4. Trading in Intra-Day Options Keeps Increasing as so do Losses.
Barrons-The options are inspiring retail traders who moved on from meme stocks during the pandemic, says John Bartleman, CEO of brokerage TradeStation. “A lot of customers are jumping into 0DTE. It’s a popular trading vehicle,” he says.
Despite big gains touted through social media, some academic research indicates the options are a losing trade for most people. Retail investors lost more than $350,000 on 0DTE options on an average trading day between May 2022 and September 2023, according to a study by researchers at the University of Münster in Germany. “0DTE options are on average not a lucrative investment vehicle for retail traders,” the researchers wrote.
8. Roaring Kitty Gamestop GME is Negative on One-Year Return
9. Satellite Images Show Expansion of Suspected Chinese Spy Bases in Cuba-WSJ
By Warren P. Strobel WASHINGTON—Images captured from space show the growth of Cuba’s electronic eavesdropping stations that are believed to be linked to China, including new construction at a previously unreported site about 70 miles from the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, according to a new report. The study from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based think tank, follows reporting last year by The Wall Street Journal that China and Cuba were negotiating closer defense and intelligence ties, including establishing a new joint military training facility on the island and an eavesdropping facility.
Community requires individuals to have the option of speaking up. If we’re in this together, we ought to be able to chime in.
But while every member of the community can speak out, the ones that are heard also have something useful to say. Being informed is a requirement to be heard.
Sometimes, our insight can come from firsthand experience, but it’s most likely that we’ve learned about the issue and the alternatives we face.
Education is at the heart of the conversation. Organized schooling, substantial peer engagement and intelligent media consumption give us a chance to earn our opinion.
IBIT after big run-up, now in sideways pattern, see how it breaks.
2. Bitcoin Trades 24/7 But Since Launch of ETF….Weekend Trading Volume Sinks
(Bloomberg) – The proportion of Bitcoin traded over weekends has declined to an all-time low of 16% this year, according to cryptocurrency research firm Kaiko. The drop comes in the wake of the launch of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded-funds, which appears to have shifted the periods when Bitcoin is traded to be more in line with the schedule of traditional equity exchanges and has lowered its price volatility.
One of crypto’s noteworthy traits is that, unlike stocks, it trades during all hours of the day and even on Saturdays and Sundays. In the past, Bitcoin trading gained notoriety for its “Wild Weekends,” where the digital currency would experience wide price fluctuations.
But that phenomenon seems to be cooling since Bitcoin’s weekend trading volume has continued to dwindle from its high of 28% in 2019. The launch of Bitcoin ETFs is likely a big reason why.
FXI Large Cap China…May 20th gave bullish upside 50day thru 200day..now pulling back
4. That Same Run-Up Started Catch Up vs. India
5. U.S and India Growing Percentage of World Market Cap
Bespoke Investment Group —We began the week with our Chart of the Day on Monday looking at Bloomberg’s % of World Market Cap indices. As shown below, the US now makes up 48% of world stock market cap, which is a record high going back to late 2003. Ten years ago in 2014, the US made up roughly 36% of world market cap, so it has risen 12 percentage points since then. Note that while the US makes up nearly half of world stock market cap, it only makes up about 25% of global GDP.
While most countries have seen their share of world stock market cap fall as the US has risen, India is really the only major player on the world stage that has also seen its share increase consistently over time. As shown below, India has seen its share of world market cap more than double since its COVID low in early 2020.
9. 25% of Offices Will Be Empty By 2026 -Chartr.com
While employees initially had to create home office setups by necessity, factors like work-life balance, reduced time spent commuting, and generally becoming accustomed to the comforts of their own desks (and/or couches) left many with a taste for the hybrid 9-5 model that still lingers today… despite mounting pressure from businesses trying to clamp down on remote working.
Indeed, the desire to WFH remains strong: research cited by The Economist indicates that the typical worker worldwide wants 2 days at home — an entire day more than the actual average — and a LinkedIn survey in January found that now only 39% of US employees want a fully in-person job.
With WFH looking increasingly established, one sector in particular is struggling to adjust to the new normal: commercial real estate. In fact, although US office vacancy rates are already at record highs, according to a report from Moody’s published yesterday, they are set to continue rising up to 24% by early 2026, driven by the expiration of leases and an influx of new office buildings onto the market.
As we noted earlier this week, the pressures on the commercial real estate sector are weighing heavily on REITs and other real estate-exposed stocks… but, while there might be short-term pain, the outlook is not entirely bleak. Moody’s foresees vacancy rates eventually stabilizing as redundant offices are either demolished or repurposed into warehouses and residential properties.
10. Vitaliy Katsenelson, CFA Grew Up in Russia…Why He Doesn’t Invest in China?
Excerpt #3: Why I Don’t Invest in China
The easiest question to answer of all is why I don’t invest in China. If every question were this straightforward, life would be much simpler.
So, why do I avoid investing in China?
For the same reason I don’t invest in Russia or any country where I operate by this one simple rule: If I were to write a negative article about the country’s leader, would I feel comfortable traveling there afterward?
If the answer is no, I probably shouldn’t invest in that country.
Let me share a true story.
In 2008, I went to Russia for the first and only time since leaving in 1991. This was after the government had stolen a company from its shareholders. I was planning to write a negative article about the incident and actually did write it, but I never published it.
The reason I didn’t publish was that I realized nobody in Russia would care about the content of my article, except if I got arrested for jaywalking. They would find out I was an American citizen, Google me, find the article, and then my fate might change.
For that reason, I’ve never invested in Russia; and for the same reason, I’ve never invested in China.
