Archive

Mad Hedge AI Market Timing Index Hits Seven-month Low at Six,

and the Volatility Index Hit a six-month high at $28, in “STRONG BUY” territory. Many technical services have the market bottoming today or next week, which, because of Thanksgiving, only has 3 ½ trading days. We will likely hit bottom when Bitcoin hits the April low at $77,500 and bounces hard. Bitcoin hit $82,000 last night.

Some 119,000 Jobs were Gained in September,

but the Unemployment Rate rose 0.1% to 4.4%, a 2025 high. That dashed the hope for a Fed interest rate cut in December and prompted a 1,100-point plunge in the Dow Average. Uncertainty is running rampant, increasing market volatility.

Find Out More

Existing Home Sales Rise 1.2% in October.

Sales of previously owned homes in October rose to 4.1 million units on a seasonally adjusted, annualized basis, according to the National Association of Realtors. Sales were up 1.7% year over year. The inventory of homes for sale fell to 1.52 million units, down 0.7% from September, although still nearly 11% higher than a year earlier. At the current sales pace, there is a 4.4-month supply, still considered lean.

Find Out More

California Pizza Kitchen Goes Private.

It has been acquired by an investor group led by Consortium Brand Partners and including Todd Boehly's investment firm Eldridge Industries, for under $300 million. The investment represents an opening foray into the restaurant category for Consortium Brand Partners, which owns activewear brand Outdoor Voices, home decor company Jonathan Adler, and lifestyle brand Draper James, which was founded by actress Reese Witherspoon.

Find Out More

S&P Global US Services Flash PMI Comes in Warm at 54.8,

a four-month high. Manufacturing came in slightly weak. Business activity growth accelerated for a second successive month in November, according to early ‘flash’ PMI data, accompanied by the largest rise in new business seen so far this year. Confidence in the year ahead outlook also improved markedly, notably reflecting reduced worries over the political environment and hopes for increased policy support to business.

Find Out More

Nvidia Beats, Forecast Raised,

but only managed a 3% gain in the stock. Its Big Three customers are still buying with both hands. “Blackwell sales are off the charts, and cloud GPUs are sold out,” CEO Jensen Huang said in a statement. “The AI ecosystem is scaling fast — with more new foundation model makers, more AI startups, across more industries, and in more countries. AI is going everywhere, doing everything, all at once.” Ales in the data-center segment, which accounts for a majority of Nvidia's revenue, grew to $51.2 billion in the quarter ended October 26. Analysts had expected sales of $48.62 billion, according to LSEG data. Still, analysts and investors widely expected the underlying demand for AI chips, which has powered Nvidia's results since ChatGPT's launch in late 2022, to remain strong. Huang said last month the company has $500 billion in bookings for its advanced chips through 2026.

Find Out More

Bureau of Labor Statistics Cancels October Jobs Report,

instead incorporating those payroll figures into the November report set to be published after the Federal Reserve’s final meeting of the year. The leaderless BLS couldn’t collect October household data, which informs key statistics like the unemployment rate, as a result of the record-long government shutdown. The agency, the figures couldn’t be gathered retroactively. The November employment report will be published on Dec. 16, more than a week later than originally scheduled.

Find Out More

Chile’s (SQM) Expects 25% Lithium Demand Increase in 2026.

Even with EV growth flat, demand for the metal is rising sharply. Buy (SQM) and (ALB) on dips, the largest US lithium producer.

Find Out More

The Civil War at the Fed.

Federal Reserve officials were at odds during their October meeting over cutting interest rates, divided over whether a stalling labor market or stubborn inflation was a bigger economic threat, minutes released Wednesday showed. While the Federal Open Market Committee approved a cut at the meeting, the path forward looks less certain. Disagreements stretched into the outlook for December, with officials expressing skepticism about the need for an additional reduction that markets had been widely anticipating, with "many" saying that no more cuts are needed at least in 2025.

Find Out More

Porsche Releases an All-Electric Cayenne SUV.

The 2026 Cayenne EV is capable of a massive 1,139 horsepower, more than anything Tesla has ever produced, 0-60 mph in 2.4 seconds, and up to 1,106 foot-pounds of torque, according to Porsche. A top-end “Turbo Electric” model starts at $163,000 — making it among the highest-priced Porsches on sale. A standard model with less performance starts at $109,000. My last Tesla, a tricked-out Model X P100D, cost $162,500.

Find Out More

Nvidia Earning Out After the Close Today,

and the market will be flatlining until then. Note that the shares are unchanged since the last quarterly earnings three months ago. Analysts largely expect that the company — the largest in the broad-market index — will meaningfully beat Wall Street's expectations and forecast strong sales growth driven by demand for its AI chips and other infrastructure.  I’m staying away as most tech stocks have sold off 10% on good earnings announcements.

Find Out More

Meta Wins FTC Antitrust Trial,

causing a nice pop in the stock. In a memorandum opinion released Tuesday, Judge James Boasberg of the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., said the FTC failed to prove its argument. The case, initially filed by the FTC five years ago, centered on Meta’s acquisition of WhatsApp and Instagram.

Find Out More

Netflix Up Sharply on Warners Brothers Discovery Bid.

Warner Bros. Discovery has set a Nov. 20 deadline for first-round bids. The board is expected to meet before Thanksgiving to evaluate the offers and aims to have the process wrapped up by year-end. It looks like a 17% annual growth rate isn’t enough for (NFLX) founder and CEO Reed Hastings. Now he wants to take advantage of Paramount’s forced sale of Warner Bros to buy market share. Warner Bros., with its deep film and TV library, extensive production capabilities, and HBO Max, is an opportunity they would be remiss not to investigate. But (NFLX) on dips.

