FOMC Recap: This Is FedCenter

 

This is clearly an AI generated parody image, so just roll with it.

Hi there and welcome to a very special edition of FedCenter. We're thankful that you've joined us. Today is a special year-end review edition. We’ll be counting down the Top Ten Plays from this year’s FOMC Recaps, but before we get there, let’s dive into this afternoon’s game of the week which featured the Powell Rangers vs. the Market Memers.

 

This isn’t the first time these teams have met and on the season series it’s been all Market Memers.  The Memers have been on a tear of late, though they entered this game without star phenom HAWK (Tuah) coin, who has been suspended for the remainder of the season.  The loss of Hawk Tuah hasn’t had much impact on the Memers of late as FartCoin has been stellar off the bench.  Let’s face it the Memers team is loaded with a cast of all-stars like PNUT, Roaring Kitty (who has been killing it since his return from injured reserve), and Moo Deng among others.   

The Powell Rangers entered this matchup riding a losing streak dating back to September 18, 2024.  The Powell Rangers star, Jay Powell (aka J-Pow), has certainly doing his best to imitate Heisman winner Travis Hunter of late, believing he can play both offense and defense, but let’s face it his stats this year seem to indicate he’s been letting a few inflation players get right past him. 

Speaking of September 18th, the Powell Rangers haven’t shown up on defense since Miki Bowman, who her teammates describe as the “heart of this defense (against inflation)”  was solid in net, with a late game glove save to prevent a power play goal as time expired, with her decision to dissent.

Heading into the game Powell Rangers assistant coach NikiLeaks mentioned how the team was searching for identity, struggling with the loss of one of their start players “R-Star”.  

Vegas knew going into this matchup that Powell was going to have a tough facing his arch nemesis and one of the stars of the Memers, “Money Printer go brrrrr…”    

So let’s get to the highlights.

Out of the gates, The Powell Rangers took a shot and cut rates 25bps to 4.25% - 4.50%.  In drawing up their play the Powell Rangers cited “economic activity has expanded at a solid pace”  while acknowledging that labor market conditions have “generally eased” while inflation remains “somewhat elevated”.  Overall characterizing risks as more balanced.

It was typical Powell Rangers strategy of trying to skate where the puck is going to be while watching their flank.  This time Cleveland Fed President Beth Hammock stayed back on defense, dissenting.  After all it is the Cleveland Fed that is the Fed’s center for inflation research and that pesky player for the Memers, the Money Printer, is always ready to run right past Powell. 

The game progressed with the Powell Rangers being pretty stingy on defense in the second period, lowering the number of projected cuts to the 2025 Fed Funds rate by 50bps, pricing out 2 cuts relative to their last projections due to higher inflation projections, and slightly adjusting their longer-run Fed Funds neutral rate up to 3%.

At the second intermission it looked like the Powell Rangers had Market Memers on the ropes, with yields rising while equities and crypto were falling.

Entering the third period (the press conference), oddsmakers were wondering if the Powell Rangers would allow the Market Memers a comeback as the Memers would look for openings where the Powell Rangers might be making the same mistakes of the 1970s and be sticking to their notoriously inaccurate forecast?

The third period opened with the Memers taking a shot, looking for an opening in the Powell Rangers defense, with the typical attack focused on "Why did you cut today, if you expect inflation to remain above target next year?"   The Powell Rangers defense lead by J-Pow, was their usual skating around in a manner that utterly confuses the opponent while producing no tangible results.

The Powell Rangers coach played under a 5 prong attack which consisted of "growth is stronger, unemployment is lower, inflation is higher, we’re closer to neutral and uncertainty is higher” as a strategy to keep the Memers at bay.

Powell's defense even added a trick-play which he called in as "driving on a foggy night" as a way to keep the Memers off his tracks as he skated up the ice.

