The Closer – Bottlenecks, S&P Additions, Ludicrous – 9/23/25
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Looking for deeper insight into markets? In tonight’s Closer sent to Bespoke Institutional clients, we kick off with a look at the energy bottlenecks for the AI trade (page 1 and 2) before pivoting over to the latest flash PMIs (page 3). We then dive into the latest earnings and Fedspeak (page 4) before closing out with a look into S&P 500 new addition performance (page 5) and an update of our Ludicrous List (page 6).
See today’s full post-market Closer and everything else Bespoke publishes by starting a 14-day trial to Bespoke Institutional today!
The Closer – AI Parallels, Fedspeak, Positioning – 9/22/25
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Looking for deeper insight into markets? In tonight’s Closer sent to Bespoke Institutional clients, we lead off with some commentary regarding the market’s current level of frothiness (page 1). We follow up with a review of the performance of stocks relative to crypto (page 2) before switching into some commentary surrounding a busy day of fedspeak (pages 3 and 4). We then finish with a dive into the latest positioning data (pages 5 and 6).
See today’s full post-market Closer and everything else Bespoke publishes by starting a 14-day trial to Bespoke Institutional today!
Investors Buying Apple (AAPL) as Consumers Buy the iPhone
In last Monday’s Chart of the Day we discussed the performance of Apple (AAPL) surrounding the release of their staple product: the iPhone. While the newest version of the phone, the iPhone 17, was announced officially in a reveal back on September 9th, it finally hit the shelves today.
As shown below, AAPL rallied 1.5% from the close of the day of the announcement through yesterday’s close. That is right in line with the median performance for that period for prior iPhone releases.
As for today where consumers are actually able to get the phones in their hands, AAPL is rallying an impressive 3% on the session. As shown below, median performance on those days has actually been negative on a median basis historically.
We will eventually learn how successful the launch was in terms of sales, but as for the stock price reaction on iPhone release dates, today is the second strongest response by AAPL behind the 3.32% gain in 2011 when the iPhone 4s launched.
ChatGPT and Netscape Keep Track
If history does not repeat itself, it can at least rhyme. One good example of this has been the performance of the Tech-heavy Nasdaq since the AI era began in earnest with the release of ChatGPT in November 2022. In our chart below that we first published in early 2024, we show the move in the Nasdaq Composite since ChatGPT’s release and compare that to the move in the index following the release of the first modern web browser, NetScape, in December 1994.
As the chart shows, the moves in the Nasdaq following the release of ChatGPT and Netscape have been eerily similar. Putting a number to it, the two lines have an astoundingly high correlation coefficient of 0.95. For a refresher from your 101 statistics class, a coefficient of 1 would indicate the two lines move identically; so for real world statistics, this is about as close as it gets!
In terms of absolute performance, the rally in the Nasdaq has been slightly weaker this go around than it was in the 1990s. Since the release of ChatGPT, the Nasdaq has risen 105%, which compares to a 132.5% gain for the index from December 19, 1994 up through the next 703 trading days (through 9/29/1997). The index doubling in a little more than a two and a half year span is impressive in its own right. With that said, if these two lines were to continue to track one another down the road, history would suggest that there is still plenty of steam left in the rally.