Find Out More

$1.2 Trillion Lost in Crypto in Six Weeks,

after Bitcoin bounced off $90,000 last night. The risk-sensitive cryptocurrency has lost all this year's gains and is now around 26% below a peak of $126,000 in October. It was last up nearly 1.9% at $93,532, after slipping as low as $89,286.75. Market participants said a combination of doubts around future U.S. interest rate cuts and the risk-averse mood in broader markets, which have wobbled after a long rally, was dragging down crypto. Avoid all crypto.

Find Out More

Trump Invasion Threats Prompt Massive Rally in Venezuela Debt Default Bonds,

betting that the ouster of socialist leader Nicolas Maduro will pave the way for an investor-friendly government that quickly cuts a deal to pay back a chunk of the debt. A change in leadership would, in theory, help to unlock Venezuela's oil wealth, setting the country on a more stable footing while setting the table for negotiations over debt restructuring. There’s always a trade somewhere. Who said Trump wouldn’t be good for the market?

Find Out More

Bitcoin Craters Below $90,000 and is Now Down 4% on the Year.

Liquidity, which crypto feeds on, is drying up. Watch Bitcoin even if you don’t play in the crypto space. It’s a great risk indicator, and right now it is shouting “RISK OFF”. Avoid (BTC) and (MSTR), it’s too late to short.

Find Out More

Major Cloudflare Outage Takes Out Big part of the Internet.

The outage had taken down the websites for everything from the chief US energy regulator, ChatGPT, the New Jersey transit authority, and the social-media platform X. ChatGPT and X were among the services that were back online by 10 a.m. New York time. A Cloudflare spokesperson said the company observed a “spike in unusual traffic” to one of its services around 6:20 a.m. ET, causing some traffic passing through its network to experience errors. The issue was fixed within six hours, according to the company. Avoid (NET).

Find Out More

Strategy Buys More Bitcoin,

taking its holdings up to 640,418 bitcoin, worth around $70 billion. Strategy Inc. sold €775 million ($898 million) preferred shares at 80 cents on the euro earlier this month. Now, with Bitcoin prices in freefall, the few traders offering prices on the stock are willing to sell at about 78 cents and buy a couple of cents lower, according to two people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be named as the prices were shared privately. Strategy has been doubling down despite the recent crypto rout. The firm bought $835.6 million in Bitcoin in the seven days ended Sunday, the largest purchase by the firm since July. The company appeared to finance the majority of the purchases with the proceeds of the euro preferred offering.

Find Out More

Jobless Claims Hit Two-Month High.

Continued claims for jobless benefits - those receiving benefits beyond an initial week of relief - rose to 1.957 million in the week ended October 18, updated figures posted to a Labor Department website showed on Tuesday. That was up 10,000 from the prior week and was the highest since early August. It was up notably from the 1.916 million level in the week ended September 13, the last week of data to have been reported prior to the start of the shutdown on October 1.

Find Out More

Homebuilder Sentiment Comes in Flat.

U.S. homebuilder sentiment remained subdued in November as concerns about the labor market and household finances weighed on demand, contributing to a surge in the share of builders slashing prices to reduce new housing inventory. The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index edged up one point to 38 this month. It remained below the 50 breakeven point for the 19th straight month. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast the index unchanged at 37.

Find Out More

Berkshire Hathaway Takes Major Stake in Amazon.

The value of that stake was $904 million by the closing bell on Wednesday. Despite the sizable headline figure, the position doesn’t put Berkshire near the top of Amazon’s biggest shareholder list. The stake represents about 0.1% of Amazon’s outstanding equity. The size of the position, however, had not previously been reported to the public. If it's good enough for Warren, it's good enough for me. Buy (AMZN) on dips.

Find Out More

China iPhone Sales Jump 22%.

Sales of iPhones in China rose 22% from year-earlier levels in the first month after the iPhone 17 series launched, even as the broader market softened, a private survey showed on Friday. The new lineup drove most of Apple’s smartphone sales in China in the period from the September 19 launch, with the 17 series accounting for nearly four-fifths of units sold to consumers, according to the data from research firm Counterpoint. Buy (AAPL) on dips.

Find Out More

Construction Spending is Up 0.2%,

the best reading of the year. I’ll take whatever data points I can get, no matter how obscure. The Commerce Department's Census Bureau said on Monday that construction spending increased 0.2% after an upwardly revised 0.2% gain in July. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast construction spending would ease 0.1% after a previously reported 0.1% dip in July.

Find Out More

Margin Calls on Bitcoin are Forcing Selling of Tech Stocks,

which explains the massive 25% down moves matching Bitcoin's own 25% swan dive. Avoid crypto, as it hasn’t found a bottom yet. It has most affected top brokerages like Robinhood (HOOD), Coinbase (COIN), and Interactive Brokers (IBKR). Robinhood has soared nearly 225% in 2025, while Interactive Brokers is up about 50%, which means they could have more room to fall.

Find Out More

Nvidia Earnings are Out Wednesday After the Close.

Markets may flatline until then. The chip giant is the most important bellwether for the AI trade, with any miss or beat on projections set to impact price action on a wide array of AI stocks. For Q3, analysts are anticipating adjusted earnings per share (EPS) of $1.26 on revenue of $55.2 billion, according to Bloomberg consensus data. That would represent increases of 55% and 57% increase versus the $0.81 EPS and $35.1 billion the company reported in the same period last year.

Find Out More