At one point during the third period, Rangers star J-Pow seemed to lose track of the play call, failing to find the data during a question and shuffling papers repeatedly.  Powell almost lost the puck on a few occasions, but the Memers failed to capitalize on the Rangers few openings and couldn't find much of a "dovish" opening that would have allowed them to put some goals on the board.

In the closing moments of the third period, the Memers had an opening, trying to run their "financial conditions" play, seeing if they could get the Rangers to give them an opening with a good old "Bitcoin" question, but the Rangers defense dumped the puck back down the other end of the rink.

The Powell Rangers seemed to be "in a new phase" in terms of their play calling relative to their last few games and it seemed to keep the Memers off guard.   J-Pow's late game defense even consisted of a Jedi mind trick where he said something like "there is no certainty.  It's actually a good thing that we know that we don't know exactly [where the neutral rate is]." as a way to combat the opposition, who promptly turned the puck over.

While skating off the ice with the upset in the books, J-Pow, said "the jobs not done" and we'll get inflation back sustainably to 2%.

We'll get interviews with all the Powell Rangers stars over the coming weeks.

Now turning our attention to the FedCenter Top 10 Highlights of Fed Watching in 2024 (courtesy of AI's reading of my FOMC recaps):

Number 10: The Man in the Orange Hat - Election Year Politics! Remember way back in January when the Fed was still hiking rates? Talk about a flashback! Turns out, our guy J-Pow is a Deadhead, and we're pretty sure he wasn't listening to "Sugar Magnolia" when he was staring down those inflation numbers. This was the year the author started worrying about those election year shenanigans, and he even channeled some Paul Volcker wisdom to remind us that politics and monetary policy don't always mix!

Number 9: March Madness Lessons: The Fed's Bracket is Busted! Springtime! Birds are singing, flowers are blooming, and the Fed is trying to figure out how to pull off a soft landing. Spoiler alert: it's about as easy as filling out a perfect bracket. Our author took us to school with this one, reminding us that the economy is a wild and unpredictable beast, and even the best-laid plans can go out the window faster than a Cinderella team facing a powerhouse.

Number 8: "Dark Matter" - The Unknowables of Monetary Policy! Things got a little existential in May when the author dove deep into the "dark matter" of economics. We're talking about all those hidden forces that nobody can really measure or predict. He even dropped some Pearl Jam lyrics to drive home the point! Clearly, uncertainty was the name of the game this year, and we're not just talking about the Fed's forecasts.

Number 7: Powell's 21 Questions - Obfuscation and Evasion! Time for some press conference shenanigans! Remember back in June when Powell faced a grilling from those pesky reporters? It was like watching a masterclass in dodging questions. Our author decided to translate for us, revealing the "questions behind the questions" that Powell just wouldn't answer. Let's just say, transparency wasn't exactly the Fed's strong suit this year.

Number 6: "Trade Deadline" - The Balancing Act Continues! July brought more FOMC drama, and this time the author compared it to the MLB trade deadline. Apparently, setting interest rates is a lot like building a championship baseball team – you've got to make tough choices, manage expectations, and hope you don't blow it all up. Hey, nobody ever said this Fed gig was easy!

Number 5: March Madness: The Fed's Playbook?   Apparently, the Fed can learn a lot from college basketball. "It is impossible to be perfect" and "plans are worthless, but planning is everything." Deep stuff. Someone get Coach K on the FOMC!

Number 4: "Got Debt?" - Fiscal Concerns Take Center Stage! Remember that awkward family Thanksgiving dinner where everyone argued about politics and money? Well, that was basically the FOMC meeting in November. Debt and deficits were the main course, and Powell even admitted that unsustainable fiscal policy was a threat to the economy. Our author was practically screaming "I told you so!" from the rooftops, warning about the dangers of financial repression and the erosion of the Fed's independence. Pass the gravy, please!

