Written by Gary
Stocks dump, dollar jumps as self-sustaining recovery narrative collapses (SPY -0.7%). NIH director says new Israeli Covid data is building a case for booster shots in the U.S.
The Market in Perspective
Here are the headlines moving the markets. | |
The Afghanistan Crisis Could Destabilize The RegionGovernments across Central Asia appear as stunned as the rest of the international community in the face of the rapid disintegration of order in neighboring Afghanistan. Some leaders have held snap consultations with security officials and defense allies. Others are choosing to remain mute in the face of rapidly unfolding events. The potential for spillover looks limited for the time being, but multiple episodes of flight by defeated Afghan soldiers may be a troubling omen. A representative of the Afghan Embassy in Dushanbe told Eurasianet that | |
India’s Fuel Demand Remains Firm As Asia Grapples With CovidIndias fuel consumption recovery was a rare bright data point in the first half of August, while China, Japan, and Southeast Asia are struggling to contain a COVID resurgence with lockdowns and emergency measures that threaten to reduce immediate refined product demand. Indias gasoline sales rose by 3.7 percent in the first two weeks of August compared to the same period of the pre-pandemic 2019, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday, citing preliminary data from the three largest fuel retailers in the country. Sales of dieselthe most | |
Bearish Sentiment Begins To Take Hold In Oil MarketsIt has been a quiet start to the week for oil markets, but bearish sentiment is undeniably building as the Delta variant threatens to damage global demand. Chart of the Week-Oil and gas majors have withstood the immediate ramifications of a sternly-worded IPCC report warning of the dire consequences of climate change quite well.- Energy companies remain the second-most lucrative investment in the S&P 500 pool, having gained 30% over the course of this year, Bloomberg reports.- At the same time, the era of energy stocks soaring above | |
U.S. Refiner Citgo Books First Quarterly Profit In Two YearsRefiner Citgo Petroleum, the U.S. subsidiary of Venezuelas state-held oil firm PDVSA, reported this week a net income for the second quarter, its first quarterly profit since the third quarter of 2019. Citgo Petroleum, which is the eighth-largest refiner in the U.S. in terms of crude processing capacities, had been suffering even before the pandemic when it lost access to Venezuelan oil with the U.S. sanctions on Nicolas Maduros regime. Citgo Petroleum, headquartered in Houston, also faces possible seizure of assets from creditors | |
Big Oils Carbon Capture Push Is All Talk And No SubstanceBig Oil has cleaved into two factions. On the Eastern side of the Atlantic, supermajor oil companies in Europe have majorly divested from oil and gas. Reading the writing on the wall, Big Oil in the European Union has made a concerted effort to place itself at the forefront of the green energy transition, pivoting to rebrand itself as Big Energy. Across the pond in the United States, Big Oil has taken an entirely different approach. Instead of accepting the inevitable and imperative move away from fossil fuels, U.S. supermajors have doubled down | |
Brazil Woos Oil Majors With Low-Carbon Crude ProjectsBrazil is hoping to attract oil majors to new deepwater projects that would employ low-carbon extraction technology, Reuters has reported, citing country officials. According to unnamed sources, Exxon, TotalEnergies, BP, and Chevron were among the targets for potential talks about the development of the new fields, to be auctioned this December. Projects that produce less CO2 will be the last ones to go offline, the head of exploration and production at Petrobras, Fernando Borges, told Reuters at the Offshore Technology Conference | |
Stocks making the biggest moves midday: Home Depot, 23andMe, Tencent Music and moreThese are the stocks posting the largest moves in midday trading. | |
Satellite company Spire begins trading on the NYSE after completing SPAC mergerSmall satellite builder and data specialist Spire Global began trading on Tuesday, the latest space company to close a SPAC merger and go public. | |
NIH director says new Israeli Covid data is building case for booster shots in the U.S.Israel data shows a reduction in the effectiveness of Pfizer’s Covid vaccine against severe illness among people 65 and older who were fully vaccinated. | |
Home Depot says it sold out of an early drop of Halloween decor almost immediatelyHome Depot said it quickly sold out of an early release of Halloween products, serving as an indication that consumers are eager to decorate their homes. | |
Britain launches plan to ramp up ‘low carbon’ hydrogen capacityWhile there is excitement about potential use cases for low carbon hydrogen, hurdles remain. | |
Retail sales drop worse-than-expected 1.1% in July as rising Covid fears hit consumersRetail sales were expected to decrease 0.3% in July, according to economists surveyed by Dow Jones. | |
Airlines split on whether to mandate Covid vaccines for employeesSeveral airlines are mandating Covid vaccines for employees while others have maintained a policy of encouraging, not requiring them. | |
Americans are spending $765 more a month than they did in 2020, survey findsBetween dining out and travel, Americans are spending an average of $765 more a month compared with last year, according to a report. | |
With retail earnings in focus, Oppenheimer analyst names favorite play in the spaceWhile the retail earnings calendar is loaded, Oppenheimer’s Ari Wald looked to a retailer that isn’t reporting this week as his favorite play in the space. | |
Walmart earnings top estimates, fueled by strong grocery sales and back-to-school spendingThe discounter also sharpened its forecast for the year, saying it expects Walmart U.S. same-store sales to increase by 5% to 6%, excluding fuel. | |
Los Angeles Lakers trade Gatorade for BioSteel to fill team’s bench sponsorshipBioSteel will have exposure on the Lakers bench and in-arena signage at Staples Center. Beverage deals with top NBA teams can range up to $5 million per year. | |
Home Depot shares tumble despite earnings beat, retailer rang up fewer customers as DIY trends weakenHome Depot’s same-store sales came in slightly short of Wall Street estimates, as fewer people visited its shops to buy items for do-it-yourself projects. | |
