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“Euphoria Is Increasing”: Goldman Doubles Down On Market Meltup Call, Sees $90BN In New Stock Buying This Week

"Euphoria Is Increasing": Goldman Doubles Down On Market Meltup Call, Sees $90BN In New Stock Buying This Week

Last weekend we published a note by Goldman flow trader, Scott Rubner, who explained why despite a huge wall of worry which include

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"Euphoria Is Increasing": Goldman Doubles Down On Market Meltup Call, Sees $90BN In New Stock Buying This Week

Last weekend we published a note by Goldman flow trader, Scott Rubner, who explained why despite a huge wall of worry which included such worries as a stagflation, China property bust, China slowing, Covid, tapering, corporate margin fears, snarled supply chains, energy, rate hikes, global growth slowing, higher rates, etc, stocks would melt up for a handful of simple reasons including a flood of buybacks and equity fund inflows, collectively amounting to roughly $8 billion per trading day, muted buyside sentiment, gamma flipping positive, a buying thrust from Vol Control funds and favorable seasonals.

In retrospect, and with the S&P hitting new all time highs just a few days later, the Goldman trader was spot on.

Fast forwarding one week, some may ask if Goldman's enthusiasm has tapered. The answer, as the flow trader wrote in his latest Tactical Fund Flow note, is not at all, and instead Rubner is doubling-down on optimism, once again predicting nothing but meltups for stocks in the weeks to come. If one had to summarize his sentiment with one word it would be FOMO - the money just keeps flowing into stocks as the mechanistic Pavlovian response to just keep buying because the Fed will never let stocks sink proves simply far too strong. As a result, the bank now expects a gargantuan $90 billion in global equity demand for the coming week (more below).

Global Equities logged >$1 Trillion dollars worth of inflows during the last 51 weeks and the start of positive vaccine news. This is the biggest market structure dynamic of the year. For context, the prior best rolling 51 week record was +$250 Billion. 2021 is 4x larger than the next best yearly inflow. I think the equity TINA money flow train keeps charging to close the year and accelerates aggressively in November. I calculate a significant, +$18B worth of non-fundamental equity demand every day this week and this increases with massive November monthly inflows and corporate demand after >47% of the S&P reports next week.

Below Rubner lays out his latest detailed take on why the most likely path for stocks is a continued meltup higher.

  • 1. S&P 500 just logged its 55th new all-time high of 2021 after 7 straight gains and highest level since September 2nd.  Watch CNBC “boo-ya Jim” headlines.
  • 2. S&P 500 logged a new all-time high in every month so far this year and that has only happened one other time since 1928. (2014)
  • 3. There have been 15 times since 1928, that the S&P is up >20% or more through October. The median return for the rest of the year (last two months only) is +5.92%, with an 80% hit rate. 2021 would be the 16th time.

  • 4. As of Friday, Goldman Sachs Sentiment Indicator, which pulls in 9 positioning indicators, logged the lowest reading (-.9), since May 22nd, 2020 (covid times), which was 73 weeks ago. (SPX was 2,955.45 vs. SPX 4,532.65 currently).

  • 5. We are entering the strongest month (and best two month period) of the year with a median return of 2.1% and positive hit rate of 71% going back to 1985. VIX below 15, through pandemic lows.

  • 6. November Inflows is the biggest dynamic in the market next week. Goldman models +20bps of AUM ($23 Trillion) or +$46B of new demand (I expect double given money has completely halted going into bonds).

  • 7. Improving tax headlines dampen my biggest flow-of-funds worry for December. I am reducing my probability of December selling, no selling of tech stocks is positive in itself.
    • a) The timing of a potential capital gains tax rate hike has been a key focus of many investors. Long-term capital gains and qualified dividends are currently taxed at a maximum rate of 20%, along with a separate 3.8% tax on investment income. Vice President Biden has proposed taxing these as ordinary income for filers with over $1 million in annual income. This would roughly double the tax rate on capital gains and dividend income from 23.8% to 43.4%. Link
    • b) Using Federal Reserve data, GS Research estimates the wealthiest households now hold around $1 trillion in unrealized equity capital gains. This equates to 3% of total US equity market cap and roughly 30% of average monthly S&P 500 trading volume.
    • c) Past capital gains tax hikes have been associated with declines in equity prices and in total household equity allocations. In addition, high-momentum “winners” that had delivered the largest gains to investors ahead of the rate hike have usually underperformed. The Tech and Consumer Discretionary sectors have led the market this year and have also been the largest sources of capital gains within the US equity market during the last 3, 5, and 10 years.
    • d) The wealthiest 1% were the biggest net sellers of equities across US households around the last capital gains rate hike in 2013. In the three months prior to the hike, the wealthiest households sold 1% of their starting equity assets, which would equate to around $100 billion of selling in current terms.

