MAD Macro - Deja Vu at the Pentagon
The Press Doesn’t Understand the Unknown Unknowns
The Press Leaked the Unknown Unknowns
MAD Macro Is Going On Vacation. I Will Publish Occasionally. The Next Regular Issue Will Be Monday 7/14
Déjà vu all over again at the Pentagon.
Pete Hegseth did his best Donald Rumsfeld yesterday. He blasted the press for leaking the unknown unknown and rooting against Trump because they hate him. He has a point, the NYT does hate Trump. Pete should have tried Donald Rumsfeld’s actual quote when he was asked about the evidence linking Iraq to weapons of mass destruction in 2002. Rummy said, “There are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are unknown unknowns – the ones we don’t know we don’t know.” Next time Pete is asked by the press what he knows about the destruction of Iran’s nuclear facilities, he should go full Rummy. That should shut them up. It worked for Rummy on February 12th , 2002. Kimberley Strassel has a good article on the press’s efforts to discredit Trump’s Iran nuclear damage assessment in today’s WSJ, linked here. It’s titled, “Trump Bombs the Leak Machine”.
The NYT has an interesting article on Zohran Mamdani’s parents in today’s paper, linked here. It’s titled, “The Parents Who Helped Shape Zohran Mamdani’s Politics”. Let’s just say it explains a lot. Zohran is the likely next NYC mayor. It will be very entertaining to watch the NYT cover this election. Do they support Eric Adams? Not likely. They hate him and have been trying to publicly impeach him for working with Trump on the ICE arrests. But the more important question is when will the NYT endorse Zohran? Because we all know they will.
Howard Dumbnick is predicting lots of trade deals. Yesterday he announced that they formalized the China Geneva trade framework agreement. Plus he predicted that they are close on 10 more trade agreements. By the way, what does it mean to formalize a framework agreement? China did confirm the agreement, saying they promise to “review and approve eligible export applications for controlled items in accordance with the law”. Wow, that sounds great. Trump predicted a big beautiful trade agreement with India. Meanwhile, India says they are not close to an agreement. I think the market will be disappointed in the near future by the lack of trade agreements and continued disagreement over the BBB’s projected budget deficits.
Markets are a little higher again this morning. The NASDAQ 99 is making new highs. The S&P cash closed at the exact old high yesterday and is due to open at new highs this morning. We get the PCE inflation report this morning. It’s expected to be 2.3% year over year, up from 2.1% last month. The PCE is the Fed’s preferred inflation reading.
I updated the U.S. Dollar Index, U.S. 10yr yield, U.S. 10yr-2yr yield spread, WTI crude oil, NY copper, spot gold, NYSE Arca Gold Miners Inex, bitcoin, Strategy, S&P futures, cash S&P weekly, NASDAQ 99 futures and DOW futures charts below.
The dollar is unchanged and interest rates are slightly higher.
Crude oil is unchanged and copper is lower. Gold is also lower and testing a trendline support level. The NYSE Arca Gold Miners Index should open lower with gold prices. Bitcoin is a little lower and Strategy is due to open lower.
S&P, NASDAQ 99 and DOW futures are all higher this morning.
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