Apr 21, 2025
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“The world in which we live is collapsing and may be nearing the breaking point,” – Pope Francis
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
Maybe US markets should have followed the US lead and stayed closed for Easter today. US futures are sharply lower to kick off the week as investors face the uncertainty of US economic, trade, and monetary policy. There’s always uncertainty, but investors have a lot to contend with right now as there has been little evidence of progress on trade deals with the 70+ countries eager to “make a deal”, heightened concerns over the Fed’s independence, and how these policies will impact the economy. And, oh yeah, we’re just getting into the peak of earnings season.
Outside of the equity market, long-term treasury yields are modestly higher, the dollar is lower, and gold is surging. Even Bitcoin is starting to show signs of life as dollar weakness becomes more ingrained into global markets.
It may have been a short week, but US stocks still found a way to fall last week, with the S&P 500 dropping 1.5%. While the index declined, five sectors finished the week higher, and only three – Technology, Consumer Discretionary, and Communication Services – underperformed the S&P 500. Overall, the eleven S&P 500 sectors had an average change of 0.00%, which was much better than the index itself.
Since 1990, it hasn’t been particularly common to see such a wide disparity between the weekly performance of the S&P 500 and the average performance of its sectors. Last week was just the 19th time that the S&P 500 fell more than 1%, and the average sector’s performance was either positive or less than a decline of 0.5%. In the chart below of the S&P 500, we have included a red dot to indicate each occurrence.
From 1990 through 1998, there was never a single weekly occurrence, but from 1999 through 2000, there were eight separate occurrences. Since then, the occurrences have been relatively spread out, the most recent being in March and April 2022. The fact that most of the prior occurrences came in 1999, 2000, and 2022 can be explained by the fact that those were other periods where there was a high level of concentration in the market, and more specifically in the Technology sector. When one sector has such a large weight in the overall index, it creates a backdrop where one sector can have a big impact on the index itself, even as other sectors hold up relatively well.
Apr 17, 2025
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“Had it not been for the recent uncertainty from global tariffs and their downstream impacts, we would have raised our expectations for 2025.” – Tim Arndt, CFO, Prologis
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’s still early in the Q1 earnings season, but one of the most significant quotes we have heard in an earnings conference call came from Prologis (PLD) CFO Tim Arndt where he noted that business fundamentals were improving to close out the first quarter to the point where the company was planning to raise expectations. Then the President appeared with the Reciprocal tariffs on April 2nd, and that moment changed everything. That ceremony forced corporate America to reassess everything as we enter one of the most uncertain operating environments in at least a generation.
In addition to a trickle of earnings news this morning, we got updates on Housing Starts and Building Permits for March at 8:30, along with jobless claims, and the April Philly Fed report. Housing Starts were a big miss, but Building Permits came in stronger than expected. Initial Jobless Claims came in 10K lower than expected, while Continuing Claims were higher. The Philly Fed report was a big miss and came in at -26.4, which, outside of one reading in April 2023, was the weakest since the Covid crash.
Ironically, the main company of focus this morning has nothing to do with tariffs. Shares of UnitedHealth (UNH) are trading down over 20% in the pre-market after the company reported a reverse triple play with weaker-than-expected EPS and revenues while also lowering guidance. After dropping as low as $438 in late February, the stock rallied up just above $600 as recently as last Thursday, but this morning has given it nearly all back as the stock sinks to $460.
What makes today’s plunge even more painful is that investors had been gravitating to the stock as they took on more defensive positioning since the market peak in February. Since the 2/19 peak in the S&P 500 through yesterday’s close, UNH had been the 12th best performing stock in the S&P 500 and the best performing stock in the Dow, and that included a 12.5% downside gap on 2/21! When the defensive stocks start to fall, where is an investor to turn?
With the stock on pace to open down 20.52% as of this writing, it would go down as UNH’s second-largest downside gap at the open since 1990. The only one that was larger was a 20.57% gap in August 1998 when the company took a $900 million charge. At this point, though, it wouldn’t take much more downside for today’s decline to unseat that decline. Besides the August 1998 occurrence, the only other time that UNH gapped down anywhere near 20% was in July 1996 (-19.13%). It’s also interesting to see that this morning’s extreme downside gap follows what was one of the stock’s most extreme upside gaps less than two weeks ago!
Apr 16, 2025
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“In seeking truth, you have to get both sides of a story.” – Walter Cronkite
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
Trade headlines are weighing on market sentiment this morning as semiconductor stocks are down about 4% in aggregate on the heels of a 6%+ decline in Nvicia (NVDA) due to US government restrictions on the sale of Hopper chips to China. While not having as large of an impact as they have in the past, it’s another indication that uncertainty surrounding trade isn’t going anywhere.
