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☆ Morning Bid: Apple comforts as payrolls loom
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

Apple upped its dividend and authorized another $90 billion share repurchase program, same as a year ago. Apple's stock has outperformed most of Wall Street in 2023, up 28% year-to-date. After a torrid 2022, that narrow index is up 35% so far this year - far outstripping the Nasdaq 100's (.NDX) 18% gain and accounting for the bulk of the more modest 6% rise in the S&P500 <.S&P500>. And after three hefty daily retreats in a row for the S&P500 this week, futures are up 0.4% ahead of Friday's open. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias.

☆ An Ohio homeowner surrounded by 598 houses getting demolished said the teardowns have increased property values and improved his neighborhood
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Alcynna Lloyd | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

There are thousands of homes left vacant from abandonment or foreclosure in Ohio. Tony Kelly said the demolitions improved his area, from luring residents to lifting home values. At the end of 2019, Attom found, Ohio was among the states with the highest number of vacant homes, with 3.8 million. Mike DeWine said in a 2021 statement announcing the Ohio Building Demolition and Site Revitalization Program. "The demolitions helped to raise property values in the city, making the town more attractive to purchase and build houses," he said.

So far this year, super PACs have spent more than $12 million, about three times as much as four years earlier, according to public disclosures. The outlays suggest an aggressive cycle ahead for spending by super PACs, who helped drive about $1 billion in independent spending in the 2020 presidential contest. TRANSFERS QUESTIONEDRegistered as a super PAC, MAGA Inc is allowed to raise and spend unlimited sums supporting candidates as long as it doesn't coordinate spending with their campaigns. Steven Cheung, a Trump campaign spokesman, dismissed the Campaign Legal Center's arguments, calling the organization "a Democrat group." Campaign finance law specialists say they fear DeSantis could emulate Trump by transferring some of those funds into a federally registered super PAC to support his expected presidential campaign.

☆ Morning Bid: Hike and hold, bank angst and Apple
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

As the Fed delivered what markets assume will be the last rate hike of a brutal 13-month, 500-basis-point tightening cycle, further aftershocks from the March bank blowups reverberated in the background. And given they had advance knowledge of next week's quarterly loan survey before Wednesday's rate decision, it suggests the bigger picture they see remains somewhat equivocal. Norway's central bank raised interest rates as expected and signalled more to come. Events to watch for on Thursday:* European Central Bank policy decision, statement and news conference* U.S. first quarter unit labor costs and productivity, April layoffs, March trade balance, weekly jobless claims. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias.

☆ Contrarian investor Mike Dever shared with us 2 vital lessons he learned from his highly profitable association with legendary trader Paul Tudor Jones
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Marley Jay | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Starting in the 1980s, he crossed paths with leading investors, including Paul Tudor Jones. Dever says Jones delivered huge returns for Dever's clients, and explains what he learned from Jones. He also invested for several years in the 1980s with Paul Tudor Jones, now a billionaire hedge fund manager. While Dever remembers being very impressed by the returns Jones delivered, he also recalls what he learned from the approach that went into them. Shortly after Dever invested with Jones, Jones had a bad run in the bond market.

Unlike much of the past 15 years, euro strength is on the ECB's side as it meets on Thursday. Indeed, ECB President Christine Lagarde and chief economist Philip Lane littered speeches with warning shots about an excessive euro strength when the euro last snarled up to this extent in October 2020. Lagarde's predecessors Mario Draghi and Jean-Claude Trichet similarly weighed in with verbal intervention to cool periodic 10% surges in the trade-weighted euro over its history. Euro strength has built on belated ECB interest rate hikes since July - up some 350 basis points to 3.0% so far and expected to go up at least another 25 bps this week. So should euro strength be finally embraced by ECB as way of slaying the inflation beast?

☆ Morning Bid: Bank reverb frames Fed decision
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

While there was some minor repricing of Fed probabilities in the futures market, the latest bout of bank stock nerves is unlikely to change the Fed's course on its own. A White House economist on Tuesday said Fed rate hikes were having a negative impact on the banking sector. Signs of some loosening of a very tight labor market may also encourage the Fed that its rate hiking job is done after this week. Private sector job readings for April are due later today along with service sector surveys for the month. With the Fed in view alongside the debt ceiling crunch and bank stock retreat, longer-term Treasury bonds rallied.

☆ Morning Bid: Volatile news, not markets
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

While the Federal Reserve is almost certain to raise interest rates again on Wednesday, the move could be its last. So in a holiday-strewn month around the world, the VIX (.VIX) - Wall St's so-called 'fear gauge' of the implied stock market volatility for the month ahead - hit its lowest level on Monday since November 2021. Even though it ticked back up a bit above 16 overnight, it remains three full points below its 33-year historical average. For macro markets, the Fed decision is complicated by the debt ceiling and banking backdrop. March job openings numbers later on Tuesday will give an indication of just how tight the labor market remains.