Number 3: September Surprise: 50 bps Cut and a Dissent! Now we're getting to the good stuff! Back in September, the Fed shocked everyone with a whopping 50 basis point rate cut AND a dissent from one of the Governors. Talk about a plot twist! This was the moment the author really started pounding the table about the Fed's dovish turn, and it set the stage for the rest of the year's easing action.

Number 2: Market Memers Bow Down, Allow the Powell Rangers to Skate the Clock Out! The tension was palpable as December arrived. The Powell Rangers, bruised and battered from a season of battling inflation, were clinging to a narrow lead. Suddenly, the crowd erupted! Whispers of "normalization cuts" sent those 2-year yields tumbling faster than a meme stock on a bad day. The Memers, caught off guard by the Rangers' unexpected agility, could only watch in disbelief as the bond market surrendered. Victory was within reach!

And the Number 1 Play: Powell Rangers Snatch Victory from the Jaws of Defeat! The final whistle blew, and the scoreboard lit up with a second consecutive rate cut. The Powell Rangers had done it again! They had faced down inflation, navigated a treacherous yield curve, and emerged victorious. Sure, there were a few stumbles along the way (that Hammack dissent had some folks scratching their heads), but in the end, they proved that experience and a little bit of luck can go a long way. The Memers, left wondering what just happened, retreated to their locker room, vowing to return next season with a vengeance. But for now, the Powell Rangers are hoisting the trophy, basking in the glory of their hard-fought win.

Daily Economic Update: December 18, 2024

FOMC day is here, what presents will Powell come bearing to the markets?  Whatever the Fed does, it won't stop Fartcoin.

Dow losing streak is now the longest since the 70’s and that’s despite Nvidia being a Dow member and despite a strong retail sales print. Speaking of the Dow does anyone remember the “Dogs of the Dow” investment strategy?  I wonder if that would work these days.  Value stocks generally have been taking it on the chin.

In terms of retail sales data, core retail sales rose 0.4%  while headline sales rose 0.7% with auto sales being strong.  The industrial production and manufacturing data came in weaker than expected apparently due to declines related to aircraft.  The ATL Fed lowered their GDP estimate from 3.3% to 3.1%.

In yield land things were little changed despite a relatively poor 20Y auction.  The 2Y is 4.25% and the 10Y is 4.40%.  Kind of hard to believe UK 10Y Gilts are up at 4.50%, even higher than when the head of lettuce was on YouTube.  In dollar land the dollar remains strong.   

In politics, the Canadian govt. in apparently in turmoil as a result of Trump's planned tariffs, which I guess means they are joining the ranks of Germany and  France as developed countries where leadership is in doubt.

XTOD: Please stop using hashtags. The system doesn’t need them anymore and they look ugly.

XTOD: Hedge fund managers will raise billions and hire teams of Ivy League grads just to underperform degen 14 year olds trading Fartcoin in their mom’s basements

XTOD: The 2025 outlook for the Fed will hinge on two defining debates:  1) What's a neutral rate for the post-pandemic economy?  2) How do policy changes (trade, tax, immigation, regulation) change the inflation forecast and the risks around it?

XTOD: “I don’t know how to predict the stock market, I don’t know how to predict interest rates, I don’t know how to predict business. All I know is if I buy the right kind of business at the right price with the right people I’ll do well over time.”   — Warren Buffett

XTOD: The ideal form of work feels like play, but still accomplishes something useful and valuable. 

Joyful for you. Helpful to others.

Daily Economic Update: December 17, 2024

Apollo's Slok warns of higher rates in 2025 and the risk that 2025 will be a repeat of 2022 where both stocks and bonds performed poorly.  Not everyone agrees obviously, after all differences of opinions make a market.

Yesterday's Empire Mfg survey, which is always volatile in my opinion, was weaker than expected with falling new orders, shipments and employment.  In S&P PMI data the services sector looked good and manufacturing weaker...I think the U.S. is described as a service based economy, so I guess this is good.

