Stock Market Today: June 16th - 20th, 2025

Welcome to the trading week of June 16th!

Dow falls more than 700 points on Friday as attacks between Israel and Iran escalate: Live updates



Stocks tumbled Friday after Israel launched a wave of airstrikes on Iran, pushing energy prices higher and adding another complication at a time of heightened geopolitical tensions.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 769.83 points, or 1.79%, ending at 42,197.79. The S&P 500 dropped 1.13% to close at 5,976.97, while the Nasdaq Composite lost 1.30% and settled at 19,406.83.

Nvidia and other stocks that have led the market’s comeback from the April lows dropped as investors shed risk. Oil and defense stocks were higher. Exxon added 2%, while Lockheed Martin and RTX each jumped more than 3%.

The market drop began Thursday evening as Israel’s defense minister Israel Katz declared a special state of emergency following an Israeli attack on Iran. Two U.S. officials said that there is no U.S. involvement or assistance, according to NBC News.

On Friday, stocks’ decline worsened after Israel Defense Forces said that Iran launched missiles toward Israel, in retaliation for Israel’s series of airstrikes. Iranian state television said Friday afternoon that Iran will not participate in the sixth round of nuclear negotiations with the U.S. planned for this weekend.

Brent crude futures and West Texas Intermediate crude futures both surged more than 7%. At one point, WTI crude oil neared $74 a barrel. Gold prices rose to a near two-month high, driven by safe-haven demand.

“This conflict adds challenges to the already sizable collection of worries being maintained by the markets–those aren’t going away. At the bare minimum the spike in crude, if it persists, will have an almost immediate impact on inflation numbers,” said Mark Malek, chief investment officer of Siebert Financial.

President Donald Trump, in a Friday morning post on his social media site Truth Social, warned Iran to come to the negotiating table.

“There has already been great death and destruction, but there is still time to make this slaughter, with the next already planned attacks being even more brutal, come to an end. Iran must make a deal, before there is nothing left, and save what was once known as the Iranian Empire,” Trump wrote. “No more death, no more destruction, JUST DO IT, BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE.”

Trump said in a separate early morning post that he is giving Iran “perhaps, a second chance” to strike a nuclear deal. “Two months ago I gave Iran a 60 day ultimatum to ‘make a deal.’ They should have done it! Today is day 61,” he wrote.

Separately, a closely watched University of Michigan survey released Friday indicated an uptick in consumer sentiment last month. The university’s Survey of Consumers rose to 60.5 in June, well ahead of the Dow Jones estimate for 54 and a 15.9% increase from a month ago.

Friday’s sell-off dragged the major averages into negative territory on the week. The S&P 500 lost 0.4%, while the Nasdaq slid 0.6%. The Dow fell 1.3% over the week.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:


S&P Sectors End of Week:


Major Indices End of Week:



Major Futures Markets End of Week:


Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

 

4 Reasons We Believe That Israel’s War Against Hamas Won’t Be Market Moving and 2 Things That Could Change That


We have received several questions about the potential market impact of Hamas’ brutal terrorist attack on Israel, the Israeli response, and the on-going aftermath. Thinking about these kinds of issues is our job, but we are also well aware that these considerations are trivial compared to the events themselves and the lives they impact.

Looking at the numbers, after just a few trading days markets have been resilient overall. On Monday and Tuesday combined:

• The S&P 500 Index was up 1.2%.
• The more economically sensitive Russell 2000 Index of small cap stocks was up 1.7%.
• The MSCI EAFE Index of international developed stocks, which tends to be more sensitive to oil supply shocks in the Middle East, was up 2.2%.
• Oil (West Texas Intermediate) did jump on Monday but was down slightly Tuesday, with a still meaningful two-day gain of just under 4.5%.
• U.S. bond markets were closed Monday, but the 10-year Treasury yield declined sharply Tuesday, Treasuries’ role as a safe haven asset dominating any inflation fears from higher oil prices.
• Gold, sometimes also treated as a safe haven asset in the face of geopolitical risk, climbed 1.6%, a meaningful but not outsized move.

The reaction thus far has been somewhat benign compared to geopolitical shocks historically. Markets are a forward-looking and typically will look ahead to the economy recovering from the initial shock even as some uncertainty persists.

Looking at a list of similar historical events (that still vary in scale quite a lot) median performance over the next year is somewhat lower than historical returns. The average return is also weaker than the median return, signaling some asymmetrical downside risk. But context here is very important.



Keep in mind that much of the negative market behavior is likely not driven by the geopolitical event itself. For example, the U.S.S. Cole bombing was coincident with the tech bubble bursting in 2000. What stands out from the chart is not so much the downside risk of geopolitical events, but the coincidence of drawdowns and recessions independent of geopolitical risks. If you look at the major drawdowns, most take place during or near a recession, including 1956, 1973, and 2000-20001.

But there are cases where geopolitical risk played some role in the decline. For example, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine worsened already building inflationary pressures, eventually contributing to an aggressive Federal Reserve and weighing on equity markets. But that has been the exception rather than the rule. Markets saw strong gains despite the start of the Iraq invasion in 2003 and Israel’s Six-Day War in 1967. And, of course, the bigger picture beyond the more tactical 12-month time frame is that the markets have always recovered.