Just in case his euphoria outlook was not clear enough, Rubner then repeats what he wrote in various client chat rooms this week, explaining - again - he expects another epic liftathon.

  • 1. CTA - GS systematic strats estimate $47B to buy over the next 1 week assuming a flat tape. (and $23B to buy in a down 2.5 standard deviation move lower). ~$10B of global equity demand per day.
  • 2. Corporates - US Corporates are expected to purchase $3.80B shares per day. 47% of S&P reports next week.
  • 3. Retail – This week Global equities logged +$25B worth of inflows or ~5B per day.
  • 4. Retail (2) – US households currently own 38% of the $75 Trillion US Corporate Equity Market. There is a max frenzy around the new Bitcoin ETF launches. Pull up the DWAC SPAC, Euphoria is increasing.

  • 5. That is roughly $18B worth of global equity demand per day, every day this week, according to Goldman's calculations.
  • 6. Positioning on the discretionary HF side remains low / negative / short, and Goldman is looking for any dip to be shallow.

Last but not least, seasonals from here are up, up and away.

Tyler Durden Sun, 10/24/2021 - 19:00

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Stock Market Today: Stocks turn lower as factory inflation spikes, retail sales miss target

Stocks will navigate the last major data releases prior to next week’s Fed rate meeting in Washington.

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Check back for updates throughout the trading day

U.S. stocks edged lower Thursday following a trio of key economic releases that have added to the current inflation puzzle as investors shift focus to the Federal Reserve's March policy meeting next week in Washington.

Updated at 9:59 AM EDT

Red start

Stocks are now falling sharply following the PPI inflation data and retail sales miss, with the S&P 500 marked 18 points lower, or 0.36%, in the opening half hour of trading.

The Dow, meanwhile, was marked 92 points lower while the Nasdaq slipped 67 points.

Treasury yields are also on the move, with 2-year notes rising 5 basis points on the session to 4.679% and 10-year notes pegged 7 basis points higher at 4.271%.

Updated at 9:44 AM EDT

Under Water

Under Armour  (UAA)  shares slumped firmly lower in early trading following the sportswear group's decision to bring back founder Kevin Plank as CEO, replacing the outgoing Stephanie Linnartz.

Plank, who founded Under Armour in 1996, left the group in May of 2021 just weeks before the group revealed that it was co-operating with investigations from both the Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. Department of Justice into the company's revenue recognition accounting.

Under Armour shares were marked 10.6% lower in early trading to change hands at $7.21 each.

Source: Under Armour Investor Relations

Updated at 9:22 AM EDT

Steely resolve

U.S. Steel  (X)  shares extended their two-day decline Thursday, falling 5.75% in pre-market trading following multiple reports that suggest President Joe Biden will push to prevent Japan's Nippon Steel from buying the Pittsburgh-based group.

Both Reuters and the Associated Press have said Biden will express his views to Prime Minister Kishida Yuko ahead of a planned State Visit next month at the White House. 

Related: US Steel soars on $15 billion Nippon Steel takeover; United Steelworkers slams deal

Updated at 8:52 AM EDT

Clear as mud

Retail sales rebounded last month, but the overall tally of $700.7 billion missed Street forecasts and suggests the recent uptick in inflation could be holding back discretionary spending.

A separate reading of factory inflation, meanwhile, showed prices spiking by 1.6%, on the year, and 0.6% on the month, amid a jump in goods prices.

U.S. stocks held earlier gains following the data release, with futures tied to the S&P 500 indicating an opening bell gain of 10 points, while the Dow was called 140 points higher. The Nasdaq, meanwhile, is looking at a more modest 40 point gain.

