Closing Stock Market SummaryThe stock market logged steep losses today on the heels of disappointing August inflation data that served as a reality check for a market that bought into the peak inflation narrative. The major averages took a sharp turn lower at the open and then moved sideways before geopolitical worries sent the market distinctly lower ahead of the close. Broad selling brought the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite below their respective 50-day moving averages, and the S&P 500 fell toward the 3,900 level by the close.
The initial sell-off was precipitated by hotter-than-expected August inflation data, which challenged the peak inflation narrative. This fueled worries about the Fed's rate hike path. To that end, the fed funds futures market is now pricing in a 32% probability of a 100 basis point rate hike at the September 20-21 FOMC meeting versus 0.0% yesterday, according to the CME FedWatch Tool. Effectively, then, the market is assigning a 100% probability to a rate hike of at least 75 basis points next week.
Geopolitical factors further weighed on investor mentality following a Reuters report that the U.S. is looking at possible sanctions on China that would deter a possible invasion of Taiwan. This came after an earlier Reuters report today that said President Putin and President Xi will be meeting in Uzbekistan on Thursday and that they will discuss various matters, including Ukraine and Taiwan.
Bids fell by the wayside following this afternoon news item and the major indices cascaded lower into the close, settling near their worst levels of the session.
Separately, a fund manager survey by BofA revealed the highest cash level (6.1%) since 2001 and a record-low share of fund managers taking higher risk than normal. That extreme bearish-minded positioning is considered to be a contrarian indicator, but the stock market's performance was ultimately dictated by the disappointing CPI report and geopolitical worries.
Treasury yields rose sharply in response to the CPI data. The 2-yr note yield, which was at 3.50% before the release, settled at 3.76%. The 10-yr note yield, which was at 3.30% before the release, settled at 3.42%.
The US Dollar Index also moved noticeably higher following the CPI report. It was up 1.4% to 109.86.
Selling efforts were broad and orderly in nature in what amounted to a general buyers' strike. All 11 S&P 500 sectors closed in the red with losses ranging from 2.5% (energy) to 5.6% (communication services). All 30 Dow components finished with a loss.
There was little discrimination as many stocks logged sizable losses. The Vanguard Mega Cap Growth ETF (MGK) closed with a 5.4% loss and the Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight ETF (RSP) closed with a 4.0% loss. The Russell 3000 Growth Index closed down 4.6% and the Russell 3000 Value Index closed down 3.6%.
Decliners outpaced advancers by an 8-to-1 margin at the NYSE and a 10-to-3 margin at the Nasdaq.
Energy complex futures settled mixed with WTI crude oil futures falling 0.4% to $87.49/bbl while natural gas futures rose 0.2% to $8.33/mmbtu.
Looking ahead to Wednesday, market participants will receive the weekly MBA Mortgage Application Index (prior -0.8%) at 7:00 a.m. ET, August PPI (consensus -0.1%; prior -0.5%) and core PPI ( consensus 0.3%; prior 0.2%) at 8:30 a.m. ET, and weekly EIA Crude Oil Inventories (prior +8.84 million) at 10:30 a.m. ET.
Reviewing today's economic data:
- NFIB Small Business Optimism reading was 91.8 compared to the prior 89.9 reading
- Total CPI increased 0.1% month-over-month in August (consensus -0.1%) and core CPI, which excludes food and energy, rose 0.6% month-over-month (consensus 0.3%). That left the year-over-year increases at 8.3% for total CPI (versus 8.5% in July) and 6.3% for core CPI (versus 5.9% in July).
- The key takeaway from the report is the acceleration in the year-over-year rate for core CPI, which was pushed in part by increases in the indexes for shelter, medical care, and new vehicles. That has provided a disheartening data point for market participants -- and the Fed -- that suggests the rate hike at the September 20-21 FOMC meeting will be 75 basis points and that one cannot be assured that there won't be another aggressive rate hike after that.
