MAD Macro - Jake and Jill Fix Title IX
We Fixed Title IX. You Can Choose Teams Now.
The Tin Man Can Play the Red Tees Now
Jake and Jill fixed Title IX. Now the Tin Man can choose to play the women’s tees. It’s well known that the Orange Mad King I plays golf by his own rules. It does bother me that he has his own rules. I think it’s important to honor and respect the rules of golf, but at least he is consistent. The Orange Mad King I has his own rules for life and golf. He does not require others to play by his rules. His rules are only for him. The Tin Man, on the other hand, is always making up new rules for everyone. We know the Orange Mad King I will play the men’s tees. After all, he identifies as a biologically male king. Tt would be a fun match, the Tin Man playing the women’s tees and the Orange Mad King I playing by his own rules. Kind of like Billie Jean King vs Bobby Riggs in 1973, only different.
The WSJ has a good editorial today about offshore wind projects, linked here. It’s titled, “Gone With the New York Wind”. The editorial board does a good job of explaining why offshore wind projects are being canceled, despite generous support from the Inflation Reduction Act. Unfortunately, rising labor and material costs and higher interest rates raised the cost of wind projects by 60% between 2021 and 2024. So the wonderfully named Inflation Reduction Act actually caused inflation. Funny how so many government policies backfire. New York regulators were willing to pay $150 per megawatt hour for offshore wind power. The developers still can’t make that work because of rising costs. Natural gas power costs about $30 per megawatt hour. You might think the regulators would allow natural gas pipelines to supply power for the Northeast. You would be wrong. The death of common sense.
Markets continue to recover from last week’s selloff. The temporary peace in the Mideast is helping markets stabilize. Gold and crude oil have pulled back from the recent highs. There might be temporary peace in the Mideast but there is war on U.S. college campuses. The NYT is working overtime to cover the anti-Israel college campus protests and the Orange Mad King I’s trial of the century. The NYT newsroom is buzzing with excitement. Risk assets are higher this morning and commodities are lower. There are important earnings reports due out today, including Tesla. The important economic news is out Thursday and Friday: Q1 GDP and PCE inflation.
I updated the U.S. Dollar Index, U.S. 10yr yield, U.S. 10yr-2yr yield spread, WTI crude oil, copper, spot gold, bitcoin, S&P futures and NASDAQ 100 futures charts below.
The dollar is unchanged and interest rates are a little higher this morning. Crude oil, gold and copper are all lower after selling off yesterday. Bitcoin is testing the 50 day average resistance level.
S&P and NASDAQ 100 futures are both higher, testing yesterday’s highs.
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Unless otherwise stated, Bloomberg is the source of all data and charts.
S&P 500 futures are a type of derivative contract that provides a buyer with an investment priced based on the expectation of the S&P 500 Index’s future value. Nasdaq 100 futures are commodities futures products traded within the equity futures sector. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) oil is a benchmark used by oil markets, representing oil produced in the U.S. Brent Crude Oil is a blend of crude oil recovered from the North Sea in the early 1960s, whose price is used as a benchmark for the commodity's prices. The U.S. dollar index (USDX) is a measure of the value of the U.S. dollar relative to the value of a basket of currencies of the majority of the U.S.'s most significant trading partners. UBS Bloomberg Constant Maturity Commodity Index is a total return rules-based composite benchmark index diversified across commodity components from within specific sectors.
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