Benchmark 10-year Treasury note yields edged 3 basis points lower to 4.213% while two-year notes were little-changed at 4.626%.

Stock Market Today

Stocks finished lower last night, with the S&P 500 ending modestly in the red and the Nasdaq falling around 0.5%. The declines came amid an uptick in Treasury yields tied to concern that inflation pressures have failed to ease over the opening months of the year.

A better-than-expected auction of $22 billion in 30-year bonds, drawing the strongest overall demand since last June, steadied the overall market, but stocks still slipped into the close with an eye towards today's dataset.

The Commerce Department will publish its February reading of factory-gate inflation at 8:30 am Eastern Time. Analysts are expecting a slowdown in the key core reading, which feeds into the Fed's favored PCE price index.

Retail sales figures for the month are also set for an 8:30 am release as investors search for clues on consumer strength, tied to a resilient job market. Those factors could give the Fed more justification to wait until the summer months to begin the first of its three projected rate cuts.

"The case for a gradual but sustained slowdown in growth in consumers’ spending from 2023’s robust pace is persuasive," said Ian Shepherdson of Pantheon Macroeconomics. 

"Most households have run down the excess savings accumulated during the pandemic, while the cost of credit has jumped and last year’s plunge in home sales has depressed demand housing-related retail items like furniture and appliances," he added.

Benchmark 10-year Treasury yields are holding steady at 4.196% heading into the start of the New York trading session, while 2-year notes were pegged at 4.628%.

With Fed officials in a quiet period, requiring no public comments ahead of next week's meeting in Washington, the U.S. dollar index is trading in a narrow range against its global peers and was last marked 0.06% higher at 102.852.

On Wall Street, futures tied to the S&P 500 are indicating an opening bell gain of around 19 points, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average indicating a 140-point advance.

The tech-focused Nasdaq, which is up 7.77% for the year, is priced for a gain of around 95 points, with Tesla  (TSLA)  once again sliding into the red after ending the Wednesday session at a 10-month low.

In Europe, the regionwide Stoxx 600 was marked 0.35% higher in early Frankfurt trading, while Britain's FTSE 100 slipped 0.09% in London.

Overnight in Asia, the Nikkei 225 gained 0.29% as investors looked to a key series of wage negotiation figures from key unions that are likely to see the biggest year-on-year pay increases in three decades.

The broader MSCI ex-Japan benchmark, meanwhile, rose 0.18% into the close of trading. 

Related: Veteran fund manager picks favorite stocks for 2024

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Walmart and Target make key self-checkout changes to fight theft

Both chains are making changes customers may not like, but self-checkout isn’t going anywhere, according to one industry expert.

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In parts of the world, public bathrooms come with a charge, but people pay on the honor system. The money charged allows for better upkeep of the facilities and most people don't mind dropping a small bill or some coins into a lockbox and many of the people who don't are likely dealing with larger problems.

The honor system, however, requires honor. It's based on the idea that most people are trustworthy and that they will pay their fair share.

Related: Beloved mall retailer files Chapter 7 bankruptcy, will liquidate

In the case of a bathroom, people cheating the system are only stealing a low-value service. In the case of self-checkout, a variation on the honor system, people looking to steal by "forgetting" to scan an item can be a very expensive problem.

That has led retailers including Target, Walmart, and Dollar General to make changes. Target has limited the amount of items you can scan at self-checkout at some stores while Dollar General has literally eliminated it in some locations.

Walmart, like Target, has experimented with item limits and limiting the hours of operation for self-checkout. Now, in some stores, the chain has decided to designate some of its self-checkout stations for Walmart+ members and delivery drivers using the Spark app.

Advantage Solutions General Manager Andy Keenan answered some questions about Walmart, self-checkout, and theft from TheStreet via email.     

Target has made self-checkout changes at select stores.

Image source: John Smith/VIEWpress.

What Walmart's self-checkout changes mean

TheStreet: What are the benefits of reserving self-checkout registers for Spark drivers and Walmart+ customers?

Keenan: The benefits include exclusivity and perks of membership, speed, and convenience when shopping.

TheStreet: If this rolls out more broadly, what do you anticipate being the impact on non-Walmart+ customers?

Keenan: There is the potential for non-Walmart+ customers to become agitated, they are losing convenience because they are not enrolled. Customers who are looking for convenience will have fewer options for speed to check out. 