- The Treasury Budget for August showed a deficit of $219.6 bln versus a deficit of $170.6 bln a year ago. The Treasury Budget data is not seasonally adjusted, so the August deficit cannot be compared to the deficit of $211.1 bln for July.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: -14.4% YTD
S&P 400: -14.5% YTD
S&P 500: -17.5% YTD
Russell 2000: -18.4% YTD
Nasdaq Composite: -25.6% YTD
After Hours Summary: Quiet session after-hours; RLGT +5.6% on earnings; FLS -2.7% on updated Q3 earnings forecastAfter Hours Gainers:
Companies trading higher in after hours in reaction to earnings/guidance: RLGT +5.6%, OI +1.3%, RTX +0.3%
Companies trading higher in after hours in reaction to news: TBLA +4.5% (announces restructuring program, reducing headcount by 6%), BWXT +0.8% (submits New Drug Application to FDA), O +0.4% (increases monthly dividend), AKRO +0.2% ($175 mln common stock offering), TWTR +0.2% (stockholders approve merger agreement with Elon Musk), CTT +0.1% (shareholders approve merger with PotlatchDeltic), RM +0.1% (expands operations into Louisiana), IBM +0.1% (to transfer $16 bln defined benefit pension obligations), CPA +0.1% (reports August traffic)
After Hours Losers:
Companies trading lower in after hours in reaction to earnings/guidance: FLS -2.7%
Companies trading lower in after hours in reaction to news: PNT -10% (commences common stock offering), TSLA -0.1% (hires Ontario government official for mineral supply chain in Canada, according to Electrek)
AI tries its hand at economics
The ability to simulate problems and solutions could help real world policies
Over the next few months, you and your computer code can hatch a plan to save a planet. It’s a fictitious artificial planet, granted, but one that simulates the economy, geopolitics and climate of our real world. And perhaps your ideas will soon prove useful here on warming Earth.
Launched last month, AI for Global Climate Cooperation is a competition organised by Mila (an artificial intelligence institute in Quebec) and Salesforce Research. The group, working at the intersection between AI and economics, is soliciting submissions in the form of novel climate agreements and negotiation protocols.
Academic economics is generally a conservative enterprise, but AI is slowly beginning to seep in. Instead of writing down and solving trusty formal mathematical models, with the assumptions and difficulties they carry, AI may allow economists to throw all their ingredients into a simulated stew and find out how it tastes.
When it comes to saving the planet, these ingredients will be plugged into “a multi-region integrated assessment model” called RICE-N, calibrated to the latest real world data. Each proposal will change the simulated world in some way, as its AI agents go about their self-interested business. The fictitious temperature will be checked and winners will be declared. But that’s not where the work will end.
“That competition is just a vehicle for the community to quickly try out a lot of new solutions,” said Stephan Zheng, a research scientist at Salesforce and a contest organiser. If the work passes ethical and peer review, “we can start thinking about communicating those results to the policymaking world, to the actual climate.”
“We can do things that are hard to do analytically,” said David Parkes, a member of the competition’s jury. “Economic models tend to be highly stylised — maybe with AI we can get closer to the real problem.”
The real economic problem in this instance is climate change. But a similar approach could shed light on other knotty challenges for economists — tax policy, contract design, trade deals or the supply chain.
The advantages are many. AI agents might be able to do some of the dirty work for us, playing out our proposals to their conclusions. They also mean that if we mess things up, we won’t cause our own extinction. Let the simulation wrestle with the tricky business of geoscience, meteorology, macroeconomics, international politics and national interests.
AI for Global Climate Cooperation (perhaps an algorithm could invent a snappier name) builds off the earlier AI Economist project, in which AI citizens wander around a simulated two-dimensional digital world of houses, coins, wood and stone. An AI government keeps a watchful eye, aiming to maximise productivity and equality, learning as it goes about the behaviour of its digital constituency and responses to new policies such as a changes in the income tax rate.
There are hopes that the growing influence of AI in economics might also address a trio of nagging difficulties in the field. The first is the sheer number of people that exist, with all their different interests. For tractability, economists often assume the existence of a Platonic “representative agent”, or simply elide the fact that many real people make up the real world. With enough computational power, perhaps you can simulate them.
