Aug 21, 2025
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“Solving big problems is easier than solving little problems.” – Sergey Brin
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
Futures are set for another lower open this morning, just as the Fed kicks off its annual Jackson Hole symposium and tomorrow’s speech by Fed Chair Powell. Shares of Walmart (WMT) are down close to 4% after the company reported weaker-than-expected EPS. If the stock closes down today, it would mark the third consecutive negative reaction to earnings, the longest such streak since 2021. Outside of WMT, the earnings calendar is relatively quiet this morning, but it’s a busy day for economic data, with jobless claims (higher than expected) and the Philly Fed (weaker than expected) at 8:30, PMIs at 9:45, and then Leading Indicators and Existing Home Sales at 10:00 AM.
The weakness in US futures follows what has been a weak morning in Europe, where the STOXX 600 is down 0.3% while Asian stocks were mixed, with Japan falling 0.7% and China, India, and South Korea all finishing the session with modest gains.
A four-day losing streak for the S&P 500 hasn’t done much to improve what has already been subdued sentiment on the part of individual investors. In this week’s survey from AAII, bullish sentiment rose slightly to 30.8% from 29.9% but with the S&P 500 within 2% of 52-week highs, investors aren’t happy. As shown in the chart below, a similar divergence emerged between equities and bullish sentiment earlier in the year, right before the market started to unravel. Then again, from early in 2021 and throughout the year, sentiment steadily deteriorated while the market just marched higher.
It’s been a mixed picture in terms of sector performance over the last week. Technology (XLK) has been the biggest loser, declining 3.2%, moving it out of overbought territory. Besides tech, the only other sector down more than 1% is Communication Services (XLC), while Consumer Discretionary (XLY) and Materials (XLB) are down just shy of a percent. At the other end of the spectrum, it has been defensive sectors holding up the best, just as you would expect during a market pullback. Health Care (XLV), the only sector down YTD, is up 3.2% while Real Estate (XLRE) and Consumer Staples (XLP) are the only two other sectors that have gained more than half a percent.
Looking at the Tech sector, at one point in yesterday’s sell-off, it tested its 50-day moving average and short-term support that coincides with other low points since the start of the second half. If these levels don’t hold, the next area to look at would be the high from earlier in the year, right before markets started to roll over. Those levels are about 7% below yesterday’s close.
Health Care has been a completely different animal. After testing support near 52-week lows last week, the sector has now rallied back to the high end of its post-Liberation Day range. If it can break through those short-term resistance levels, the next areas to watch will be the 200-DMA, which is about 1% above yesterday’s close. After that, the downtrend line in place for a year now would be the next area to watch. If the sector can break through all these levels, we may finally be able to say that the sector is on the mend!
Aug 20, 2025
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“Only in America can you find so many angry people claiming to love their country, while hating almost anyone in it.” – Don King
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
Futures are modestly lower this morning after a weak day for momentum and megacap stocks yesterday. There’s only been a handful of earnings reports this morning, and the market reaction to them has been mixed. On the positive side, shares of Analog Devices (ADI), TJX, and Lowe’s (LOW) are all higher, while Estee Lauder (EL) and Target (TGT) are both down sharply. For both of these stocks, the negative reactions aren’t exactly a surprise, as they have been weak for some time now. EL is on pace now for its sixth straight negative reaction to earnings and the 11th out of the last 12. TGT hasn’t been quite as much of a disaster, but today will be the fourth straight quarter that the stock has reacted negatively to earnings.
Besides these earnings reports, there’s not much else on the calendar for today. Weekly mortgage applications fell 1.4% after a 10%+ increase last week. We’ll also get the FOMC Meeting Minutes at 2 PM, along with speeches from Waller at 11 AM and Bostic at 3 PM.
In Asia overnight, the session was mixed, with China up 1% and Japan down 1.5%, as trade data was weaker than expected. In Europe, major averages are little changed as the STOXX 600 is up fractionally, as CPI was in line with expectations (0.0% m/m).
Depending on how you look at it, yesterday could have been a good or bad day. Based on the S&P 500’s 0.59% decline, it looked like a bad day, but underneath the surface, 354 stocks in the index finished the session higher, and the equally-weighted S&P 500 finished the day up 0.45%.
Divergent days like yesterday, where the cap-weighted index declines at least 0.4% while the equal-weighted index rises at least 0.4% have been very uncommon. Since 1990, yesterday was only the 16th occurrence, and there have only been eight days where the opposite occurred (cap-weighted index up 0.4%+ and equal-weight index down at least 0.4%).