☆ What Do You Know About the Money of Young Adults? Take Our Quiz.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Mike Dang | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Young people have a lot going against them when it comes to money. They start their careers at the bottom of their earning potential, so it can be difficult for them to save money or think about investing in their retirements. Fill out our short quiz, then let us know what your biggest questions are when it comes to personal finance. Feel free to share a little about your financial situation so we can get a sense of how to plan coverage that helps young adults get a better handle on their money. If you are not a young adult, but know one or two, consider sharing this with them.

So far in 2023, this index of what are the leading lights of the U.S. economy is up 36% - six times the year-to-date gains of the S&P 500 index (.SPX). Put another way, this year's rise of these 10 mega tech stocks accounts for pretty much all of the S&P 500 gains. "But given how often the S&P 500 has been used as Exhibit A for overall 'resilience', it's important to acknowledge just how idiosyncratic this macro gauge has been." Are tech stocks overpriced? There are certainly plenty of concerns that these mega stocks may be overbought and just too expensive - even though that concern will hardly be a new worry for these stocks.

☆ Morning Bid: Amazon cools, Intel warms, Japan hesitates
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

[1/2] A smartphone with a displayed Intel logo is placed on a computer motherboard in this illustration taken March 6, 2023. But the dramatic re-acceleration of Big Tech stocks this week - where the NYFANG+TM (.NYFANG) index of the top 10 Big Tech stocks is now up 37% so far this year - is competing with multiple macro narratives that are increasingly hard to read. With the Fed meeting in view, the release of March PCE price inflation data later on Friday tops the diary. Wall St stock futures fell back 0.4% after a wild ride in Amazon.com shares overnight. With much of Europe and Asia closed on Monday for the May Day bank holiday, Asia bourses advanced in Wall St's slipstream but Europe retreated sharply on some jarring corporate updates.

☆ 5 reasons fighting Disney is a political winner for DeSantis — and 6 reasons it could hurt his shot at the presidency
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Kimberly Leonard | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +13 min

It does a ton of business in China, which many GOP voters view as a threat to the US. DeSantis already ran on being anti-Disney — and wonTaryn Fenske, DeSantis' communications director, has described the Disney fight as being "the will of Florida voters." And they might not vote for DeSantis if they think the Disney fight is a killer in a general election. Families often work hard and save for years to take their children to Disney World. If DeSantis can't bring a resolution to the Disney fight, can he handle the job of president?

☆ These are the top Senate races to watch in 2024
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Kevin Breuninger | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +8 min

They have reason to be hopeful: Democrats face a daunting 2024 Senate map that puts them on defense in 23 of the cycle's 34 races, including multiple seats considered ripe for GOP challenges. The grim outlook has some Senate Democrats considering retirement, even after the caucus expanded to a 51-49 majority following a better-than-expected showing in the midterms. Jim Justice, reportedly the state's richest man and one of its favored contenders for the Senate race. But the 2024 Senate race in Ohio is currently considered a toss-up, as Republicans have made significant gains in the state in the last two election cycles. Sabato's Crystal Ball and the Cook Political Report both say the Michigan Senate race leans Democratic.

☆ Morning Bid: Fresh spur from Meta and Europe's banks
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-27 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

Perhaps even more surprising, Europe's big banks are wowing the gallery too - showing limited, if any, fallout from the failure of ailing Credit Suisse at the end of the quarter. And so the glass appears half full again despite background tensions around regional U.S. banks and as wider markets brace for several weeks of a U.S. debt ceiling standoff. With Amazon reporting later, its stock rose another 2% ahead of the bell too. The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday narrowly passed a bill to raise the government's $31.4 trillion debt ceiling that includes sweeping spending cuts over the next decade. The dollar was marginally weaker, with crude oil prices struggling to recover from their latest lunge lower this week.

☆ Russian oil sanctions appear to be working - crude still flows even as Moscow's pulling in less money. But there's more to it than that.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-27 | by ( Phil Rosen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

I spent much of yesterday parsing through pages of data on where Russian oil is heading and how much buyers are paying for barrels. Today we're unpacking two less obvious observations about Russian oil. That said, researchers pointed out that most of the Western companies still facilitating Russian oil shipments don't actually abide by the $60-a-barrel price cap that the EU and G-7 imposed. Ships carrying Russian oil, according to Argus, indeed make a premium for doing what they do, but that premium has shrunk over the last month. In effect, the "sanctions premium" isn't what it was a month ago.

And, as it's global liquidity that matters, the bowl is also kept brimming as the Bank of Japan continues to buy government bonds at pace. But a study looking at the U.S. banking shock that led to the failure of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank last month and deposit runs across many regional banks suggests a different angle - a 'deposit glut' from within the richest countries that is increasingly unstable. "In a context of rising wealth inequality and growing corporate savings, an increasing share of bank deposits is uninsured and held by sophisticated agents," Vuillemey wrote. "This implies that these deposits are increasingly fragile, and that deposit insurance schemes ... are slowly losing bite." As illustrated in Technicolor in the SVB run, big uninsured deposits are volatile - sensitive as they are to any hint on the bank's health and moveable at push of a button.