Second are the logistical, political and financial barriers that exist when it comes to experimentation. It’s not often feasible to test a pet tax policy, social program or international agreement in the real world. But it’s easy enough to change the laws and parameters of an artificial planet.
The final hurdle is a conundrum at the heart of game theory. Just because an agreement is great for the collective, or the climate, doesn’t mean that individual actors will adhere to it — the central result of the prisoner’s dilemma. No single authority can enforce the optimal deal, so successful agreements — climate agreements included — must be upheld through a scaffold of supporting incentives. Perhaps a simulation can test many of these possible scaffolds without the risk of the whole thing falling apart.
But AI cannot solve the most crucial problems in economics — or anything else — on its own. The most interesting problems are multidisciplinary and require wisdom beyond the models and algorithms. And eventually real people will need to shake hands, sign agreements and pass laws. At some point, the humans will need to get involved.
JPMorgan warns of up to 50% drop in investment banking fees
Gloomy outlook underscores Wall Street anxiety over global economy and debt markets
JPMorgan Chase’s third-quarter investment banking revenues could be as much as 50 per cent down on last year’s, one of the bank’s most senior executives warned on Tuesday.
Daniel Pinto, JPMorgan president and head of the corporate and investment bank, said he expected third-quarter investment banking fees to be down 45-50 per cent on the $3.3bn achieved a year earlier, having fallen 44 per cent in the first six months of 2022. The bank will announce its results on October 14.
The gloomy forecast for the largest US bank by assets, which is an industry bellwether, underscores the anxiety on Wall Street over a dealmaking slowdown amid economic uncertainty, war in Ukraine and unsupportive debt markets for leveraged buyouts.
The slump in fees follows a blockbuster 2021 and has raised the spectre of lower bonuses and potential lay-offs on Wall Street. Goldman Sachs is planning to start a job-cutting programme in the coming weeks that could affect hundreds of employees.
Pinto said JPMorgan would “adjust over time to whatever we believe is a medium-term structure needed, and overall banking business size needed, to cater to that wallet size”.
“You need to be very careful when you have a bit of a downturn, to start cutting bankers here and there, because you will hurt the possibility for growth going forward,” Pinto said.
“So if anything in an environment like this, there may be some very, very top bankers that you could not access or hire in the past and now they’re available to be hired.”
Given that the lion’s share of banker pay packets is made up of performance-based compensation, Pinto said the bank can “adjust not just letting people go, you can adjust by reducing comp”.
He added that JPMorgan’s trading business, which has benefited this year from volatile equity, credit and commodity markets, was on track to be up about 5 per cent year-on-year in the current quarter. In the first six months of the year, trading revenue was up 4 per cent year-on-year.
Pinto also said interest rate rises by the Federal Reserve, increasing loan demand and higher revolving balances at its cards business would boost lending business more than the bank had previously anticipated. JPMorgan’s latest guidance for full-year net interest income, excluding its trading business, was $58bn-plus. Pinto said the current environment meant that plus was now “bigger”.
Despite worries of a potential US recession and high inflation, Pinto said JPMorgan views the US consumer as being “in a very good place”.
“People are not touching much . . . of the wealth that they accumulated over the last couple of years. And they are saving less to pay to maintain consumption and to pay for higher prices,” Pinto said.
Armenia, Azerbaijan Clashes Test Russia’s Support for Regional Ally
Violence is the latest security challenge in Russia’s sphere of influence since Moscow launched its invasion of Ukraine
A new round of fighting erupted between Armenia and Azerbaijan, threatening to unravel a cease-fire brokered by the Kremlin and testing its support for traditional allies during the war in Ukraine.
The violence, which is among the deadliest since the end of a war between the two countries in 2020, is the latest security challenge in Russia’s sphere of influence since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February. Isolated by the West during the war, Russia has diminished leverage over some of its erstwhile partners in the post-Soviet world.
