weekly market update

this market is b-a-n-a-n-a-s

This is a weekly market update (I post daily to TikTok). I publish these once a week (beta phase), as well as single stock pieces (1-3x a month) and macro deep-dives. I also publish on TikTok, Youtube, and Twitter!

YouTube here

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Probably the best representation of investing I’ve seen:

LEX @investwithLEX

Despite what it may seem, most investors make prudent, long-term financial decisions and are not engaged in YOLO high risk bets on options trades, crypto or the meme stock du jour. You don't need to be a genius to win, just stick to your plan, don't take risks and compound away.

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The Market

• The power of alternative grocers - people going to natural/gourmet super markets more - I think that this has a lot to do with the bifurcation of income as well. But very interesting to see how people’s spending habits on the day-to-day shift over time. A telling sign of 1) economic growth 2) higher incomes or 3) people wanting to flaunt fake-wealth - one of the three!

  Andrea Hernández 👁️⃤ @iiiitsandrea

  Alternative Grocers are 📈 as conventional ones are shrinking note gourmet (specialty) 👀🛒

  

• Marriott and PINS: 79% of people are using $PINS when actively considering their travel decisions”. Marriott is using a huge ad campaign (incorporating Pinterest) to try and get people out and about. Pinterest has a lot of cool stuff in the works - definitely watch this space!

• Shiller PE is at all time highs - I try to not use the PE because how can you considering the below - but it is concerning to watch it tick up higher and higher

  Stalingrad & Poorski @Stalingrad_Poor

  Shiller PE 38.36!!!

  

• Dole is going public - some might say that things are truly getting ~bananas~ out there.

• The sad state of a maybe - I think a lot about the future in the iteration of the metaverse, but there is a lot to say about the most inelastic companies out there that will stick because they are *bad* and we as humans have bad tendencies

  ∞ CO฿IE @CryptoCobain

  @jebus911 invest in companies that profit from war, invest in payday lending, invest in pharmaceutical monopolies, invest in gambling institutions, invest in scratch cards, invest in tobacco companies, invest in pornography producers, invest in private addiction clinics

• TikTok launched resumes… TikTok is NOT A SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORM. THEY ARE AN AI APP. Reggie had a great point here - ByteDance’s goal is to eliminate search - They want to know what you are looking for before you do.

  🌀 @HipCityReg

  Again... ByteDance’s goal is to eliminate search In every vertical https://t.co/55lahjSAiv

  

  Josh 🇳🇬🇺🇸 @JoshuaOgundu

  We're excited to launch "TikTok Resumes" as a pilot program designed to continue expanding and enhancing TikTok as a new channel for recruitment and job discovery. https://t.co/cA9O7iFn1X

• ETF Wars: DFA filing for ETFs with fees all < 20 bps, which means that the ETF wars are about to get heated. Active management might truly be a thing of the past.

• Online vs Instore - E-commerce still has huge opportunities for growth.

• Healthcare for a $: Dollar General is hiring a chief medical officer!!! YIKES!

• Robinhood: "30% of retail investors in the US place orders using a mobile app, according to 2018 FINRA surveys. That number grows to 59% when looking solely at participants aged 18-34." Don’t underestimate the power of mobile, especially with the next generation.

• More about Costco!!

  Science of Hitting @TSOH_Investing

  Five interesting things I learned while researching Costco (COST) 1 / Costco’s private label brand, Kirkland Signature, generated $52 billion in sales in 2020 (+7% YoY). To put that in perspective, Best Buy’s total FY21 sales, from 1,100+ stores worldwide, were $47 billion.

Economy

• Goodbye, Fed: The Fed is selling bond ETF portfolio on Monday - everyone already knows what’s going to go down, and everyone knows that they will come back if needed.

• Treasury option skew have moved a lot this week - premium of puts over calls in 10-year futures has vanished!

• Bonds continue to tick up - 10Y yields fell below 1.3%, which is just bonkers. Anyone short bonds is probably in a world of pain right now. No one really knows what is happening. It might be technicals. It might be positioning. It might be fundamentals. But a lot people are worried about ~growth~.

• Labor force participation rate continues to languish - this is what the Fed is going to pay the most attention to, so it’s concerning that it doesn’t appear to be recovering quite as quickly as anticipated.

  💸 Mαrkets ∞ Mαyhem 💸 @Mayhem4Markets

  Despite a seemingly strong NFP number today, the labor force participation rate continues to languish. It's important to watch this metric, alongside PCE, as they are both major components for how the Fed weighs its monetary policy decisions, and most pivotal of them is tapering.

  

• Container rates still at all time highs - demand too high relative to the pace of delivery. However, the Fed is still insisting that everything is temporary (but has admitted that inflation is pretty high)

  Ben Breitholtz @benbreitholtz

  Container rates get no reprieve! Still shooting higher entering July even while previously impaired ports (like Yantian) get back to working order. Demand just too great relative to the pace of delivery. (1/2)

  

• The TGA balance will be important to pay attention to - they are not ~meeting their goals~ which will mean 1) higher RRP use due to a cut in bill issuance or 2) an intensification in the debt ceiling debate

• FOMC who?? The market didnt really pay much attention to the FOMC minutes, but the main take away is that the taper will probs end by the end of 2022, rate hikes might come sooner than expected, and there was another increase in counterparty limits :) rrp who!!

Crypto

• Bullish: A crypto exchange with basically a prototype is going public - Bullish is going with Tom Farley, former president of NYSE. There is a lot of excitement to validate crypto, and this is just one way to do it! I am excited, but a bit worried about Bullish.

• Circle is going public. This is huge for the validation of crypto in the eyes of the regulators, and especially good for USDC.

  Jeremy Allaire @jerallaire

  6/6 With scale and success comes greater expectations and the need for greater transparency. We also recognise that this is a journey, and that self-governance and regulatory models in this space will also evolve. We intend to be a leader throughout this.

• Lots of venture money going into the space: “Excluding Block.one’s $9.7 billion injections into Bullish Global — there was roughly $6.2 billion in private investment, or approximately a 90% increase in venture funding Q/Q.”

  • “This quarter alone had more funding than all of 2018 combined” !!! what is going onnnnn

  • Financial services get the most $$ - so if you want to go into crypto, might make sense to check one of these out!

    twan @dantwany

    5/ Companies within the Crypto Financial Services vertical continue to be the most well funded. The vertical received approximately $1.6 billion and out of the 27 deals that raised $50 million or more during Q2, more than a quarter of the deals were firms in this vertical.

    

• Coinbase falling out of favor in the app store. Bullish for crypto (seriously. Coinbase is an inverse signal imo).

  Steven @Dogetoshi

  Coinbase went from rank 1 in App Store to nearly rank 300 in 2 months.

  

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The Week Ahead

• Lots of banks reporting this week!!

Stock Market News @StockMKTNewz

Earnings season is back next week!! What earnings will you be watching?

Lots of economic data too

Disclaimer: This is not financial advice or recommendation for any investment. The Content is for informational purposes only, you should not construe any such information or other material as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.