July 19, 2026 | Daily JAM |
We’re used to talking about momentum markets only when stocks are going up. And investors buy more shares because they think yesterday’s gains will be repeated tomorrow. But momentum can work on the downside too when investors think that yesterday’s losses will be repeated tomorrow. And that’’s where I think we are after last week’s selling pushed the chip sector–and especially AI-related chip stocks into a Bear market 20% decline. At some point I expect a shift in sentiment. Investors will say, again, that the selling is a buying opportunity. If memory chip maker Micron Technology was a buy on June 22 as it climbed to an all-time high, isn’t it a bargain at 30% lower? I mean, Come on! the AI revolution isn’t ALL hype, right? But to get that change in sentiment, I think we need a catalyst or two to switch the focus from what might go wrong–a further escalation of the Iran war, fear of an interest rate surprise from a Federal Reserve that suddenly sounds very hawkish on inflation, more AI Bad news from China–to what might go surprisingly right.
July 14, 2026 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
American consumers got some relief in June after months of soaring prices. The all-items Consumer Price Index (CPI) was up 3.5% in June from a year earlier, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said on Tuesday. That represented a cool-down from May, when annual inflation hit 4.2 percent, a three-year high. Prices actually fell 0.4 percent from May to June, the largest outright decline since 2020. BUT… The improving inflation picture was largely the result of tumbling oil prices.
July 13, 2026 | Morning Briefing, Short Term |
Higher oil prices. Greater odds of an interest rate increase from the Federal Reserve.
Traffic in the Strait of Hormuz plummeted after Iran’s attack on a Cypriot-flagged container ship on Saturday set off an exchange of strikes with the United States. Just 14 ships passed through the waterway on Sunday in both directions, the fewest in a month, according to Kpler, a maritime data firm. Of those ships, only three were tankers exiting the Persian Gulf laden with crude oil, chemicals or other commodities, and all three were shadow or sanctioned vessels. Before the start of the war in late February, an average of more than 130 vessels transited the Strait daily. In mid-June, when the United States and Iran signed a preliminary agreement to reopen the strait, traffic spiked. In the seven days starting June 20, nearly 400 ships moved through the strait, the highest number in a one-week period since the war began. But hopes for a recovery in shipping quickly faded with renewed attacks on ships by Iran.
July 7, 2026 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
Financial markets increasingly believe inflation is coming down, but borrowing costs are headed higher. Rising bond yields are pointing to higher real interest rates even as inflation expectations moderate
.This means that the decline in oil prices has brought little relief to rate-sensitive sectors. Mortgage rates have bounced around near 6.6% in recent weeks, well above the 6% rate in late February before the attack on Iran.
July 3, 2026 | B, Daily JAM, GDX, GDXJ, GLD, Mid Term, Morning Briefing |
On June 17, in his press conference after the Federal Reserve’s meeting, new Fed chair Kevin Warsh said no more forward guidance on interest rate moves. He even, personally, made a point of not voting in the update of the Fed’s Dot Plot projections on interest rtes, inflation, and economic growth. Then on July 1, Warsh appeared on a panel with other central bank leaders at the ECB Forum on Central Banking in Portugal. He again declined to pre‑commit on the July rate decision. he also said inflation remains “too high.” But he noted that inflation risks have come down in recent weeks as inflation expectations and some energy‑related pressures eased. The financial markets certainly read these remarks as an indication–not forward guidance, of course–that the Fed would not raise interest rates at its July or September meetings. I think you’re entitled to ask What’s the difference between the old policy of forward guidance and the new policy of announcing forward conclusions based on trends picked out of the data, somehow? (I would note that neither Warsh or anybody else at the Federal Reserve KNOWS how quickly the inflationary pressures created by the Iran war will diminish.) I’ve got two answers to that question.
July 2, 2026 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
The U.S. economy added just 57,000 jobs in June, far below economists’ expectations of 100,000 and down from 129,000 jobs in May. The unemployment rate dipped slightly from 4.3% to 4.2%. Average hourly earnings growth for workers registered 3.5 percent on an annual basis in June. Pay raises are not keeping up with prices. Inflation is hovering around 4% on an annual basis after dropping to near 2% in 2024. How you think about this report depends on what part of the data you focus on.
June 17, 2026 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
The Federal Open Market Committee voted unanimously to hold its benchmark federal funds rate in a range of 3.5% to 3.75% in its first gathering with Kevin Warsh in the chair. Warsh vowed to restore price stability following his first policy meeting since taking the helm of the U.S. central bank. “Persistently high prices are a burden for the American people, but the recent past need not be prologue,” Warsh said in his debut press conference as chairman. Officials “are unambiguous and unanimous. This committee will deliver price stability.” Which would seem to signal an intention t raise rates to battle inflation. But maybe not in Warsh-speak.
June 13, 2026 | Daily JAM |
If your love for the dramatic wasn’t satiated by last week’s SpaceX IPO launch, this week will being more thrills with the oh-again, off-again, nobody knows what’s in the agreement Iran war peace deal, and Wednesday’s meeting of the Federal Reserve interest-rate setting body, the Open Market Committee.
June 7, 2026 | Daily JAM |
Goldman Sachs economists no longer expect the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates this year due. The bank pushed back its forecast for the Fed’s final two rate cuts to June and December 2027 from previous expectations of December 2026 and March 2027. But Goldman still doesn’t beieve the next move for the Fd is an interest rate increase. Inflation appears “less likely to become self-sustaining,” Goldman chief U..S economist David Mericle said in a note dated Friday.
June 5, 2026 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, Short Term |
The economy added 172,000 jobs in May, more than economists had expected. The unemployment rate stayed at 4.3%. With revisions, March and April added 93,000 more jobs than previously reported. That puts average job growth in 2026 at about 114,000 per month, much stronger than the 10,000 average last year. That’s much faster than the rate at which people have been coming into the labor market because the Trump administration has squeezed net immigration to near zero.
May 30, 2026 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
It’s jobs week. On Friday the Bureau of Labor Statistics will release its labor market report for May. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expect that the unemployment rate will hold steady at 4.3% and that the economy generated 89,000. That figure would be higher than in recent months and bring the three-month average to the highest level in more than a year. That would be more than enough to support talk on Wall Street of a durable acceleration in hiring. Which would be one more nail in the coffin for the argument that an interest rate cut is needed to spur the economy.
May 20, 2026 | Daily JAM, Short Term |
A majority of Federal Reserve officials at the Federal Reserve’’s April 29 meeting warned that the central bank would likely need to consider raising interest rates if inflation continued to run persistently above their 2% target.