Armenia said on Tuesday that 49 of its soldiers had been killed in the clashes on its side of the border with Azerbaijan. The two countries have fought two wars over the Nagorno-Karabakh region and disputed the territory since the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. Azerbaijan said that it had been attacked by Armenia’s forces.
The Armenian prime minister’s office also said that the government decided to implement a 1997 mutual defense treaty with Russia, and appealed for help from the Collective Security Treaty Organization, a military alliance dominated by Russia.
Russia responded by calling for a de-escalation. The Russian Foreign Ministry said that Moscow had brokered a cease-fire in effect from Tuesday morning. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday that President Vladimir Putin was “making every effort to help de-escalate tensions on the border.”
Mr. Peskov’s remarks come after Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan discussed the border clashes in a phone call with Mr. Putin, according to comments carried by Russian state news agency RIA Novosti.
The fighting in the Caucasus region is the latest in a series of challenges to Russia’s dominance in its traditional sphere of influence before and during the war in Ukraine. In January, Russia sent 2,000 soldiers to help repress protests in Kazakhstan, and backed the government in Belarus against a mass antigovernment uprising in 2020.
“What was driving this was both the perception and a reality of Russian weakness, especially given recent developments in the Ukrainian theater. Azerbaijan sensed a unique opportunity but also a closing window of opportunity to act and act boldly,” said Richard Giragosian, the director of the Regional Studies Center, a think tank in Armenia’s capital, Yerevan.
The invasion of Ukraine has limited Russia’s influence over some post-Soviet states, with countries like Kazakhstan remaining neutral in the conflict despite being the recipient of the Kremlin’s support during the protests in January.
The Ukraine invasion has tested the limits of Russia’s military strength, forcing it to draw resources from the periphery of its sphere of operations from places like Syria and the Russian Far East. It has also strained Russia’s economic and diplomatic relationships after Western countries imposed sweeping economic sanctions on Moscow.
Azerbaijan won the 2020 war, gaining ground thanks in part to military backing from Turkey, including Turkish-made Bayraktar TB-2 drones, which have proven effective against Russia and Russian-backed forces in a series of conflicts, including the war in Ukraine, further testing Russia’s military influence in the region. It was the second full-scale war between the two countries over Nagorno-Karabakh and adjacent territories after another conflict in 1994.
Turkey, another regional power that is both a partner and a rival of Russia, sided with Azerbaijan in this week’s hostilities, blaming Armenia for the flare-up.
“Armenia needs to learn its lesson and seek peace,” said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu in comments on Tuesday. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is set to meet Mr. Putin on the sidelines of a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a Russian and Chinese-led body, in Uzbekistan later this week.
Armenia, which hosts a Russian military base, also appealed to the Russian-backed Collective Security Treaty Organization for aid during the 2020 war, but the alliance ignored those pleas.
Mr. Giragosian said the Armenian government is seeking to overhaul its relationship with Russia after a lack of significant help from the Kremlin during recent crises. Armenia is also working to normalize its relationship with Turkey in an attempt to diversify its relationships.
“The strategic imperative is to begin to confront Armenia’s over-dependence on Russia, especially after Ukraine, and to justify domestically, a deepening to the West and a pivot,” he said.
Western officials flew into the region on Tuesday in an attempt to defuse the hostilities. The State Department’s senior adviser for Caucasus negotiations, Philip Reeker, flew to Baku, the Azeri capital, on Tuesday to express U.S. support for peace talks. The European Union’s special envoy for the region, Toivo Klaar, was also traveling to the region, the EU said.
The State Department urged an immediate end to the hostilities. “There can be no military solution to the conflict,” the department said on Monday.
What Travelers Should Know Before Heading to England to Mourn Queen Elizabeth II
Surging demand for flights and hotels means visitors should expect high prices, long lines, delays and closures
Getting to London this year already been has a challenge, and with hundreds of thousands of mourners expected from around the world to pay their respects to Queen Elizabeth II, travelers should brace for it to get even harder.
