Happy Friday,

Yesterday was the most exciting day in what has been a pretty boring week thus far. It was the two-month anniversary of the Knicks Championship win, there was a full slate of NFL preseason games (26 days until the regular season starts), Kyle Schwarber hit multiple homeruns in the Field of Dreams game, it was my daughter’s birthday and US markets rallied with the S&P 500 hitting a new all-time high. Treasury yields pulled back after a slightly better than expected PPI reading helping to put a bid under equity markets. The S&P 500 closed up 0.7% briefly trading above 7,800. Tech outperformed with the NYSE 100 index up 1.2%. Memory stocks led the way after SanDisk provide updated guidance for 2028 - 2030, expecting high teen revenue growth while maintaining 80% margins. Hardware and chip stocks also traded well. Software ripped into the close after Reuters reported that Workday was in talks with private equity firm Silver Lake. Outside of tech yield-oriented sectors outperformed. The materials sector was down 0.7% with miners and ag chemical companies under pressure as commodities sold off.

It is another pretty quiet morning with US futures trading on either side of unchanged. The administration has now pivoted back to economic pressure with Treasury Secretary Bessent saying there will be unprecedented economic isolation with details to be released next week. Oil prices moved higher overnight but have since reversed course trading slightly lower. Retail sales unexpectedly fell 0.6%, the largest drop since Feb. 2023. Ex-autos and the control group, which feeds into GDP, both fell as well. Two caveats within the data - gas stations fell 0.9% as oil prices declined and non-store retailers (internet sales) fell 2.2% which is some give back after Prime Day. There was minimal reaction to the data. Applied Materials is the most recent tech stock to have strong results yet selloff. Memory stocks are continuing to move higher in the pre-market (DRAM +>2.5%).