Market Domination host Josh Lipton and guest host, Bullseye American Ingenuity Fund Portfolio Manager Adam Johnson, recap Friday's market action following the closing bell.
Michael Reynolds, vice president of investment strategy at Glenmede, joins the program to speak on what interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve could mean for small-cap stocks.
Yahoo Finance's senior reports also come on to discuss the bullish sentiment being communicated by Wall Street after the rally stirred by US-China trade talks, as well as what to look for in Congress' latest tax bill draft.
To watch more expert insights and analysis on the latest market action, check out more Market Domination Overtime here.
That is the closing bell on Wall Street, and now it's market domination over time. Still with me is Adam Johnson, Bullseye, American Ingenuity Fund, portfolio manager, and we're joined now by Jared Blickery to get you up to speed on the action from today's trade. First, let's see where the major averages ended up. I'll tell you where they ended up. They ended up in the green. We've got the Dow up more than 330 points. I got the S&P 500.Gauge tax on 7.1% and the tech heavy Nasdaq up 0.5%. The Russell 2000 meanwhile up about 9.1%. Yes, I know we got that consumer sentiment report this morning. It was weak, but it looks like investors were going to look right through that, concentrate instead on trade and tariffs. The US-China trade truce. We also have this report from the FT.Financial Times saying the US and the EU broke an impasse to enable tariff talks. Bottom line, green across all your popular averages today. Now over to Jared for a closer look at today's sector action.
Thank you, Josh. It is a bullish day and a bullish week. Here's the Dow. It is a laggard this week, but it's up 0.1% this day. And let's check out the 5 day price.where we can see up 3.5% basically Nasdaq the leader up 7%. This is the 3rd week out of 6 that the Nasdaq and the Nasdaq 100 have been up more than 6%. So just flying high here. Here's the S&P 500 up all 5 days this week along with the Nasdaq up about 5%. So tack that on and let's take a look at the S&P 600, some small cap action.That is up 4.5%. Uh, the bond market, we're gonna talk about this, Josh, in about 30 minutes, but the bond market, the 30 year kissed 5.0%, but it, uh, declined today. Here's the intraday view right there, but, uh, that has some implications for risk markets if it goes above that, we're gonna talk about that in a little bit. Let's just skip over to some heat maps and figure out what the sector action is telling us for the day and, uh, healthcare has had a tough time this week.Not today. It is leading the pack. Call it a bounce back. Call it what you want, but it is a leader up 2%. After that we have utilities, real estate, and staples. So if you're looking at the top 4 here, that is a defensive kind of set up, uh, despite all the bullishness that we've had this week. Here's a 5 day look though tech in the pole position that is up almost 8%, followed by consumer discretionary and industrials, all three of those outperforming.And let's get a 5 day look at the Nasdaq 100 as well. Look at that Tesla up 17%, Nvidia up 16%. Best week in, uh, just a few weeks because we've been having a number of good weeks recently.And I'll get, I'll close here on the Dow, where we can see a lot of green. The only red spots, J&J 2% to the downside, UnitedHealth 23%. That stock has been cut in half from its high one month ago. But aside from that, uh, we're looking at some really bullish action in a broad swath of sectors here, and I'll send it back to you on that.
Thankyou, Jared. For more on this week's market action, let's welcome in here Michael Reynolds, Glenn Mead, VP of Investment strategy. It is good to see.So, let's talk about today's market action, Michael, because green across the screen here today. I know we had that consumer sentiment reading this morning and it was weak, but it seems like investors are going to look through that. They're concentrating, it seems, Michael, on trade, on tariffs, on what they see is this de-escalation perhaps on that front. I got an FT headline here. The US and the EU broke an impasse to enable tariff talks. What do you make of it, Michael? What are you telling clients?