In economic news, Retail Sales were inline with expectations at the headline level but better than expected after stripping out Autos, and February’s readings were also revised higher. On a net basis, this was a strong report as the divergence between hard and soft data continues.
The S&P 500 bounced over 8% from its closing low last week and more than 11% from its intraday low. Despite the rebound, on Monday, the index experienced what technical analysts call a ‘death cross’ where its 50-day moving average (DMA) crossed below its 200-DMA as both have downward slopes.
This was the S&P 500’s first death cross in more than three years (March 2022) and the 25th in its history, dating back to 1928. It’s also the eighth such pattern in the post-financial crisis period, and as shown in the chart below, it followed a nearly 20-year period where there was only one occurrence.
Apr 15, 2025
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“The Titanic hit the iceberg not because they could not see it coming but because they could not change direction.” – Dean Devlin
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’s over. No, not the tariff tantrum, but the 2024 tax season. If you’ve somehow forgotten to get your taxes done (or file for an extension), you’ve got a few more hours left!
Bespoke’s Paul Hickey was invited on CNBC earlier this morning to discuss markets. You can view the clip here or by clicking on the image below.
While the S&P 500 is down 12% from its highs after making a series of lower lows, the index’s cumulative advance/decline line – which is simply a running sum of the daily number of advancers minus decliners – has held up very well. As shown below, even after the post-Liberation Day market crash, the cumulative A/D line remained above its December lows.
Apr 14, 2025
See what’s driving market performance around the world in today’s Morning Lineup. Bespoke’s Morning Lineup is the best way to start your trading day. Read it now by starting a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium. CLICK HERE to learn more and start your trial.
“Concentration is that ability to not think about anything.” – Pete Rose
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
If you were hoping that April’s volatility would calm down this week, you will have to wait at least another day. However, bulls will find today’s volatility to be much more tolerable since it’s to the upside. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq are indicated to open over 1% higher while treasury yields are lower, crude oil is higher, and gold is marginally lower. It’s a much more ‘normal’ picture this morning than many days we saw last week. Friday evening’s news that smartphones, semis, and other electronics would be exempt from reciprocal tariffs has tech stocks flying, and nowhere is the strength more notable than in Apple (AAPL), which is trading up over 5% in the premarket.
Talk about a roller coaster. After peaking just after Christmas, shares of AAPL lost more than a third of their value in less than four months and have since recovered more than 23% when you consider this morning’s gains. Volatility of this magnitude is notable when it occurs in just about any stock, but this is the largest company in the world we’re talking about. Are we really to believe that the company’s value has fluctuated by this magnitude in such a short period?
With today’s 5% rally in the pre-market, AAPL is on track for its second straight daily gain of over 4%. Since the iPod was launched in 2001, the only other time the stock had a higher number of consecutive 4%+ daily moves was in October 2008 when there were three in a row. The current streak of back-to-back gains, if it holds, would be the first such streak since coming out of the Financial Crisis, but before that, they were common as the market cap was much lower.
Apr 11, 2025
See what’s driving market performance around the world in today’s Morning Lineup. Bespoke’s Morning Lineup is the best way to start your trading day. Read it now by starting a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium. CLICK HERE to learn more and start your trial.
“Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.” – 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.
To see yesterday’s segment from CNN’s OutFront, click on the image below.
Looking at futures now, we may see a positive end to the week, but if you look in a few minutes, the picture could look entirely different. Banks have kicked off the earnings season positively with all of the major banks that have reported exceeding EPS forecasts. In response to the reports, most of the stocks are modestly higher, but with gains of less than 1%, the moves are hardly convincing.
The only economic reports on the calendar are PPI and Michigan Sentiment. Just like yesterday’s CPI, PPI cam in weaker than expected with both the headline and core readings showing negative readings on a m/m basis. Given the brushing off yesterday’s CPI, it doesn’t look like the market will pay much attention to that report. Regarding the UMIch report, we would expect to see another round of extremely divergent views based on political leanings, but an overall weaker trend.
If there are years where nothing happens, the last few weeks have been a period where years happened, and this weekend can’t come soon enough. As the President has torn up the playbook for global trade, financial markets have responded with some of the most violent moves in years. The most extreme aspects of the volatility started last Wednesday night, but this week has seen just as notable moves across the financial spectrum.
During periods of the most heightened volatility and uncertainty in markets, three areas where investors often flock are gold, the dollar, and US Treasuries. This week, only one of those safe havens caught a bid.
After pulling back to its 50-day moving average earlier this week, gold has bounced in the last three days. It’s still early, but if today’s gains hold, it will be gold’s third straight day of rallying more than 1.5% and the longest streak of gains in the magnitude or more since 2011/ During the last three days, gold is up over 8% and on pace for its largest three-day move since March 2020. Before that, you would have to go back to the financial crisis to find the last time it rallied as much in three days.
