainty dampen demand.

- The home improvement retailer said it now expects full-year comparable sales to decline by 3% to 4% compared to the prior fiscal year. It had previously expected comparable sales, a metric that takes out the impact of store openings and closures and other one-time factors,

Japan stocks PLUNGE!

Tech stocks in correction - nearing bear market.

What does the crystal ball tell us? Where is the PPP?

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Warm Up

- OMG - Did you see that?

- Fear - blood in the streets

- Looking for someone to blame for the selloff

- Boeing news....Finally

Market Update

- RISK off - all risk assets (aside from bonds) down in August

- Bitcoin - CRUSHED - as with other cryptos - so much for safe-haven

- 13:1 Day Decliners to Advancers (that is pretty significant.

- Records broken - Worst day in 50 years for one stock

Where is the PPP?

- Now we are hearing about an emergency cut - looking for a 0.75% cut (Jeremy Seigel)

- Investors looking for a save - Plunge Protection Team!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

- Seems like Tuesday in Japan - PPP to the rescue - +10%

Bitcoin and ETH

- Seriously - takes it on the chin down 15% with global market sell-off

- What happened to it being a safe-haven - all but discounted at this point....

Japan's first increase in decades

- Actually, last increase was 2017 - so 17 YEARS OF LOW RATES

- The Widowmaker trade is finally working - but for how long?

- Japan's major stock market - YEN Up 11% since 7/11/2024 and  the Nikkei is down  23% (28% at low on Monday) since 7/11/2024

- Carry-Trade (borrow Yen at low rate and reinvest) BLOWING UP

- WORST day for Japan's markets since Black Monday in 1987

--- The loss of 4,451.28 points on the index was also the largest in terms of points in its entire history.

-=-=-=-= This is not the first time Japan's central bank has caused this type of situation. Their entire investing and monetary process is very dangerous.

-=-=-=-=- - Japan's Nikkei had the best day since 2008 on Tuesday

Repercussions

- Stocks around the world got hammered - worrying about YEN unwind as well as the earnings and outlook from Tech

- Kospi -8% down Monday

- World stocks off by 3%+

- UGLY moves and lots of trading opportunities

- $1 Trillion in market cap erased from Mega-Caps Monday (Mag7)

AND

- A sharp drop in U.S. stocks is provoking selling from volatility-sensitive funds, exacerbating a selloff

- Volatility control funds - systematic investment strategies that typically buy equities when markets are calm and sell when they grow turbulent  have gorged on stocks as indexes soared to record highs in 2024

- More recently, they have begun selling, as worries over the economy and tech earnings rattle investors: volatility control funds have dumped about $83.6 billion of U.S. equity futures over the last two weeks

VIX

- SPIKES to 65 on Monday morning.... (Then comes down to about 36 on the close)

- Historical spike like that  are  interesting signs that it may be end of route (or getting close)

- - 80's for Pandemic and peak of Financial Crisis

---- Unbelievable move in 3 days that seems that most people were unprepared for

Economic Issues

- Nonfarm payrolls grew by just 114,000 in July, below the downwardly revised 179,000 in June and the Dow Jones estimate for 185,000.

- The unemployment rate edged higher to 4.3%, its highest since October 2021, triggering an economic rule on recessions.

- Health care again led, adding 55,000 to payrolls. Other notable gainers included construction (25,000), government (17,000), and transportation and warehousing (14,000).

- Average hourly earnings increased 0.2% for the month and 3.6% from a year ago. Both figures were below respective forecasts for 0.3% and 3.7%.

Google loses Anti-Trust

- Google’s payments to make its search engine the default on smartphone web browsers violates US antitrust law, a federal judge ruled Monday,