Market Briefing For Tuesday June 18

'Distortions' in the market - which for months I'd described as 'bifurcation', of course persist (albeit slightly improved breadth), even as Nasdaq joins S&P with more record high closes. 

 

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I realize Goldman and Evercore increased targets for year-end both for S&P and Nasdaq. I don't dispute possibilities of that but caution the higher targets at this point are 'seasonally' valid. We too have talked of June / July strength after recent high level consolidation tries.

What we have is mega-caps out on a ledge (hoping for a lifeline) as a majority of the 'list' are stagnant or after declining, as we've pointed out with respect to looking at 'equal weight' (or Advance/Declines) S&P or Nasdaq (internals) actually declining. To adjust strategies for significant upgrades for the Indexes they need breadth to improve.. significantly. Perhaps so many now see what I have called 'concentration' in AI or similar, that contrary opinion sticks with the upside, allowing periodic consolidations of course.

(I gathered a couple charts updated into the weekend, and now we're higher, but they illustrated the point...of course money managers need to lasso more than 12 of the S&P 500 soon to have this truly broaden...interestingly maybe you'll get limited movement of the Index but individual stocks attract buyers...a desire scenario but could 'flip the game' for Index-only players, who benefit of course from the concentration...again cap-weighted vs. equal-weighted.)

 

 

Before returning to the current market (note: remains bifurcated), let's pause just a moment to remember what lies in the background and how it relates in a way more now, than it did years ago when everyone worried about the 'debt' excess, which by comparison to 'now', was nickel & dime stuff. But it works if global financialization system persists, and falters if it does not. How so?

Systemic offsets...or buffers...have allowed the monetary structure to build...at minimum...what can be called excessive 'debt' really persisting on a global basis. There is little room to adjust policy 'yet' and when that easing comes, it could be offset by something more treacherous...oddly runaway inflation or a diametric opposite, deflation because of collapse, not moderated controls.

My concern is 'both political parties' are advocating higher tariffs on China, as China became the world's workplace (primarily for lower-end goods, but that evolved too over the years... even the debate about their new EV's offering a good bit more 'per dollar' than others has sparked massive tarriff talk.. just an example).. with of course the Semiconductors at the center of the discussion.

 

 

I don't particularly expect any of the mega-caps to break now, just illustrating.

 

 

Market X-ray: 

Not an imminent problem, but soon enough, will be... the debt issue as I touched on recently. Let me summarize that: risk is being repriced globally, as tariffs do make costs rise. Result: trade and capital dependencies increasingly risk undercutting fiscal, monetary and even social stability.

Keep this in one's mind as one presumes a disconnect between Indexes and the real world, with an economy staggering (also bifurcated) amid record high Index prices and nearly yearly lows (sorry) in the majority of stocks...

For now, there are some 'known unknowns', and one of those comes Tuesday morning. The CBO (Congressional Budget Office) will remind everyone of the incredible record debt plus sobering costs to service that debt. Retail sales come Wednesday (market closed), then we get light re-balancing shuffles (as may already be a slight factor in some of this current Index-led action).

 

 

Bottom-line: risk persists amidst high-level S&P complacency as records fall, targets are increased, but participation is reluctantly improving or very spotty.

 

 

This week has a Wednesday holiday, traders rushed to recover the very early Tuesday minor dip, as I suspected they would in my morning 'tweet' (post on 'X'). This is all constructive, provided it doesn't turn destructive, as momentum helps just a bit at this point.


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