Fed Preps ‘Most Unpredictable’ Meeting in Years: 8 Key Items Shaping the Stock Market Wednesday
Renewed conflict in the Middle East, Microsoft and Meta earnings and other headlines moving stocks this morning.
Why You Should Think Twice About That 12% ETF Yield
A 12% yield sounds better than 3%, until you look at what’s actually generating each payout.
The Hottest ETFs of 2026 Come With a Dangerous Warning Label
Single-stock leveraged ETFs top 2026’s performance charts, with gains above 500%. But their own prospectuses warn investors away, and a collapse in South Korea shows what happens to retail buyers when the trade turns.
Things I Did Today
Here are today’s things:
* Covered my index shorts very early (4:30 AM) premarket: $SPY at $746.05, $QQQ at $703.66 and $IWM at $295.66
* Shorted $GRNY at $37.58
* Added to cannabis: $TRLV at $8.67 and $MSOX at $2.51
* Shorted more $JOET at $45.29
* Sold some $PG long at $150.31
Position: Long TRLV (S), MSOX (VS), PG (VS); Short JOET (S), GRNY (L)
Selling Some P&G
Making some sales of Procter & Gamble ($PG) (purchased much lower yesterday) at $150.33.
Position: Long PG (S)
Things I Did Today
Here are today’s things:
* Added to $GTBIF at $7.08, $TRLV at $8.74, $VRNO at $5.72 and $MSOS at $4.39.
* Added small to $PEP at $136.32 and $PG at $148.73,
Position: Long MSOS (VL), GTBIF (S), TRLV (S), VRNO (S), PEP (S), PG (S)
Adding to Pepsi, Procter & Gamble
I added to PEP ($PEP) and PG ($PG) this morning.
Positions: PEP S PG S
Examining ‘Group Stink’
* And fading it…
I don’t own and am currently short (and have been recently short C, JPM, GS, MS, UBER, NFLX, homebuilders, etc.) some of the most consensus sectors.
I am long some of the most non-consensus sectors.
Consensus Longs:
* Memory: SanDisk ($SNDK), Micron ($MU), Intel ($INTC), AMD ($AMD), Applied Materials ($AMAT) (“it’s different this time”)
* Value Tech: Adobe ($ADBE), Oracle ($ORCL), ServiceNow ($NOW) and Nvidia ($NVDA)
* Tech With Biggest Moat: Apple ($AAPL)
* Value Industrial: Caterpillar ($CAT)
* Best Overall Value: Homebuilders
* Streaming: Netflix ($NFLX)
* Autonomous: Uber ($UBER)
* Entertainment: Disney ($DIS)
* Financials: JPMorgan ($JPM), Citigroup ($C), Goldman Sachs ($GS), Morgan Stanley ($MS)
* Frontier Exposure “For The Long Haul”: SpaceX ($SPCX)
Non-Consensus Longs:
* Cannabis: $MSOS, $VRNOD, $TRLV, $GTBIF, $GLAS
* Private Equity: Apollo ($APO), Blackstone ($BX), KKR ($KKR)
* Consumer Staples: Kimberly-Clark ($KMB), PepsiCo ($PEP), Procter & Gamble ($PG)
Positions:
Long MSOS (L), VRNOD (S), TRLV (S), GTIBF (S), GLAS (S), APO (S), BX (S), KKR (S), KMB (S), PEP (S), PG (S)
Short SPCX (VS), SNDK (VS), MU (VS), INTC (VS), AMAT (VS), AMD (VS), CAT (VS)
Short-Term Tactics
* I was very active on the short side yesterday
On the last day of trading for the month and quarter, S&P futures rose as high as +65 handles in what seemed like an algo-driven markup — and closed about +41 handles (as it dropped about 20 handles in the last few minutes).
This morning S&P futures are -30 handles.
Ignored throughout Tuesday was a sharp rise in yields:
Observation
TLT low of the day, yields at the high of the day as quarter-end markups started early in the equity markets.
Position: None
BY Doug Kass · Jun 30, 2026, 1:09 PM EDT
As posted in my Diary, fearful of a quarter-end mark-up, I shorted equities more aggresssively yesterday — but on a scale higher (giving the market a wider berth) than I have in several weeks:
* Most notably, on strength and steadily through the day I moved from very small sized to small sized to medium sized index shorts ($SPY and $QQQ).
* I put on three tranches of my high-octane tech short basket yesterday. I can’t remember when I did so aggressively in the past but it reflects my view of the exceptionally poor reward vs. risk on the market darlings.
* I added meaningfully to my $GRNY short and added to $JOET short.
* On the buy side I added to $PEP and $PG, which should prosper in a correction.
* With the rescheduling of cannabis hearings going so well, I added to individual weed longs. The group looks like it might finally be breaking out of a range.
Position: Long PEP (S), PG (S), VRNOD (S), GLAS (S), GTBIF (S), TRLV (S), CURLD (VS); Short SPY (M), QQQ (M), GRNY (M), JOET (S), High-Beta Tech Basket
Key Observation (Part Deux)
Breadth mixed (but sector divergences are wild), trading inconsistent and swinging wildly intraday:
* Despite the evisceration of tech yesterday, there are few tech stocks higher on the day — Google ($GOOGL) (DJIA inclusion), Amazon ($AMZN), Apple ($AAPL)
League leading hitter, Nvidia ($NVDA), has cracked to the downside some fractal support
* Hard reversal lower in financial stocks
* Carnage in the oil patch ($OIH -$13) with oil -$2.65
* Consumer staples are the world’s fair ($KO, $PEP, $PG and $KMB)
* Private equity shares are breaking down (after more redemptions and gates)
* Bitcoin breaks $60k to the downside (remember this was one of the possible catalysts I mentioned to a disrupted market filled with leveraged players)
* Speculative faves $PLTR (don’t investors ever learn?) and $HOOD are breaking down
Position: Long KO (S), PEP (S), PG (S), KMB (S)