The Chinese government decided that Jack Ma said something wrong. By the way, this is something I always had an issue with regarding Charlie Munger. Somehow, he looked at Singapore and Hong Kong and fantasized about China. I looked at China and just saw a bigger version of Russia, albeit maybe slightly more pragmatic.
This is why we never really invested in China. I don’t want to wake up one morning and find out that a CEO said something the government didn’t like, and suddenly I don’t own the company anymore. https://investor.fm/about/
But do you know what happened during this period? Where do we begin … 1.3 million Americans died while fighting nine major wars. Roughly 99.9% of all companies that were created went out of business. Four U.S. presidents were assassinated.
675,000 Americans died in a single year from a flu pandemic.
30 separate natural disasters killed at least 400 Americans each.
33 recessions lasted a cumulative 48 years.
The number of forecasters who predicted any of those recessions rounds to zero.
The stock market fell more than 10% from a recent high at least 102 times.
Stocks lost a third of their value at least 12 times.
Annual inflation exceeded 7% in 20 separate years.
The words “economic pessimism” appeared in newspapers at least 29,000 times, according to Google.
Dave Lutz Jones Trading Nearly a quarter of all 1-month peaks in the Nasdaq 100 happened in July. That’s twice as many as any other month. Quite a few factors lining up for a short- to medium-term peak soon.
People who are afraid of talkative Uber drivers, rejoice: Driverless taxi rides are one step closer to ubiquity. Waymo One, the ride-hailing service that employs self-driving white Jaguars, is now available to everyone in San Francisco. San Francisco is the second city to go full Waymo, four years after the company opened operations to the general public in Phoenix, Arizona. Not to be confused with John Mulaney’s soda-delivering robot friend, Saymo, Waymo was started 15 years ago as a project within Google’s parent, Alphabet. Multiple tests and destroyed cars later, it stands out as a pioneer in the nascent robotaxi space. And it could be coming to a city near you. Waymo currently offers limited service in Los Angeles and plans to start operating in the San Francisco of Texas—Austin—later this year. Everyone’s cool with this? Waymo’s success makes it almost easy to forget that it’s had plenty of hiccups:
As recently as last month, a probe by the US Highway Traffic Safety Administration discovered safety incidents relating to Waymo’s cars.
Waymo recalled software in all its cars earlier this month after one crashed into a telephone pole.
In February, a San Francisco crowd set a Waymo car on fire.
And yet, Waymo is still cruising. The company said 300,000 people were on its San Francisco waitlist before it opened to the public. Waymo claims that its cars have driven riders over 3.8 million miles across SF as of April. Its next goal…make money. As the company vies for a piece of the market dominated by Uber and Lyft, it hopes to find a way to be profitable and make back some of the billions that Google has spent to develop it. Zoom out: Waymo is the future of the US robotaxi industry. Its closest competitor, GM’s autonomous vehicle unit Cruise, had its licenses in California suspended in October after a series of collisions.—CC
9. Value of U.S. Homes by State
10. Wealth Building
By Morgan Housel @morganhousel Here’s how the U.S. economy performed over the last 170 years:
But do you know what happened during this period? Where do we begin … 1.3 million Americans died while fighting nine major wars. Roughly 99.9% of all companies that were created went out of business. Four U.S. presidents were assassinated.
675,000 Americans died in a single year from a flu pandemic.
30 separate natural disasters killed at least 400 Americans each.
33 recessions lasted a cumulative 48 years.
The number of forecasters who predicted any of those recessions rounds to zero.
The stock market fell more than 10% from a recent high at least 102 times.
Stocks lost a third of their value at least 12 times.
Annual inflation exceeded 7% in 20 separate years.
The words “economic pessimism” appeared in newspapers at least 29,000 times, according to Google.
Jefferies Zach Goldberg 335 and Counting…Bespoke noted, while the current streak is only about a third as long as the longest on record, if we get to July 17th without a one-day drop of 2%+, this will be the longest streak without a 2%+ drop since 2007.
3. Semiconductor Seasonality—NVDA 20% of Index
4. Streaming Wars-PARA Lost $1.6B on Streaming Last Year
What they heard surprised them. Young folks basically say they see no difference between going online for news versus for social interaction. Gen Zers approach most of their digital experience in what the researchers call “timepass” mode, just looking to not be bored. If they want to answer a question or learn something new, they might turn to a search engine, but they’re acquiring new information mainly via their social feeds, which arealgorithmically pruned to reflect what they care about and who they trust. In short, they’ve created their own filters to process an onslaught of digitized information. Only the important stuff shows up, and if something shows up, it must be important.
Gen Zers told researchers they spend most of their digital lives in “timepass” mode — engaging in light, obligation-free content. Jigsaw and Gemic
They don’t read long articles. And they don’t trust anything with ads, or paywalls, or pop-ups asking for donations or subscriptions. “If you’re making clickbait, you have zero faith in your content,” one subject told the researchers. “And news sources — even CNN and The New York Times — do clickbait. I throw those articles away immediately.”
For Gen Z, the online world resembles the stratified, cliquish lunchroom of a 1980s teen movie. Instead of listening to stuffy old teachers, like CNN and the Times, they take their cues from online influencers — the queen bees and quarterback bros at the top of the social hierarchy. The influencers’ personal experience makes them authentic, and they speak Gen Z’s language.
“Gen Zers will have a favorite influencer or set of influencers who they essentially outsource their trust to, and then they’re incredibly loyal to everything that influencer is saying,” says Beth Goldberg, Jigsaw’s head of research. “It becomes extremely costly to fall out of that influencer’s group, because they’re getting all their information from them.”