Stocks mostly up, at least the techy ones that matter, market breadth is terrible and the Dow is on an eight day losing streak.  Yields were up too. The 2Y is 4.26%  and the 10Y is 4.40%.

What does the data matter anyway when Bitcoin is around $110K and Microstrategy is you know doing some arb (or con?).   China's economy seems broken, or broke, I'm not sure.  Brazil appears to be in bad shape too. Does anyone even temember BRICs anyway (it was coined by Goldman in 2001) ?  And we still don't know much about these drones, are they sniffing for nuclear material, who knows.  Drones aren't stopping Masa Son from reportedly looking to invest $100 billion in the U.S. over the next 4 years.

On the day ahead it's Retail Sales, Industrial Production, 20Y Auction.

XTOD: Powell is (again) trying to find the right gear for monetary policy amid signs the labor market is less wobbly and inflation is a touch firmer than they appeared in September.   He faces misgivings from some colleagues over continuing to cut and less conviction from others who strongly backed those first two moves.   Given current market expectations of a cut, the path of least resistance would be to cut by a quarter point, and then use new economic projections to strongly hint that the central bank is ready to go more slowly on the reductions.  Full story (no paywall in the link) has more details on the delicate steps officials took to arrive at this point: https://wsj.com/economy/central-banking/fed-interest-rate-cut-outlook-2025-657e718a?st=U6AjWz&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

XTOD: The way I like to put it is that my job is to say the same few things 50-100 times a year, but do so without either my editors or my readers noticing that I’m repeating myself.   It’s harder to do than it sounds, though.

XTOD: You must understand the following: In order to master a field, you must love the subject and feel a profound connection to it.  Your interest must transcend the field itself and border on the religious.

Daily Economic Update: December 16, 2024

FOMC week starts with the major indexes on a losing streak and bond yields having recently crept back a little higher off their lows.  Nonetheless the cake is baked for a 25bp cut this Wednesday.  We'll get BoE and BoJ in the mix as well to make this week truly a holiday treat.  In less of a holiday treat, S. Korea impeached their president following the recent attempted maritial law debacle. 

Of course investors are still excited about a deregulatory push, low taxes, and generally pro business policies, along with a Fed that is likely to have their back in 2025.  There is seemingly less concern about "frothy valuations" despite valuation metrics putting the current market on par with other "bubbles" in hisotry.  Time will tell.

Beyond that drones and nobody watches the NBA this year.  

On the week ahead:

Monday: S&P PMI's

Tuesday: Retail Sales, Industrial Production, 20Y Auction

Wednesday: Building Permits, Housing Starts and FOMC

Thursday: BoE,  3Q GDP Final read, Jobless Claims, New Home Sales

Friday:  PCE, UofM

XTOD: Michael Saylor's $MSTR is added to the Nasdaq on December 23rd.  Meanwhile, Interactive Brokers CEO is warning about a massive margin call on Bitcoin loans...  This is the perfect storm.

XTOD: ZIRP and “passive flows” are I think the two most overrated phenomena of the last 15 years. I think basically any story about markets since the GFC has to start (and probably end) with the extraordinary realized earnings growth of a handful of gigantic tech companies.

XTOD: Starting a company is awesome if you want to feel like a piece of shit one day and king of the universe next day and just keep alternating back and forth forever and ever

XTOD: In any case, the idea that spreads matter more than levels seems like an important idea. Same idea holds for the yield curve. A Friedman rule for the yield curve would likely argue for a flat yield curve most of the time.

XTOD: Love this insight from John Bragg on keeping costs low.  "It’s a fact that a low-cost producer can become a great marketer. The easiest profits come on the cost side. A dollar saved in expenses goes directly to the bottom line. We have a saying that goes like this: “You cannot sell your way to prosperity.” By this I mean—don’t try to fix the problems by sales alone. Get the operations fixed and then work on sales."   My episode on The Knowledge Project Podcast with Bragg is one of the most listened to in 2024!