Yeah, thanks for having me. And look, S&P 5 for 5 this week, a really strong week. Not even Aaron Judge goes 5 for 5, and he's having a great year, but we're looking at really the fundamental narrative right now is, is still focused on trade, and we think the best way to think about this is to perceive whether or not the administration is looking at this more ideologically versus practically, and we'd argue that we were at peak ideology at liberation Day.But ever since then we've been pulling back on that trade deals have at least been getting positive headlines, if not actual agreements with some countries like the UK, which have given people a little bit more visibility into just how the administration is thinking about this, and it is looking considerably more practical than I think a lot of people had feared, so it doesn't surprise us that the market's getting quite a bit more constructive here.
And Michael, when you, when you're looking at opportunities in the stock market right now, where do you want to be positioned, Michael? What are you screening for?
Well, we're looking for some of the things that have been hit hard most over the course of this year so far, and really our eyes are pretty firmly focused right now on small caps where they actually came into the year with we would call fair valuations, but actually now sit at decent discount valuations, and we do think that they could be relative beneficiaries if we are pulling back from the brink on trade here. We think earnings could have the ability to outpace large cap earnings in 2025 and perhaps even beyond then.Uh, so it's sort of picking through the opportunities I think further down the capitalization spectrum is probably where investors are gonna get the best bang for their buck rightnow.
Michael, I too, Adam Johnson here. I too am long small caps. I call it my any day now trade because they just can't seem to get going. Um, do we need rate cuts for small caps to suddenly come back to life so that those forward discount rates go down and you can afford to actually pay more for the stocks now?
It certainly wouldn't hurt if we start to see rate cuts come through that could really be put a bid underneath small caps. We look at the composition of debt underneath a lot of the small cap indexes in general and quite a bit more floating rate debt on those balance sheets. So if the Fed starts to take rates lower, you can actually see direct benefits on the profitability of these companies. Uh, if we start to see those rate cuts come through with the, the call it the back half of this year, our base case is about 2 or 3 that we'll get.Uh, that could really be something that sort of just boosts the opportunity we see there. What you
definitely want to get at, Michael, speaking of that, what about the Fed's recent decision here, stand pat this kind of a wait and see approach, is that the right one, Michael?
We feel like it is. We're looking at the same data they are where the labor market looks fine. Inflation actually moving in the right direction when we look at on a 3 month annualized basis. I think if we weren't dealing with tariffs, the Fed would be really happy with where things sit.But of course we do know that these tariffs are out there still and they still do represent a relatively inflationary force that we just still don't know the full information about how it's going to proliferate through the economy. Taking a wait and see approach, I think the Fed has the luxury to do that because the economy is held up so well going into this.And again, our base case is probably back half of this year. You start to see the Fed pull the trigger on a few more rate cuts. 2 to 3 is our base case, but if you start to see inflation getting sticky, it's probably fewer rate cuts. If you start to see the economy take a little bit of more of a hit than people are expecting, expect more rate cuts. So there's actually a pretty wide band of expectations, but.Middle of the road 2 to 3 rate cuts. Yeah,
it is a wide band and Michael, here's, here's my gripe CPI went all the way up to over 9%. PPI went above 11%, and now you got both PPI and CPI down in the uh low 2s with a target of 2. So doesn't that justify more rate cuts than what we've seen so far?
It does, but past performance is not indicative of future results. You work in an industry, you hear that quite often, and it's again, the Fed knows something that just isn't showing up in the data yet. It's that tariffs we, we do know that it's gonna show up in some places perhaps more quickly than others, but I think will give the Fed a little bit of an advance notice. We're looking at things like apparel where a large portion of those come from overseas and your inventory turnover ratios are actually pretty swift for apparel.So if they start to see major groups like Apparel come through footwear, uh, electronics without really big price increases, it may give them the confidence that this just may not be coming through as big as some people had feared, but it's just still too early to tell.
Michael, great having you on on the show today. Thank you for your time. Appreciate it.The GOP-led House Budget Committee votes down President Trump's sweeping tax and spending bill, bill facing several forms of opposition. Here to break it all down for us, Washington correspondent Ben Workel. Ben.