From the time the queen’s coffin lies in state at Westminster Hall starting Wednesday until the funeral Sept. 19, travelers in town for work, vacation or specifically for the queen’s mourning period are being warned to expect more traffic, security, closures and congestion.
Flying to and from the U.K. has already been marked by delays and cancellations. Amid surging demand and staffing shortages, London Heathrow Airport in July said it would enforce a cap on departures and the number of passengers moving through its terminals. The cap remains in effect through Oct. 29.
The mourning period following the queen’s death will affect airport operations. A representative for Heathrow says that some flights Wednesday afternoon local time would be disrupted to ensure there is silence in central London during the ceremonial procession from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Hall. Passengers on affected flights will be notified by their airlines of changes. The representative added that further changes to the airport’s operations are likely to occur on Sept. 19 during the queen’s funeral.
Those who make the journey have been advised that waiting in the line to pay respects could take hours, or even last overnight. The government has said that mourners will face crowded trains and other modes of transport as well as airport-like security.
Even visitors not in town for the funeral will feel a ripple effect. While the city’s metro system will run normally, travelers should prepare for temporary closures on short notice during commemorative and ceremonial events, according to London’s transportation authority.
The public will be able to file past the coffin 24 hours a day from 5 p.m. local time on Wednesday until 6:30 a.m. on the day of the funeral, Monday, Sept. 19. Some royal watchers had already set up tents Monday along the Mall, which leads to Buckingham Palace.
Since the funeral details were announced, a surge in search traffic for flights to London has surged. For those who haven’t yet booked, flights and hotels may be hard to come by.
Demand for flights to Europe shot up following news of the queen’s death and again when Buckingham Palace confirmed the date of her funeral, says Hayley Berg, lead economist at Hopper, a travel app. Bookings on the Hopper app for trips to London increased 38% in the week of the queen’s death compared with the prior week.
Additionally, flight searches from around the world to London increased 40% over the previous day after the queen’s passing was announced, according to Hopper. In the U.S., searches for flights to London jumped nearly 50%.
These increases in demand haven’t been sustained, so the full impact on prices and availability isn’t yet known, Ms. Berg says. Before the announcement of the queen’s death, the average cost of round-trip airfare to the U.K. from the U.S. was roughly $710, she says.
Flying to the U.K. in time for the queen’s funeral will be more expensive. Average round-trip airfare from the U.S. to London for flights departing on Thursday, Sept. 15, is $1,120, according to Hopper.
Instead of booking direct flights, mourners might have an easier time booking flights to European hubs such as Paris or Amsterdam, then taking another flight to the U.K. or traveling by rail, Ms. Berg says.
If getting a flight to London for the events doesn’t prove to be challenge, securing a hotel likely will. “I expect that hotels will be sold out across London,” Ms. Berg says, noting that hotels were sold out for other recent events involving the royal family, including the weddings of Prince William and Prince Harry.
After the queen’s death was announced, the average nightly rate for a hotel in London rose from $244 per night to $384 per night, Hopper found. Search demand for hotels in London increased 92% in the day following the announcement compared with the previous week, with searches primarily focused on stays from Sept. 16 to Sept. 18.
Kensington Tours, which operates private tours, says demand for the U.K. already was high for this fall. There are nearly triple the number of tours booked this month compared with September 2019, says Chantal Gouveia, the company’s destination specialist for the U.K. and Ireland.
The company is helping travelers reroute their trips. Rather than go to Windsor Castle, they suggest Blenheim Palace, where Winston Churchill was born. The palace’s website notes that it will be closed on the day of the queen’s funeral, but is otherwise open.
Because of limited availability, the number of closures and the difficulty of getting around, Ms. Gouveia suggests that travelers eager to witness a moment of royal history should wait for the king’s coronation.
Details regarding King Charles III’s coronation have yet to be announced. If Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation serves as a guide, it could be months away. Elizabeth’s coronation took place in June 1953, nearly 16 months after she acceded the throne following the death of her father, King George VI.