Stocks Dump, Dollar Jumps As Self-Sustaining Recovery Narrative CollapsesStocks Dump, Dollar Jumps As Self-Sustaining Recovery Narrative Collapses Ugly retail sales, industrial production strong, homebuilder sentiment slammed, and the Kiwis locking down over one (yes one) COVID case… All added up to ‘growth scare’ time as US macro data is declining/disappointing at the fastest rate since March 2020… Source: Bloomberg It seems that without the government constantly puking cash into Americans’ pockets (for doing nothing) that this ‘blistering recovery’ is just an illusion. As Goldman’s Chris Hussey noted, putting it all together, the combination of lower-than-expected retail sales and auto production in July, and given an increasingly likely drag on services consumption from the Delta variant, our economists will likely revise our second-half growth assumptions. After y … | |
Pershing Square’s SPAC Sued Days After Report Revealing Some Retail Investors Lost “Millions”Pershing Square’s SPAC Sued Days After Report Revealing Some Retail Investors Lost “Millions” It was no sooner we mentioned how spectacularly the blowup of Pershing Square’s Tontine Holdings SPAC was for some retail investors, than the entity is being sued. The lawsuit seeks to prove that Pershing Square’s SPAC was an investment company and not a SPAC, according to Bloomberg Tuesday morning. As we noted days ago, this is the exact reason the SPAC got pushback from the SEC when it announced its intention to make an investment in Universal Music, leaving cash left over to acquire, invest and/or merge with other companies. The suit was filed by shareholder George Assad, according to the report. If it is found to be meritorious, it could have implications for how SPACs are viewed in the future since Assad is trying to make the case that PSTH was an investment company. In response to the suit, Bill Ackman told Bloomberg on Tuesday:  œPSTH has never held investment securities that would require it to be registered under the Act, and does not intend to do so in the future. We believe this litigation is totally without merit. | |
Goldman On Tesla: Some NHTSA Investigations Can Take “Months Or Years”Goldman On Tesla: Some NHTSA Investigations Can Take “Months Or Years” Adding to Tesla’s woes on Tuesday, a day where the stock was slammed alongside a broader market selloff, was Goldman Sachs. The investment bank came out and commented on yesterday’s news that the NHTSA had opened a broad-reaching investigation into Tesla’s Autopilot feature. In its note, Goldman appeared anything but optimistic that the probe into Autopilot would be resolved quickly. œGiven the current probe is related to a Level 2 driver-assist system, one solution could be for an enhanced driver monitoring system to ensure driver compliance with Tesla’s terms of use, the investment bank wrote Tuesday morning. The bank also said that although past NHTSA investigations had varied in length, that this some have taken as long as multiple months or years to complete. Recall, yesterday we reported that regulators in the United States had finally come to their senses and opened the long-overdue investigation. The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said the investigation includes Tesla’s Model X, S and 3 for model years 2014-2021. The broad range of models and model years means that this could be the large-scale investigation that skeptics have been requesting for years, we noted. The NHTSA said the investigation would assess technologies, methods “used to monitor, assist, and enforce the driver’s engagement” during autopilot operation, according to Bloomberg. | |
6 Positive Market Months In A Row… What Happens Next?6 Positive Market Months In A Row… What Happens Next? Authored by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com, In this past weekend’s newsletter, I discussed the rarity of 6-positive market months in a row. To wit:
As stated, I only went back 10-years in the chart above. Such generated several email questions asking about the number of historical occurrences over the long term. 6- … | |
Afghan bank governor flees saying country left in chaosAfghanistan’s central banker Ajmal Ahmady says he tried to maintain calm before fleeing crowds and gunshots. | |
UK job vacancies at record high as wages pick upJob vacancies hit 953,000 amid signs the country’s labour market is rebounding “robustly”. | |
Nando’s shuts restaurants as it runs short of suppliesThe chain says it will lend some of its own staff to its suppliers, to help tackle delays to deliveries. | |
Beyond Bitcoins: Investors make big bets in altcoinsEdul Patel, CEO & co-founder, Mudrex, said the rally in altcoins has reduced the dominance of Bitcoin, whose market cap was now at 45 per cent of the total crypto market cap. | |
Robust Q1 earnings could brighten growth picture, says Axis Bank chief economistSaugata Bhattacharya, chief economist at Axis Bank, and a veteran when it comes to analysing the vicissitudes of economic cycles, believes that the proverbial glass is half full rather than half empty when it comes to India’s GDP growth. | |
How a mechanism for formal trading of unlisted securities can be a gamechangerNASDAQ’s Private Markets, founded in 2014, provides a way for private companies to trade shares ahead of a stock market listing. It offers a trading platform for high quality private issuers who want to remain private. | |
: Big tech conferences are coming back, but smaller ones see a different pathTech companies with typically the biggest conferences in the fall and in early 2022 are pressing forward with hybrid shows — a digital component running in tandem with in-person programs — despite a jump in COVID cases and hospitalizations, while smaller events are being scaled back to virtual-only get-togethers. | |
Commodities Corner: Gasoline prices may have reached their peak for the yearThe bad news is you’re probably paying the highest gasoline prices you’ll see this year. The good news is demand for the fuel is set to drop more than it usually does in September, taking prices down with it, according to the Oil Price Information Service. | |
Bond Report: Treasury yields end mixed as Fed’s Powell says it’s not clear what rise of COVID cases means for the economyTreasury yields end somewhat mixed Tuesday after data showed a bigger-than expected decline in U.S. retail sales and rise in industrial production for July. |
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