TheStreet: Do lane restrictions like limiting lanes to 10 items or fewer help reduce time spent waiting in lines?

Keenan: Yes, but retailers must have a diverse amount of check lane options including 10 items or fewer to ensure that the speed of checkout actually transpires.

TheStreet: Do you believe self-checkout is leading to partial shrink? If so, do you think that this move to shut off self-checkout lanes will help prevent theft in the future?

Keenan: Yes, self-checkout is leading to partial shrink. We believe this tends to be more due to errors in scanning and intentional theft. 

There are already front-end transformation tests going on in stores, reducing the number of self-checkouts and shifting back to cashier checkouts in order to measure the reduction in shrink. Early indicators show that a move back to cashier checkouts combined with other shrink initiatives will help prevent theft.

Self-checkout is not going away

While changes are ongoing, Keenan believes self-checkout is here to stay.

“Self-checkout is not, as one recent article called it, a failed experiment. It’s actually part of the next evolution of the retail customer experience, and evolutions take time,” Keenan said in a web post about the findings of the 2024 Advantage Shopper Outlook survey.

He makes it clear that rising labor costs and struggles to find workers make some for of self-checkout inevitable.

“Since the pandemic, there’s been a revolution on hourly labor,” Keenan said. “Labor in certain markets that would cost you $16 an hour now costs you $19 or $20 an hour, and it’s a gig economy. The people who once stood at a checkout stand in the front of a store are now driving for Instacart or DoorDash because the hours are more flexible. They want to make their own schedule, and it’s varied work. Today, most retailers can’t offer that.”

Basically, while there are kinks to work out, self-checkout simply makes sense for retailers.

“The notion that we’re going to pivot away from technology that helps offset labor needs and will ultimately continue to improve customer experience because of some challenges is far-fetched. We need to continue to embrace the technology and realize that it may always be imperfect, but it will always be evolving. The noise that, ‘Oh, self-checkout might not be working,’ that’s just a moment in time,” he added.

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Hitting Home: Housing Affordability in the U.S.

The Issue:
Housing is becoming unaffordable to a widening swathe of the American population. This deteriorating affordability directly impacts American…

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The Issue:

Housing is becoming unaffordable to a widening swathe of the American population. This deteriorating affordability directly impacts American lives, including where people choose to live and work. It has also been cited as a major contributor to key social problems like rising homelessness and worsening child wellbeing.

The Facts:

  • Median house prices are now 6 times the median income, up from a range of between 4 and 5 two decades ago. In cities along the coasts, the numbers are higher, exceeding 10 in San Francisco. 
  • The ratio of median rents to median income has also crept from 25 percent to 30 percent in two decades. 
  • Households — renters in particular — are increasingly cost-burdened, having to spend more than 30% of their income on rent, mortgage and other housing needs. Among homeowners, about 40 percent of those in the $35-49 income range are cost-burdened. The share of cost-burdened renters in that income range has risen sharply from under 40 percent of households in 2010 to over 60 percent today (see chart). 
  • Historically, rural and interior areas of the country have been more affordable. But, even prior to the pandemic, migration toward these locations has helped drive faster house price appreciation than in more expensive regions.
  • Demographic developments have contributed to the demand-supply imbalance. Supply is crimped by more older Americans opting to age in place. On the demand side, the biggest driver is new household formation. Americans formed about a million new households a year between 2015-2017, but the pace has almost doubled according to the most recent data, largely reflecting a pickup in household formation rates among millennials.
  • A long-standing lack of homebuilding, which partly reflects tight regulatory restrictions in many parts of the country, has also contributed to rising home prices. 
  • More recently, higher interest rates since 2022 have exacerbated these secular trends to make housing even more unaffordable. The mortgage rate on a 30-year home loan soared from 3 ½ percent in early 2022 to nearly 8% in October 2023 as the Fed raised policy interest rates; the mortgage rate had only eased to about 7% in March 2024 as the tightening cycle had peaked. The problem is compounded by mortgage lock-in: higher interest rates have left many homeowners — many of whom bought homes or refinanced at the lows of 2020-21 — with cheaper-than-market mortgages, reluctant to sell their house and reset their mortgage at current, higher rates.

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