📈 Meta and Amazon crush it

 But there was a bad Apple in the bunch

Author

Wyatt from Alts
February 02, 2024

I’m taking Monday and Tuesday off next week. See you Wednesday.

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*past 24-hour performance

📰 Market Headlines

  • Stocks bounced back today after Wednesday’s selloff. All three major indexes rose about a percent.

  • Futures are up this morning after Meta and Amazon smashed earnings last night.

  • Jobs numbers are out before the bell, and economists expect them to contract from last month. They’re “calling for payrolls to have grown by 185,000 positions and for the unemployment rate to inch higher to 3.8%”. I’m going out on a limb to say jobs will come in higher, and unemployment will be lower.

  • The EU approved $54 billion in aid for Ukraine after Hungary dropped its opposition.

  • Chevron, Exxon, Bristol-Myers Squibb, and Cigna all report before the bell.

🕶️ Market Vibes

🎰 Market Forecasts and Futures

35% of traders continue to think the Fed will cut rates in March. The number is lower on Kalshi but is still too high.

Easy money there if you want it [disclosure: I have a tiny position on ‘no’]

😱 Fear and Greed Index

🧠 What do you think?

🎤 What you said last time

The two clear winners in the poll were the big winners after the bell as well. Nicely done, Hive Mind.

📈 Trends you need to know

Search results are from our friends at Glimpse, my favorite way to spot trends.

Deeptech, also known as hard tech, refers to companies, usually startups, that aim to solve complex scientific or engineering problems with their technology solutions.

📊 Stocks

Want to invest like Buffet? With Public.com, you can emulate Berkshire Hathaway’s portfolio with just a few clicks.

Winners and losers

Earnings, upgrades, and acquisitions

  • Meta tripled earnings as revenue increased 25% YoY while cutting costs. Zuck also announced both a dividend and share buyback. Shares surged 14%.

  • Amazon saw a 14% sales boost to $169.9 billion in Q4, lifting shares by 7%. Like everyone else, Amazon has a new AI assistant. They named theirs "Rufus."

  • Apple beat revenue and earnings, but sales declined 13% in China and issued a cautious outlook on iPhone sales. Shares dropped 4%.

  • Atlassian exceeded earnings forecasts with a 62% EPS jump and 21% revenue increase. The company also raised guidance, but TEAM stock fell 8% anyway.

  • Peloton shares tumbled over 24% after projecting weak Q3 revenue and reporting a drop in subscribers. “Revenue dropped 6.2% for the quarter ended Dec. 31, which included a push around the holidays. It was the company's eighth consecutive quarter of declining sales.” This thing will go to zero.

  • Starbucks reported record earnings but guided down for 2024. Shares were flat.

Market movers

  • Intel's $20 billion Ohio chipmaking project was delayed to late 2026, shares fell 1.5%.

  • Some car companies are distancing themselves from EVs spurred by weak demand and high interest rates. Aptiv ended funding for Motional, an AV project with Hyundai, and Volvo shifted Polestar's financials to its Chinese parent company Geely.

  • U.S. worker productivity was up 3.3% in Q4, while unit-labor costs only rose 0.5%, indicating economic growth and stable profit margins.

  • January job cuts in the U.S. spiked 136%. The finance and tech sectors cut back especially hard.

  • Block's layoffs led to a 65% stock rise since October.

Ideas, trends, and analysis

  • Canadian small businesses face a bankruptcy surge, with insolvencies up 38% in 2023. 

  • Mortgage rates dipped to 6.63% from 6.69%, hinting at a spring market recovery. Declining inflation should keep nudging rates lower.

  • Even though the economy is booming, stay away from these three sectors.

  • American regional banks are in for a very bad 2024.

  • Take a look at this analysis of how the timing of historical rate cuts impact the stock market.

  • Olive oil is going to keep getting more expensive.

🌍 Global Perspectives

🇺🇸🇮🇷🇮🇶 The US approved strikes on Iranian-linked militia targets in Iraq and Syria after a drone attack in Jordan killed 3 U.S service members.

🇮🇳 India is sending a message to China with its expanding naval deployments.

🇨🇳 Chinese equities had their worst week in years.

🇨🇦 A wave of SMB bankruptcies is coming for Canada.

🇳🇬 Remittance payments sent back home by Nigeria's youth exodus totaled $20.5 billion in 2023, more than all foreign investment and representing 5% of GDP.

🇰🇪 A huge natural gas explosion in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi injured more than 220 people.

📊 Income

📊 Crypto

  • Valkyrie's Bitcoin ETF introduced multi-custodian security with both Coinbase and BitGo.

  • Bitcoin's price may hit $170,000 after April's halving. Fed's hinted rate cuts could balloon its market cap to $3.3 trillion.

🧠 Errata

  • GPT-4 poses only a "mild" bioweapon risk, according to new analysis from OpenAI.

  • Several people were killed after a small plane in Clearwater, Florida, crashed into a mobile home.

  • How Ryan Reynolds built an empire of charm worth $14 billion.

📺 What to Watch Today

That’s all for today. Did I miss anything? Smash the reply button to let me know.

Cheers,

Wyatt