Hey Josh, yes, so today was a tough day for President Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson's efforts on this House reconciliation package. As you mentioned, this has, this is a bill that has some opposition on varied fronts, and today it was the fiscal hawks who really sort of made their voice felt. This is a group of conservatives who in the House Budget Committee joined with Democrats, and this is even after Trump posted online to kind of yell at them online to vote to deny advancement for this bill, and the issue.Here is the cost of this bill. This is a bill that according to the Committee on a responsible Federal Budget could lead to $3.2 trillion in new government borrowing. This is just new government borrowing over the next decade if it passes as is, and there's, and there's lots of amendments that could be coming that would that would increase that even further. And these are, these are, these are hardline Republicans, fiscal conservatives who this is their number one priority is keeping the cost of this bill under control, and it led to a real.Remarkable scene today on Capitol Hill where you had some of the hardest, the most conservative Republicans you'll ever find calling this bill quote smoke and mirrors or in need of profound changes. So there's there's real deep opposition here that Mike Johnson is going to have a hard time getting ahead, getting ahead of and the way these things work is this is kind of like a daisy chain where all this now this now sort of moves everything further down the line and it immediately calls into question Johnson's effort to get.Bill passed to the House by Memorial Day in about a week's time and then it raises questions further about the overall Republican efforts to get this to Trump's desk by the end of the summer by by July or so as for the next shoe to drop for people who don't have weekend plans, the budget committee is going to try again, and they announced a time, an auspicious time for this. They're going to reconvene Sunday night at 10 p.m., so at 100 p.m. on Sunday night hearing to kind of take this vote again.They need to get over this step before they can do the ones they had.
Ben, I love it. I'm so glad you just mentioned that there's yet another step. I've become so skeptical of Washington. You talk about deep, uh, opposition, I would say deep grandstanding. Um, so is, is, is there a realistic expectation that this just gave an opportunity for the, uh, fiscal hawks to basically say no, we are standing our ground. They made their point and now behind the scenes, behind closed doors, things start to happen.And then maybe Sunday night at 10 o'clock we get some sort of magical breakthrough
for sure, yeah, here in Washington, things tend to nothing tends to happen for a long time and then it happens very quickly right at the end. There's there's a few front to this, and I think there's some where you can kind of clearly see the way this ends. Salt, the salt tax deduction is a big element of this, and there's clearly elements of compromise here. The Medicaid piece of this, I would caution people, you have two groups that want.Essentially opposite things. There's one that wants to protect Republicans that want to protect Medicaid, and they realize that sort of denying health care for a lot of people, which would happen if this passed, is something they're opposed to. And then these fiscal conservatives who, who want increased cuts there. So that's gonna be a harder one to solve, but to your point, you know, there's a lot of kind of last minute things that'll happen and we could see sort of this going forward. The timing is very much in question though. Alright,
Ben, thank you, buddy, enjoy the weekend.The recent stock market rally fueled by President Trump's tariff relief and trade negotiations, drawing caution from some strategists. Yahoo Finance and Es Fre joins us now to discuss with Yahoo Finance's weekly investor playbook, Iz.
Yeah, Josh, and the strategists that we spoke with are cautious. They're basically saying that this rally, really, it was, it bounced back, stocks bounced back very quickly. It's been a sharp rally. There may be some overextension happening. And let me just show you this quote from Jeffrey Kleintop from Charles Schwab, basically saying that he's concerned of the magnitude of the rally that we've seen coming back that the market might beA little bit too enthusiastic that the trade worries are behind us because even though we've had this breakthrough when it comes to the US and China, the US and the UK, analysts are still saying that you're looking at the tariff rate that's still higher than what it was at the beginning of the year. UBS this week saying that it's about 6 times higher. So without concrete deals really inked and signed.And analysts are saying that there's still quite a bit of uncertainty now. We have had a good earnings season over the last for the first quarter, but still you had a lot of management that talked about uncertainty. You've had some guidance polls as well. And then you had Walmart this week that was basically saying that they may have to increase prices just because you still are seeing the tariff rates that are higher than at the beginning.Of the year as far as where strategists are saying that investors can put their money, well, first of all they're saying think long term, don't follow these short term moves, but they're also looking at defensive and there's defensives and they're looking at in international markets also Europe because as one strategist put it, Europe is not in a trade war and also they are beefing up their defense.