XTOD: “When you go through life with preferences but don’t let your happiness depend on any one of them, then you’re awake.” — Anthony de Mello

Daily Economic Update: December 13, 2024

I wrote this entry while trapped in a NYC subway, contracting bird flu, while examing pictures for evidence of unibrow or no unibrow, while checking the value of my Hawk Tauh coins and being spied on by a drone. 

Central banks cut rates cause that's what central bankers like to do: the ECB cuts 25bps as expected, with Lagarde signaling future cuts, but with no major urgency while growth is forecast slower. SNB surprised with a 50bp cut bringing their rate to 50bps while indicating further cuts could be possible.

Stateside PPI comes in at 0.4% MoM, double the consensus estimate, while the "core" was lower, things like goods and food remained hot and the trend in PPI isn't going the direction the Fed wants.

Jobless claims came in above expectations.

Heading into a near holiday Friday we had stocks down and yields up.  The 10Y reclaimined 4.30% up to 4.33% while the 2Y hit 4.20%.

XTOD: Ackman: "We're stepping into the most pro-growth, pro-business, pro-American administration I've perhaps seen in my adult lifetime."

XTOD: Watch Steve Liesman squirm as he realizes the BLS is finally publishing catch-up inflation data now that the election is over:

XTOD: OH: "We were promised flying cars, and all we got was a large-scale alien drone invasion in New Jersey."

XTOD: I’m so glad that I made the right financial decision in 2018 and ditched my $89/mo cable package so that I can now pay $83/mo for YouTube TV, $23/mo for Netflix, $16/mo for Disney+, $13/mo for Paramount, $15/mo for Prime, $10/mo for AppleTV, and $21/mo for HBO

XTOD: He was contented because he was wealthy, and wealthy because he was contented. 

- Russell Herman Conwell (Acres of Diamonds)

Daily Economic Update: December 12, 2024

Yesterday's inflation print was described with terms like "warm" and "sticky".  Lodging and used car prices were the risers while OER finally showed some signs of softening and the markets initial reaction was to send yields lower and stocks higher.  The 10Y Auction went swimmingly with the highest bid to cover in history reportedly, though yields eventually backed up some post auction.  We head into today's PPI print with a 2Y at 4.16% and the 10Y at 4.27%.  Probability of a 25bp Fed cut next week hover around 90%.

Nasdaq 20k for the first time as quantum computing propels Alphabet and AI propels everything else. Bitcoin crossed 100k again as I guess quantum computing breaking encryption isn’t a concern, although as some have pointed out it’s equally concerning for traditional finance…problems for another day I suppose.

Up in Canada they cut 50bps bringing their benchmark rate down to 3.25% while signaling they may not be cutting much more and of course some concern over the impact of the incoming U.S. adminstration.  We'll see what the ECB has to say today as they are expected to cut 25bps.

On the day ahead it's the ECB and PPI.

XTOD: Inflation came in a touch above expected, with core CPI at an annual rate:

1 month: 3.8%

3 months: 3.7%

6 months: 2.9%

12 months: 3.3% 

The last mile is proving very, very stubborn.   Core CPI up 3.7% (annual rate) over the last 3 months. That is at the 98th percentile of performance from 1992-2019.  You can make excuses about noisy factors. But there were a lot of 3 month periods during those decades with noisy factors too--but only 2% got above this.

XTOD: Nomura Securities, for example (Japan's stock brokerage Goliath) issued a report just before the market peaked on Christmas day 1989 explaining how Japan's insane PE ratios were perfectly rationale. Then "pop!": The Nikkei took over 30 years to regain that peak.....So be warned: "commeth the hour, commeth the man". Or in our current financial market asylum: "commeth the bubble, commeth the bullshit". Most Wall Street practitioners are well-paid tarts. If you want to feel better buying Nasdaq up here, they will help you with that.  But be warned: having slept with these Wall Street tarts, one morning--in the not too distant future--you will wake up full of remorse, self-loathing and a financial STD.

