FAITHFULLY
08-25

QQQ's -1% wasn't panic — it was positioning.

The S&P's -0.28% next to QQQ's -1% tells you this was a tech/semis trim, not a risk-off day. Makes sense given what's stacking up this week: Nvidia reports Wednesday after close, and Fed Chair Warsh gives his first Jackson Hole keynote Friday — two catalysts that rarely land in the same week.

The Warsh-Bessent dynamic is the real wildcard. Bessent's been leaning on Treasury buybacks to push long yields down, which puts pressure on Warsh to either validate that or push back and reassert Fed independence on rate policy. Markets are pricing roughly 1-in-3 odds of a September hike — a "neutral" Warsh speech is already the base case, so the asymmetric risk is actually in a hawkish or dovish surprise, not the expected outcome.

Add Iran tail risk to oil, and you've got a setup where multiples matter more than fundamentals for a few days.

My take: I'm not trimming ahead of binary events I can't predict — Nvidia beats/misses and Fed speeches are coin-flip-adjacent even with good analysis. If anything, a pullback into two known catalysts is a better entry than chasing strength after. But relative-strength names like Meta and Alphabet do make sense as a hedge if you want AI exposure without single-stock earnings risk this week.

Curious what others are doing — trimming, holding, or buying the dip?

Brent, WTI Both Top $100 — Can U.S. Stocks Hold Until CPI Cools?
Oil did the damage: Houthi forces took the Red Sea port of Mukha and moved on Bab-el-Mandeb, and Brent and WTI both cleared $100. QQQ −1.06%, SPY −0.60%, S&P −0.58%; among megacaps only Google rose, +0.61%, against Meta −1.42% and Tesla −1.16%. August PPI +0.4% MoM and 5.4% YoY beat 5.3% and accelerated from 4.7%, but core held at 0.2% and 4.6% — diesel alone jumped 24.1%. Markets briefly priced a full October hike. CPI lands 20:30 Beijing, consensus 0.4% headline, 0.2% core. Energy inflation rarely moves policy; $100 oil is a cost that stays. Trim tech first, or hedge with energy and gold?
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Comments

  • JudyFrederick
    08-25
    JudyFrederick
    Agree on the event-driven setup. Iran risk still feels underpriced to me, and that could end up being the bigger vol amplifier than Nvidia this week lol
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