Thank you, Nez appreciate it. Thank you. Stick around, much more market domination over time. That's still to come.Volatility coming in sharply from early April highs. Investors' sentiment shifts from being extremely fearful to jumping back into risky assets. So what does this mean for the options market? Well, joining us here to discuss is explosive options technical analysts. That would be Bob Lang in the options playbook sponsored by Tastrade. Bob, it is good to see you. So I know you have a couple of specific trades for us, Bob, but maybe, why don't we start high level, your broad take on the options market, Bob. Let's just walk me through the trends, the themes you're seeing.
Always great to be with you, Josh. Thanks for having me today. So, uh, we, we've had a huge drop in volatility over the past, uh, you know, 2.5, uh, 2 months, maybe, uh, 6 weeks. 71% drop in, in the VIX from the peak on April 2nd, which was at 60% and all the way down to about 17, which is kind of where we were at at the end of March before that surge happened in volatility.Um, many participants basically, you know, are have started buying calls again, Josh, and, you know, they looked at this, uh, this drop in volatility over the past couple of weeks as a sign to go ahead and get in, less fear. One of the reasons why the volatility went up so much is because the investor sentiment was so poor and there was so much worry of beenabout the uncertainty with tariffs and what was on the table there and how it was going to settle out and whether inflation was going to be continued to rage on and the Fed not not positioning for rate cuts. So all these things considered, the market volatility came down quite a bit and it's been a pleasant to see on
the VIX, Bob, you know, we are, you know, sub 20 here. What do you think we head next, Bob? I mean, going back to low teens.
Well, uh, we could get down to the low teens, Josh, but, but one thing that concerns me is that the market is starting to look very complacent right now. And what does that mean? That means it, uh, we have a lot of investors that are, uh, clamoring to get back into the stock market. Maybe they, they were sitting on the sidelines for a while, and we saw a lot of that volatility start to rise up towards that 55-60 level, and they said, you know what, I'm just gonna wait and be patient and sit it out for a little bit. Well, some of those people are starting to come back on.back into the game and usually when it's retail investors or maybe even some big institutions, they're coming in late late to the party and that means that they're going to get smacked around before the before the the market turns starts to turn down again. So I think that that's that's a huge worry right now. I think market complacency means that you have to buy some.Protection right now you have to buy puts the puts are very cheap right now. The options market are telling, is telling you that there's not uh an expectation of a big move up or down. So it's, it's, when, when do those big moves happen? When surprises happen, like we had a big surprise back in April 2nd when uh you know, the markets really did not seem to like what.The news from President Trump about tariffs and the markets came down quite sharply, very quick, very quickly. So those sort of surprises happen all the time. So I think that this is something we have to be worried about concerned right at this point.
Yeah, hey Bob, Adam Johnson, I hear you and I understand on your comment that the market has come a long way and now all of a sudden everyone saying, oh, train left the station, I better jump on. But think about what we're trying to do.Here, um, timing markets is very hard. I mean, you had to be right 6 weeks ago at the bottom and now you're saying, oh, it's kind of toppy, so we gotta be right again. Well, that means then it'll go down and then 2 weeks from then we gotta pick the bottom and then we gotta go pick a top. I mean that's nobody, nobody's that good. I mean, I'm not that good. You're not no nobody's that good. um, why not just focus on individual stocks and let the market do its thing and just, just write out high quality names.
Great to see you, Adam. So, uh, one of the things that we, we, we've learned about markets is that, uh, you're either in one of two different markets. You're either in a stock market or a market of stocks. And so what you're talking about it being a stock picker is in a market of stocks and it's really it's a great environment if you're a stock picker to add alpha to your, uh,Portfolios, add output to your, for your client's money. But the, the problem is that, you know, again, as you, as you allude to trying to time the market. I'm not a market timer. I'm a terrible market timer when it comes to trying to get in and get out at certain periods of time, but I, I follow trends and I follow momentum.And money flows. These are the sort of things that work for me and work for, for most, uh, most people, especially technicians, um, but it also works for fundamentalists too. I know uh there's a lot of fundamental uh investors out there who follow, uh, you know, uh, uh, you know, AA reports and follow the business cycle and so forth, but they're also closet technicians too, and they realized that uh there's some value there in findingUh, uh, finding the technicals, um, moving upwards and downwards with markets. So I think that uh you, you make a great point as far as finding the market, it's very difficult to do, but I think for the most part, um, as long as you stay long in this market, if you're a long-term investor, that's all you need to do.