The scatter chart below compares the daily performance of the S&P 500 cap-weighted and equal-weighted indices for every day since 1990, but we have truncated the axes at gains or losses of 2% so it’s easier to see the details. Dots that fall in the upper left gray box were like yesterday, where the cap-weighted index fell 0.4%+ and the equal-weight index rallied at least 0.4% while dots in the lower right box are the opposite scenario. Here again, this chart shows just how uncommon these types of daily divergences have been over time.
Aug 19, 2025
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“A lot of people are scared to ask questions because they don’t want people to know how dumb they are. I’ve never had that problem.” – Ken Langone
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
Home Depot (HD) kicked off retailer earnings week this morning and reported weaker-than-expected EPS on slightly weaker-than-expected revenues. That’s the bad news. On a positive note, the company reaffirmed its guidance for the full year, and while most companies missing results this earnings season have been pummeled on their earnings reaction days, shares of HD are trading more than 1% higher in the pre-market. HD earnings have had little impact on futures, which are mixed on either side of the flatline. That follows what was a fractionally negative overnight session in Asia, and a fractionally positive session so far in Europe.
Here in the US this morning, besides the HD earnings report, there hasn’t been much in the way of stock-specific news. On the economic calendar, July Building Permits and Housing Starts will hit the tape at 8:30. Heading into those reports, bonds are trading slightly higher, crude oil is down 1%, gold and other precious metals are modestly high, while Bitcoin and Ether continue their recent weakness with declines of roughly 1%.
Yesterday was a tough day in the market – to stay awake. From the opening to closing bell, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY) traded in a range of 0.28% which was the narrowest intraday range since March 2024. To put yesterday’s range in perspective, the intraday range of the market on April 9th at the height of the tariff drama was more than 40 times larger.
Given that we’re in August, it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise that the market has been quiet. Since the launch of SPY back in 1993, August has seen the third-highest frequency of days when the ETF’s intraday range was narrower than 0.3%. The only two months with a higher frequency were October (17) and December (22). December makes sense given the holidays, but the fact that October has had the second-highest frequency of days with an intraday range of less than 0.3% was surprising. Digging a little deeper, we found that more than half of them (9) occurred in October 2017. That could have been the most docile month of trading in SPY’s history!
On the flip side, just for fun, we also looked at which months most frequently have seen 5% intraday ranges in SPY. Unsurprisingly, October has been the clear leader with 25, followed by March with 16. Here again, the high frequency of occurrences in March is primarily due to 2020, when there were 12, and the only four other occurrences were in 2009, around the lows of the Financial Crisis.
Aug 18, 2025
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“If you’re afraid – don’t do it, – if you’re doing it – don’t be afraid!” – Genghis Khan
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
Given some of the stronger inflation data, in hindsight, last week could have been worse. Looking at futures this morning and the performance of international markets overnight and this morning, it appears as though investors thought the same over the weekend. Futures are lower, but the losses are admittedly modest, so maybe it’s just the bulls taking a breather. This week will be a busy week for earnings from retailers, which should shed some light on how tariffs are impacting results, but for today, things are pretty quiet as the only report on the calendar is Homebuilder Sentiment at 10 AM, and the only earnings report of note is Palo Alto Networks (PANW) after the close.
The end of August is a popular time for vacations, and the Fed is no exception as the Kansas City Fed hangs up its ‘gone fishing’ sign and holds its annual meeting every year at the Jackson Lake Lodge in Grand Teton National Park. Fed officials are only human, so like the rest of us, they’ll never turn down the opportunity for a ‘work’ conference that happens to be at one of the most beautiful and scenic places in the world. The conference is so ‘intense’ that the chair of the Federal Reserve himself (or herself) even makes the trip to give a speech every year.
With Fed officials from around the world attending the conference every year, members of the media who follow the Fed also attend the conference each year. With all these policymakers, cameras, and microphones in one place, the result is that many newsworthy events have ended up taking place. In 2010, Fed Chair Ben Bernanke laid the groundwork for quantitative easing, which became a staple of Fed policy in the ensuing years. Then in 2014, ECB chief Mario Draghi acknowledged that inflation expectations in Europe were dangerously below the central bank’s 2% target, setting the stage for more fiscal and monetary stimulus.
More recently, back in 2022, when inflation was still raging, markets were hoping that Powell would use the conference as an opportunity to take a kinder and gentler approach to markets reeling from an aggressive run of rate hikes. Shortly after he stepped up to the podium, however, he dashed any of those hopes. He started his speech with, “Today, my remarks will be shorter, my focus narrower, and my message more direct.” Then he finished with the promise that “We are taking forceful and rapid steps to moderate demand so that it comes into better alignment with supply, and to keep inflation expectations anchored. We will keep at it until we are confident the job is done.” In other words, the beatings will continue!
