Just Another B.S. Narrative

All last week the perma-bull cabal (including head cheerleader Fundstrat’s Tom Lee (every day) and Wharton’s (where I received my MBA) Dr. Jeremy Siegel on Friday — both of whom called for an imminent rise in equity prices) remarked that the pleasant decline in energy prices would serve to 1. reduce inflationary pressures and 2. be a salutary factor contributing to the next run in the S&P index over the next few weeks.

Naturally Fin TV moderators had no pushback — didn’t even discuss the failure to end the Iran War (to date) or the improvisational foreign policy that seemingly would not bring a resolution and peace.  Nor was the steady rise in global rates even brought up. 

Well, as night follows day the price of energy products have reversed dramatically in the last 48 hours and equities folded like a cheap suit.

The price of crude oil rose by nearly 10% yesterday as the war escalated and is up by another +$3.45/barrel (+4%) this morning.

Listen to the same bullish crowd respond to this and develop a rationale and another reason for continued stock market strength in the next few days.

Again, I call B.S. as inflation, interest rates and crude oil prices — as a base case — will likely be higher for longer.

The narrative from the bulls will change but the facts don’t seem to interfere in their upbeat views.

And, oh, Apple’s ($AAPL) shares (last week’s fave because of price momentum) were downgraded by a brokerage (we shorted late last week).

Position: Short AAPL

Monday’s Closing Market Stats

Volume and VIX

– NYSE volume 15% below its one-month average

– NASDAQ volume 33% below its one-month average 

– VIX index: up 14.17% to 17.16

Closing Breadth

S&P 500 Sectors

% Movers

Nasdaq 100 Heat Map

Closing S&P 500 Heat Map

Position: None

Abie From Brooklyn Chimes in On Market Structure

Dougie, Not often I feel I can point out something to you about markets’ structure that I did NOT see in your email re SKHynix posted on X last week:

At this moment, SKHYNIX ADRs are trading at $168 or $1680 per full SKHynix share. On http://trade.xyz, that same share is trading at $1281, a $400/share discount – the most likely reason being heavy selling by Wall St pros and their best clients who bought before IPO hype. Don’t be a sap $SKHY.

The amount of the “gap” between insiders and the public could not have been more clearly visible with the “real” SKHynix market nearly 25% below the ADR hyped AND manipulated (legally as IPO market stabilization to facilitate exit of the guys who make a living off FIFO in domestic IPO markets…they trade at the sucker IPO price but sell to the “stabilized price” profitably.) one. NOT to mention the underwriters shorting in the immediate aftermarket to more suckers…. there ought to be a Netflix series on this …        

Position: None