The longer lead time before the coronation will give fans of the royal family more time to plan their travels to the U. K.—and a greater opportunity to save. “Having more time to plan almost always enables you to find a better deal,” Ms. Berg says.
Some have preplanned trips that will coincide with the events. Danny DeLiberato, 33 years old, and his mother, Sally DeLiberato, can’t believe the timing of their London vacation. Mrs. DeLiberato has traveled annually to the U.K. since 1976—except during the pandemic and when her children were born. The pair are set to depart Wednesday from Newark, N.J.
As a special treat for his mother’s 71st birthday, Mr. DeLiberato booked a stay at The Goring, a hotel near Buckingham Palace where members of the royal family have stayed. He isn’t sure whether they will get to keep their reservation with the number of dignitaries flying in.
The Goring didn’t respond to requests for comment.
The pair plan to take part in as much of the proceedings as they can. Mr. DeLiberato says they are prepared to wait up to 18 hours in line to pay their respects.
“It’s such an unfortunate event, but my mother being such a historian of the royal family, I’m very excited that she gets to witness this history,” he says.
KKR Makes Piece of PE Fund Available on Public Blockchain
Move will broaden opportunity for individuals to invest in fund
KKR KKR -4.38% & Co. is making a slice of one of its private-equity funds available on the public blockchain, in the latest bid to expand individual investors’ access to private investment vehicles.
The buyout firm is partnering with digital-assets specialist Securitize, which will tokenize an interest in the second iteration of KKR’s KKR -4.31% Health Care Strategic Growth Fund and make it available on the Avalanche public blockchain, executives from both companies said.
Qualified purchasers—generally those with at least $5 million in investible assets—who create a digital wallet and sign up with Securitize will be able to invest in the KKR fund via what will effectively be a tokenized feeder fund. After a year of holding the security, investors will be able to sell it to other qualified individuals on a secondary market managed by a unit of Securitize.
Blockchain is a data structure that makes it possible to create a digital ledger of transactions and share it among a distributed network of computers. Executives said the move by KKR will be the first time a major private-equity firm has made a portion of a fund available on the blockchain in the U.S.
As they look for new sources of assets to manage, the biggest private-equity firms have been aggressively courting high-net-worth individuals. They have done this both by creating products designed for everyday millionaires and by finding new ways for them to pool their money together to invest in funds previously reserved for institutions and the ultrawealthy.
KKR managed about $70 billion of private-wealth assets as of the end of the second quarter, out of a total of $491 billion. It said last November it expects 30% to 50% of its annual fundraising will eventually come from wealthy individuals, up from 10% to 20% at the time.
A tokenized fund will allow individuals to invest smaller amounts than would be required of institutions and provide a smoother process for monitoring transactions and vetting investors through Securtize’s digitized onboarding process, as well as greater potential for liquidity, said Dan Parant, co-head of U.S. private wealth at KKR.
“There’s just so many barriers that have made private markets difficult to access for individual investors,” he said.
Mr. Parant said KKR had been exploring using blockchain technology for a while but was waiting for it to mature. The firm decided to try it with the healthcare growth fund, which backs rapidly growing healthcare companies in North America and Europe, because there had been significant interest from individual investors in the strategy, he said.
KKR finished raising its second Health Care Strategic Growth Fund, a $4 billion vehicle, in January. That fund’s predecessor was a $1.45 billion pool that closed in 2017.
Founded in 2017, Securitize spent years acquiring the necessary regulatory licenses to let private businesses raise capital using decentralized blockchain ledgers. The company owns multiple transfer agents and a broker-dealer that are registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission and has a unit that is a registered investment adviser.
In April, beauty company Oddity Tech Ltd. said it would offer a token that converts into a share of stock in an eventual initial public offering at a 20% discount. The offering was issued through Securitize.
The arrangement with KKR opens up a possible new frontier for the company.
“When there’s something new, nobody wants to be the first one,” said Securitize Chief Executive Carlos Domingo. “KKR has been so far the most innovative in terms of making the decision to do this, and we hope that a lot of other asset managers will take note.”