My Q1 breakdown of the emerging opportunities, overlooked market inefficiencies, and key strategic shifts most investors didn’t see coming. Read it here.
2. China Large Cap Stocks Nowhere for 17 Years
Google Finance
3. China Pulling Private Investments in U.S.
The Kobeissi Letter
4. Gold Trading at 100x Silver
Bespoke
5. IWM Russell 2000 Small Cap Bullish Triangle
StockCharts
6. S&P Underperforming MSCI All World by Most in 32 Years
Lisa Abramowicz
7. MBA Mortgage Applications Falling
Barchart
8. Argentina Driving Free Trade.Imports Increased by 42%…Exports 10%
Perplexity
9. Generic Drugs 90% of Prescriptions in America
Sherwood
10. Work Ethic vs Discipline
Via Seth Godin: A solid work ethic drives someone to show up, even when they’d rather not. If there’s work on their desk, they’ll take it on.
Discipline, on the other hand, is the ability to say ‘no’ to free up focus and resources for the work that’s worth saying ‘yes’ to.
‘Sell America’ gathers steam. The dollar plunged to a three-year low, as a US trade war and threats against the Federal Reserve drove “Sell America” trades. President Donald Trump’s renewed push to fire the Fed chair, in particular, has undermined the haven status of US assets, resulting in a combined stock, currency, and bond weakness not seen since 1981, according to Sherwood News. Pension funds worldwide are reassessing whether to keep betting on the US, while Chinese state investors are pulling back from US private equity. Traders have flocked to gold, which hit a fresh record Monday, as well as German bonds. The “exorbitant privilege of the US,” Commerzbank’s chair said, “may not be carved in stone.”
Semafor
2. Gold ETF Flows Hit Record Level
Macro Charts
3. Swiss Franc Safety Currency Rallies to New Highs vs. Dollar Sell Off
StockCharts
4. Japanese Yen Rally
StockCharts
5. Dow Jones 50-day thru 200-day to Downside…Not Sure of History
StockCharts
6. Growth Vs. Value 2025
Robertson Stephens
7. Ethereum Bounce Yesterday…Hit Lowest Valuation in History vs. Bitcoin
Barchart
8. Ex-US Stocks See Record Volatility…ACWX Did Not Make New Highs on International Rally
From Nasdaq Dorsey Wright: International equities have held up better than US stocks during the most recent bout of global uncertainty. The iShares MSCI ACWI ex US Index ETF (ACWX) fell into correction territory on April 4 with a 10% decline from its most recent high on March 19. The fund ultimately bottomed out 13.8% below that high on April 8. Over the next couple of weeks, ACWX advanced sharply to notch a 10% rally last Thursday, April 17, officially moving the fund out of correction territory.
The 20-day peak-to-trough move for ACWX was the shortest correction the broad international fund has seen since 2009, spanning less time than the previous 18 corrections. The nine-day rally was also the quickest ascent we have seen since 2011, outside of the two-day rally during COVID that saw ACWX climb out of correction territory in record time. Meanwhile, US stocks still sit in correction territory, despite the 9.5% upside movement seen from the S&P 500 Index (SPX) on April 9, the day after the recent low.
Voronoi
9. More Take Private Deals than IPOs
Private equity capitalized on take-private opportunities in the first quarter of 2025 as the market grappled with the new reality of tariffs and prolonged uncertainty around deals.
Take-private deal value increased 24.6% quarter-over-quarter, according to PitchBook’s Q1 2025 US PE Breakdown, with one big deal driving much of the action.
That prominent deal occurred in March, when consumer retail sector-focused investor Sycamore Partners acquired Walgreens in a transaction valued at $23.7 billion, the largest PE-backed take-private transaction over the last two years.
Through all this volatility, retail investors continue to buy the dip. They have not let up on buying.
Josh Schafer
2. New Highs in Account Openings at Interactive Brokers
March saw a record high in new account openings for Interactive Brokers. To be fair, maybe some of this was people opening accounts to try and short the market…
FinChat
3. China Central Bank Five Straight Months of Gold Buying
The Kobeissi Letter
4. How the Latest Sell-Off has Impacted the United States’ Share of Global Market Cap
Bespoke
5. Private Equity Stocks Down Double the S&P
Abnormal Returns
6. Miami Housing Correction
Nick Gerli
7. China Manufacturing Contracting Since 2015
China’s labour-intensive manufacturing sectors have seen broad-based declines in employment since around 2015, with textiles, clothing, and fur products experiencing the steepest drops.
Financial Times
8. Government Funding of Universities
Barron’s
9. Confidence in American Political Parties
Gallup
10. Earnings to Achieve Middle Class in Each American State
2. But Gold Still Very Small Share of ETF Holdings
Topdown Charts
3. 20% Pullbacks With and Without Recession
Charlie Bilello
4. Tesla 50-Day thru 200-Day to Downside…I am not sure of Bearish Crosses in TSLA
StockCharts
5. Tesla Bounced at Summer of 2024 Levels. That Level Goes Back to Mid-2023
StockCharts
6. Foreign Currencies vs. US Dollar Month to Date
Bloomberg
7. Foreign Tourism to US Falling Fast
Spencer Hakimian
8. APPS-Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger—98% of META Business
Sherwood News
9. Betting Line Recession 52%
The Irrelevant Investor
10. Seth Godin on How to Win an Argument with a Toddler
You can’t.
That’s because toddlers don’t understand what an argument is and aren’t interesting in having one.
Toddlers (which includes defensive bureaucrats, bullies, flat earthers, folks committed to a specific agenda and radio talk show hosts) may indicate that they’d like to have an argument, but they’re actually engaging in connection, noise, play acting or a chance to earn status. It can be fun to be in opposition, to harangue or even to use power to change someone’s position.
An argument, though, is an exchange of ideas that ought to surface insight and lead to a conclusion.
If you’re regularly having arguments with well-informed people of goodwill, you will probably ‘lose’ half of them–changing your mind based on what you’ve learned. If you’re not changing your mind, it’s likely you’re not actually having an argument (or you’re hanging out with the wrong people.) While it can be fun to change someone else’s position, it’s also a gift to learn enough to change ours.
The toddler puts on a show of having an argument, but they are holding a tantrum in reserve. If they ‘win’ the argument, no tantrum is needed. If they lose, they can tell themselves that they tried but the other person deserved the tantrum because they didn’t listen.
“Tell me about other strongly-held positions you’ve changed as the result of a discussion like this one…” is a direct way to start a conversation about the argument you’re proposing to have. “What sort of information would make it likely you could see this in a different way?”
It probably doesn’t pay to argue over things we have chosen to believe as part of our identity.