With Powell scheduled to speak at the end of the week, and facing intense pressure from the President to cut rates (who knows maybe President Trump will hire one of those planes you often see at the beach towing a message behind it to further criticize Powell), anticipation to Friday’s speech is already high, and investors are expecting volatility, but how volatile does the market really get around the Jackson Hole speech?
The chart below shows the S&P 500’s performance in the week of the Jackson Hole conference every year since the end of the Financial Crisis in 2009. More often than not, it’s been a positive week. Of the 16 years shown, the S&P 500 has only been down five times, with only two years where the drop was more than 1% (2019 and 2022). Overall, the S&P 500’s median performance has been a gain of 0.8%.
Aug 15, 2025
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“The greatest danger occurs at the moment of victory” – Napoleon Bonaparte
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
It may be a summer Friday, but there’s plenty of economic data to deal with this morning as Retail Sales and Import Prices were released at 8:30. At 9:15, we’ll get updates on Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization, and then at 10, Business Inventories and preliminary Michigan Sentiment will hit the tape. Heading into all the data, futures were mixed. Dow futures are sharply higher, but that’s all due to an 11% rally in UnitedHealth (UNH) following news that Berkshire Hathaway (BRK/b) has acquired a $5 bln stake in the company. Based on its current price, UNH is on pace to have its fifth-largest upside opening gap in the last 25 years.
It’s worth noting, though, that with the stock trading at $303 in the pre-market, it’s still trading more than 20% below its average closing price in Q2. We have no way of knowing Buffett’s cost basis on the position, but the odds are that Buffett is still underwater or barely positive on the position.
In Asia overnight, the Nikkei reversed Thursday’s losses following a better-than-expected GDP report and finished the day at another record with gains of over 1.5%. Chinese stocks were also higher, but economic data for the world’s second-largest economy missed forecasts as Retail Sales and Industrial output both came in weaker than expected.
European equities are higher across the board with modest gains as the STOXX 600 is up 0.20, led by France and Italy.
Looking through the various sectors and where they stand relative to their short-term trading ranges, we noted an interesting collection of sectors trading at overbought levels. Topping the list were Communication Services and Consumer Discretionary, which closed yesterday at ‘extreme’ overbought levels (2+ standard deviations above 50-DMA). Behind these two sectors, Technology, Utilities, and Financials all finished the day yesterday at overbought levels (1+ standard deviation above 50-DMA). It’s perfectly normal to see most of these sectors trading at overbought levels at a time when the market is in rally mode. The one exception is Utilities. Given its more defensive characteristics, Utilities tend to lag when the market is hitting all-time highs.
Utilities has been doing anything but lagging the broader market these days. As noted in last night’s Sector Snapshots report, the sector closed at overbought levels for the 27th day in a row yesterday.
At 27 days, the current streak of overbought closes for the Utilities sector is the longest since last October. As the chart below illustrates, though, this current streak is hardly extreme. The streak last October ended at 51 trading days, and there have been many other longer streaks in recent years.
Aug 14, 2025
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“Don’t dream it, be it” – Dr Frank-N-Furter, Rocky Horror Picture Show
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
Heading into this morning’s PPI and jobless claims reports, equity futures were all up less than 0.05% while the 10-year yield was unchanged. The July PPI report came in much higher than expected, though, and equity futures have moved lower, but not necessarily by as much as you would expect given the magnitude of the miss. While we’ll have to look further into the report for details, jobless claims remained subdued and came in lower than expected. It’s also worth pointing out that interest rates have barely budged higher.
Quick question. Which group has done better over the last month? Megacaps or housing stocks? Most people would instinctively say the megacaps, but as the numbers show, the housing-related stocks have really surged over the last four weeks. The chart below compares the performance of the eight trillion-dollar megacap tech-like stocks to a group of eight housing-related stocks over the last month. For the housing basket, we’ve chosen a few homebuilders (Pulte, DR Horton, and Lennar), a couple of home improvement stocks (Home Depot and Lowe’s), housing retailers (RH and Williams Sonoma), and a mortgage company (Rocket Companies).
Of the eight megacap stocks, their performance over the last month has ranged between a decline of 0.5% and a gain of 11.1% for a median gain of 9.4%. Under any environment, 9.4% is impressive, but it pales in comparison to what the housing-related stocks have done. All eight of the stocks shown are up at least 10%, and their median gain has been nearly twice the gain of the megacaps (18.5%). HD is also the only stock in the group that isn’t outperforming all eight of the megacaps.