And Bob, you, you have a couple of trades with us. I want to get to those as well. One is core weave, Bob, walk us through it.
Boyor, we had a great earnings report and the revenue growth was just spectacular, Josh, and, and, and, and frankly, I had an amazing day today. It was up 21% today. I didn't expect that large move to happen right out of the gate, but of course this is their first earnings report after they went public just about 6.5 weeks ago.Um, the stock is really tied into Nvidia and Microsoft. 70% of the revenue coming from both of those companies together. They had huge revenue growth, huge earning surge as well too. They said on the call that they don't see any slowdown in their business from demand from their customers. Shares have been accumulated lately, according to the shake and money flow.And that is a big sign that institutional investors are coming in in a big way. Indicators here are bullish, and even though the chart shows only 6 weeks' worth of action, it, you know, I think today is indicative of the fact that the stock is is in a massive squeeze, short squeeze up here. I think it's got room to get up to 100, maybe 110 before it's over. And
finally, Bob, another trade for us, Robin Hood.
Love Robin Hood, um, you know, again, there's another stock that's tied to something else. It's mostly tied to crypto, but also, you know, you get the backing of somebody like Ken Griffin who runs Citadel, and this guy, um, is when he touches things, it turns, turns to gold.Um, the, the transformation that Robin Hood has made over the past year, year and a half has been fantastic. They came up with unbelievable earnings and revenue growth just about a month or so ago. The stock did pull back a little bit after some, uh, some, some, a nice surge and a little bit of profit taking here. Um, it is, again, it is tied to uh crypto, it's tied to Bitcoin. Uh, the more, uh, we see Bitcoin going up, we see more, the more, uh, we see Robin Hood.Going higher as well too. They're they're grabbing share from other brokerages like Schwab and Interactive, and I, I see there's just a huge runway for success for Robin Hood. Institutions own 35% of the of the stock. The chart is, uh, it looks like it's very expensive here, but it's just finishing up an explosive inverse head and shoulders pattern, which is one of the most bullish patterns in the technical analysis universe. So I'm looking for a little bit of a slight pullback to buy the.
Bob, always appreciate your time in those trades. Thank
you. Great to be with you, Josh.
Alright, time now for what to watch next week. Start off here on the earnings front. Expect to hear first quarter results from Target, Lowe's, and Home Depot. Investors keeping an eye on commentary regarding guidance after Walmart, remember, warned of price hikes due to the magnitude of Trump tariffs. Toll Brothers meanwhile gearing up to report second core results, the home construction company to shed light on the state of housing as home builder sentiment we know continues to decline.Into it to announce 3rd quarter results on Thursday, analysts saying the company poised to meet estimates. Investors can also expect to hear first quarter results from Chinese EV maker Expo. As for the Federal Reserve, a slew of officials are expected to speak. New York Fed President John Williams, Boston Fed President Susan Collins, Fed Governor Adriana Kugler, Michelle Bowman, and Lisa Cook all expected to make remarks during the week. Markets to keep watch on commentary.Regarding the path for interest rates as the central bank is in wait and see mode amid tariff inflation uncertainty. And lastly, fresh update on sales in the housing market on Thursday, data on existing home sales set to release for the month of April. Economists expecting sales to rise 2% on a month over month basis. Then on Friday morning we get the latest on new home sales, which are expected to fall nearly 5% month over month in April.Well, that'll do it for today's market domination overtime. Be sure to come back Monday at 3 p.m. Eastern for all of your coverage leading up to and after the closing bell, but don't go anywhere on the other side of break. It is asking for a trend, and we have you covered for the next half hour with the latest and greatest market moving stories so you can get ahead of the themes affecting your money. Stay tuned.