XTOD: It’s still beyond unfathomable to me that these NFL teams are voluntarily passing on the greatest football coach to ever live because he has a method that works better than theirs and they can’t learn it or choose not to try to. UNC’s gain.

XTOD: Text a coworker at a random time “are you joining this meeting?” as a fun holiday prank

XTOD: Do not confuse things that are hard with things that are valuable.  Many things in life are hard. Just because you are giving a great effort does not mean you are working toward a great result.  Make sure that mountain is worth climbing.

Daily Economic Update: December 11, 2024

Inflation data begins with CPI today, with estimates for YoY core inflation at 3.3% and headline ticking up to 2.7%.  Stocks have been little changed to down ahead of CPI.  Small business seems opitimistic adding to post-election data sets that show solid expectations for 2025.  The 3Y note auction tailed slightly with weak indirects.  Heading into CPI, the 2Y is 4.16%, the 10Y is 4.22%.

In Asia, Chinese record low yields are in place despite Monday’s stimulus announcement. The stimulus headlines kind of remind me of Evergrande headlines that were seemingly recycled for 2 years (more?) as the real estate market collapsed.   Also in APAC, the RBA held rates, though indicated a case for cutting rates in February, of course dependent upon the data.

You don’t have bird flu yet, so that’s good.

CPI is the highlight and the 10Y auction is also on the docket.  If you're into Canada we get a BoC decision too. 

XTOD: A smaller share of Americans moved in 2023 than ... ever.  New from @uscensusbureau

 at https://census.gov/data/tables/2023/demo/geographic-mobility/cps-2023.html

XTOD: "SpaceX Share Sale Values Company at About $350 Billion  Tender offer includes $1.25 billion of stock at $185 a share. " Bloomberg  Employee liquidity FTW!

XTOD: US TREASURY SECRETARY YELLEN: I AM CONCERNED ABOUT FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY, DEFICITS NEED TO BE BROUGHT DOWN......a parting gift? You can't make this **** up!

XTOD: Bitcoin has totally lost its way. The purpose of Bitcoin "A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System" as Satoshi Nakamoto designed it was for a stateless, decentralized, permissionless payment mechanism that was capable of scaling to VISA-level transactions that were cheap enough to support both sub-cent micro-payments as well as large payments. This is the true value proposition as widespread adoption of payments through this system would literally free people from both the banking system and some degree of government coercion while it's fixed scarcity would also limit the #inflationary monetary malfeasance common with central banks. Nowhere in the Bitcoin whitepaper is it mentioned that Bitcoin was intended to be HODLed by a very few in order to drive the price up so that then, financial con-artists like @saylor  could bamboozal the world through reckless financial engineering. Nowhere in the whitepaper was it mentioned that it would be really great for Bitcoin to "go to the moon" after retail investors used  @BlackRock  ETFs to access only the price of Bitcoin without any possibility of custody of their own Satts. Nowhere in the whitepaper is it mentioned that there was no real way for it to scale (because of artificial block size limits) and therefore in order for Bitcoin to actually empower transactions for all, we would need some diminutive technology ignorant anarcho-gobblin like @jackmallers  to come along and create a new layer that somehow, magically would make good on the promise of global cheap transactions at scale. All we are seeing today is a massive speculative orgy with almost no real adoption and certainly no hope for the true vision of Satoshi Nakamoto.

XTOD: Stop trying to be spectacular. Start being consistent. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GecX55RXUAARhIQ?format=png&name=900x900

Daily Economic Update: December 10, 2024

Today's post was written while large unidentified drones surveilled my laptop...add that to your 2024 bingo card.