☆ Morning Bid: Cloud control - tech trumps banks
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

Alphabet (GOOGL.O) also gained 1% as it too trumpeted gains in cloud services and AI, alongside plans for a $70 billion buyback. With Meta (META.O) results out later, its stock was up 2% and Amazon (AMZN.O) raced ahead 4%. PacWest Bancorp's (PACW.O) shares jumped 15% in extended trading after the regional lender said deposits have been building recently. And in Europe, Standard Chartered (STAN.L) shares bucked otherwise dour markets on a forecast-beating 21% jump in first-quarter profits. U.S. Treasury markets continued to rally, with yields on 2-year notes dropping below 4% Tuesday and testing 3.9% early today.

☆ Mike Dever has a 40-year track record of outperforming various markets by rejecting conventional wisdom. He told us 4 ways investors can mimic his approach today.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Marley Jay | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Mike Dever is the founder and CEO of Brandywine Asset Management and author of "Jackass Investing." Over the course of four decades in investing, Michael Dever has learned that the bedrock of most people's beliefs about the stock market are faulty. Investing in stocks and bonds is adequate portfolio diversification? Dever says investors cost themselves a lot of money every year by falling for phony conventional wisdom, and that there's a better way to invest. Investors also accept limits on how much profit they'll make, but an investor who's concerned about a market downturn might see that as a worthwhile trade.

A series of upcoming challenges, from the ongoing war in Ukraine to a still-uncertain economy, could provide hurdles to Biden’s reelection. The Washington beltway event may be indicative of what’s to come for the Biden reelection campaign strategy. “Just like four years ago—I’m off to teach and Joe’s launched his (re-election) campaign! Obama held his first reelection campaign rally in May 2012, 13 months after announcing his bid for a second term. The wait for a Biden reelection rally could be just as long.

☆ Morning Bid: Tech tally in focus, China alarms Europe
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-24 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

Otherwise, a packed earnings season dominates this week's investment radar as more than a third of S&P500 companies report. Including Intel (INTC.O), those five tech stocks have accounted for two-thirds of the S&P500's gains this year - with the Artificial Intelligence craze sparked by the emergence of ChatGPT adding a new non-cyclical attraction to the sector. But before markets get a taste of Q1 tech profits, the reverberations from last month's banking blow-up are still being absorbed. European stocks were slightly negative and U.S. stock futures also marginally in the red ahead of Wall Street's open. The dollar was mixed - up against Asian currencies but off against European currencies amid hawkish European Central Bank soundings on interest rates.

☆ Abortion Surges to the Center of the 2024 Campaign
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-22 | by ( Katie Glueck | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

“In 2022, a lot of Republican candidates took their D.C. consultants’ bad advice to ignore the subject,” she said in a speech. Nicole McCleskey, a Republican pollster who worked for the successful re-election campaign of Gov. Kim Reynolds of Iowa last year, pointed to Ms. Reynolds, Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia as examples of leaders who embraced tight abortion restrictions but were not defined by that issue alone. All three swept to comfortable victories in states that often lean right, but are not the nation’s most conservative states.

☆ Morning Bid: April boomlet mocks recession script
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-21 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

A look at the day ahead in U.S. and global markets from Mike DolanThe signal is still lost in an awful lot of noise. With next week's Big Tech earnings reports hoving into view, the overall U.S. corporate healthcheck remains pretty mixed. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the overall global stock market direction remains equivocal. Although Asia bourses had initially followed Wall St's Thursday swoon, European indexes and S&P500 futures were little changed on Friday. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias.

If it is just a lagged statistical quirk, then the huge disparity in March inflation rates - of some 3-5 percentage points with western peers - should narrow sharply by yearend. With an election due next year, that may prove a big factor in any re-convergence of inflation rates if the cost of that is a much deeper economic downturn that rest. The question about Britain as an inflation outlier re-opens the age-old issue about just how that should be priced into sterling. For much of the past 10 years, G7 inflation rates were largely locked together in either their subdued pre-pandemic state or during the wild price spikes since. If UK inflation turns "idiosyncratic" among its peers during the much-vaunted normalization, then currency markets may need to rethink fundamental long-term assumptions about purchasing power, Gallo reckons.

Republicans in conservative states have sought to balance pressure from their base to place more restrictions on abortion with broader support for the right to end a pregnancy. Public support for legal abortion has climbed to 65 percent this year from 55 percent in 2010, according to recent polling from the Public Religion Research Institute. Majorities of residents in 43 states say that abortion should be legal in most cases. Around 63 percent of Republicans said abortion should be illegal in most or all cases, according to the PRRI poll. “What Republicans need to do is get to a place where they talk less about the extremes.”

☆ We mapped out the 113 most powerful people at Warner Bros. Discovery after a blockbuster merger and a tumultuous year of layoffs and cuts under CEO David Zaslav
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-20 | by ( Claire Atkinson | Lucia Moses | Taylor Tyson | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Warner Bros. CEO David Zaslav is focused on rebuilding but faces economic headwinds and an advertising slump. Insider mapped out the 112 most powerful people under Zaslav leading WBD film and TV studios, HBO, CNN, and more. One year after the merger that created Warner Bros. While Kathleen Finch has joined the mix with her portfolio of Discovery channels, top TV execs from the WarnerMedia regime — HBO's Casey Bloys and Warner Bros. TV studios chief Channing Dungey — are still in place.

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