Equity markets traded lower as news of Nvidia being under investigation for monopoly by China seemed to dampen the mood.  Bond yields rose slightly as oil continued to trade higher on the back of middle east instablity.  The 2Y is 4.13% and the 10Y is 4.20%, both relatively range bond as we approach inflation data and major central bank decisions over the next week. 

With Nvidia in the news, relating to AI, I thought this was an interesting take from Marathon Asset Management's podcast The Capital Cycle Podcast. The guest, Kai Chen, provided the following: 

"I always think in the technology world, in the semiconductor world, there is Moore's law and then in AI there is the scaling law.  And at Marathon we have the law of capital cycles, which suggest excessive investment is often followed by poor returns.  And I think this is kind of what we are observing.  There is a huge amount of investment fueled by the idea that the scaling law will continue.....but if the scaling law starts to slow down, then what we are going to end up with is massive overcapcity."

In economic "data", the NY Fed SCE was out and generally showed optimistic consumers who are increasing their inflation expectations at all horizons.  While inflation expectations rose, so did uncertainty about inflation.  In general consumers think they'll keep their jobs and get paid more in the coming year.  These two summary points might tell you all you need to know about where we are in terms of risk perception in the economy:  The share of households expecting a better financial situation in one year from now rising rose to its highest levels since February 2020, while the share expecting a worse financial situation fell to its lowest level since May 2021. The mean perceived probability that U.S. stock prices will be higher 12 months from now increased by 1.3 percentage points to 40.4%.

Within economics, I always enjoy economist Allison Schrager and her latest piece she expresses concerns that the economy might not fully grasp what a prolonger period of higher interest rates after such a prolonged period of low interest rates.  She calls out recent homebuyers using ARMs and Private Credit as two areas of potential concern.  She concludes her section of concerns with this: 

"On a related note, the push to get more retail investors into private assets needs to stop. I’m not against private markets—they provide value and have a role in institutional portfolios. But private equity and credit have likely grown beyond optimal size, another byproduct of near-zero rates. Shrinking them back to size might create challenges."

Away from markets, though tangental I suppose, there is a suspect in custody in the murder of the United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson.  The suspect is a 26 year old as was reportedly carrying a three-page document which suggests, “He seems that he has some ill will toward corporate America,” police said.  In addition it appears he was a fairly recent graduate of UPenn.  The closest historical account that comes to mind as a parallel to this sort of vitriol toward corporate executives is the attempt on the life of "robber baron" Henry Clay Frick of Carnegie Steel back in 1892.

Further afield you have Jay-Z now firmly entangled with Diddy via allegations filed in court...just mentioning so you don't have to hear about geopolitics in this post.

Speaking of entanglements, have you ever heard of "quantum entanglement"?  It's over my head, but quantum entanglement is the backbone of quantum computing.  Google made some announcements in quantum computing with a chip called "Willow"  I don't know enough but does this mean crytpo won't really be secure?  

3Y Note sale is the highlight today.

XTOD: Me waking up my 8 year old son tomorrow at 4 am to hit the batting cages after Soto got $750 mil.

XTOD: Luigi Mangione, the champagne antifa loser who attended Penn and the $40k-a-year private Gilman prep school before murdering Brian Thompson in New York last week, appears to be a beneficiary of the vast Mangione family real estate empire in Baltimore founded by his grandfather.  Among other Mangione family assets in Baltimore that supported Luigi's expensive private education were the Lorien Health Services chain of nursing homes, the Turf Valley Resort, the Hayfields Country Club, and numerous other holdings of real estate, hotels & radio stations.

XTOD: A record $140 billion pumped into US equities since the election, dwarfing any other time (Source: FT).  Huge incremental demand (this money must be used to buy stocks) + Limited supply (few are selling) = Stock prices go up. Ceteris paribus, it’s just how it works.

XTOD: If you're hungry but too lazy to prepare healthy food, you'll consume junk food. If you're hungry for knowledge but too lazy to seek out the truth, you'll consume misinformation.

XTOD: Time is money but money is not time.