Despite several Middle Eastern conflicts that did not lead to market drawdowns, the Yom Kippur War in 1973 played at least some role in the ensuing market sell-off, but we believe the current circumstances are quite different. In October 1973, an Arab coalition led by Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack against Israel on Judaism’s holiest day, Yom Kippur. After detecting Soviet resupply to Syria and Egypt, the U.S. began a massive resupply of Israel. The oil cartel OPEC responded by declaring an oil embargo against the U.S. and other countries. In 1973, the U.S. had grown increasingly dependent on foreign oil. As a result of the embargo, oil prices tripled and the added strain on the economy was one of the causes of the recession.

While there are several themes in play related to the current conflict, times have changed significantly.

• Hamas has tried to expand the conflict by implicating Iran’s support, much as the Yom Kippur War also became a Cold War flashpoint. The claims have been treated as suspect thus far by U.S. and Israeli military intelligence but the issue is unresolved. Nevertheless, Iran is not the cold war Soviet Union and Russia itself is depleted by its ongoing war in Ukraine.
• While there are various degrees of tensions between Israel and its neighbors, as of now the scope of the conflict is relatively narrow, focused geographically on Gaza.
• The dependency of the U.S. on foreign oil is dramatically different than it was in 1973. In the 1970s the amount of oil demand that could be met through domestic production was in decline. Today, U.S. production alone could meet almost all of the domestic demand. In fact, the U.S. is able to export a little under half its oil, actually making it a net oil exporter. As seen in the chart below, in 1973, oil exports were 4% of imports. In 2022, they were 115% of imports.
• In addition, Canada, not OPEC, is the largest source of foreign oil, and accounts for approximately four times the imports from all of OPEC.

Two risks do remain:

• There is, of course, the possibility for the conflict to expand and the Middle East remains a sensitive region. We view this as unlikely but still uncertain at the margin.
• The largest economic vulnerability for now is similar to the Ukraine conflict. Central banks, businesses, and consumers remain sensitive to inflation risk even as disinflation continues to be the primary path that prices have been following. As a result, broader sensitivity to higher oil prices may be more acute than usual. And even if OPEC’s role has diminished, particularly in the U.S., oil supply and demand is still a global phenomenon. But keep in mind that we are still well off peak oil prices from the last year and consumers have remained resilient even at higher price levels. The most salient impact of oil prices on American is via gas prices, and the good news is that prices at the pump have been falling recently despite the run-up in oil. Shrinking refining margins means pump prices are likely to fall even further. That’s a tailwind for American households, and consumption.

The Carson Investment Research team has not changed its overall market outlook in response to the conflict, although we continue to monitor the situation closely. We remain overweight equities but do favor the energy sector. In addition, we remain cautious on rates but have recommended adding duration (interest rate sensitivity) to bond portfolios as rates climbed sharply higher, although our recommended positioning remains below the duration of the Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate Bond Index. Most importantly, we think the U.S. economy can continue to avoid recession on the resilience of the U.S. consumer.

Welcome to the Start of a New Bull Market?


“The more things change, the more they stay the same.” French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr

What a run stocks have been on the past two months! We came into this year with everyone all bulled up after back-to-back 20% years, then stocks tanked in historic fashion after Liberation Day, so those same bullish Strategists and 50 person institutional research shops cut their S&P 500 targets near the April lows, now with stocks back up near new highs they are upping their targets.

This great chart from our friends at Yahoo! Finance sums it up.



We never cut our view on the S&P 500, leaving our target at a range of 12-15% for 2025, even when stocks were down 15% for the year on April 8. As we noted that exact day, it was still quite possible for stocks to come back to positive when the year was all said and done, especially with some good news on trade, which is exactly what has happened.

Three times historically we saw stocks down 15% or more for the year and get back to positive and all three of those times gained more than double digits for the year, something we still think is likely this time around. As I’ve said before, this is like a beachball under the water and once it gets momentum it can really get moving.



What a Two-Month Run
It is crazy to think just how bearish everyone was two months ago. I was hearing from people I hadn’t heard from for years and they were all convinced Trump’s tariffs were going to wreck our economy and crash the stock market. We did of course have a near bear market and one of the worst two-day drops ever after Liberation Day, so emotions were no doubt running high. Still, this is why sentiment is so powerful, as the opportunity was there to fade what nearly everyone was saying and be open to a major snap back, which is exactly what has happened.

We went from one of the worst two-month returns ever to one of the best. As we’ve noted time and time again this year, investors need to be aware that the worst and best days tend to happen in clusters and if you sell after some bad days, you’ll likely only miss out on the best days, which is exactly what happened to many investors.



So just how rare is it to see stocks up more than 20% in two months? Very rare and the good news is it is also very bullish. Only five other times since 1950 have stocks been up more than 20% in such a short period and those times were all great times to be looking for continued strength.

As you can see below, stocks gained after this rare signal 1-, 3-, 6-, and 12-months later every single time. Up a year later by more than 30% on average! Of course, all those other occasions saw much bigger prior selloffs, so we aren’t calling for such a big gain (but we wouldn’t complain!), but this is yet another reason to remain optimistic the second half of 2025. I mean, look one more time at those dates: February 1975, October 1982, December 1998, April 2009, May 2020, and now. Those were times to be open to much better times and this time should join them.



A New Bull Market? Nope
Stocks are officially up more than 20% from the near bear market lows of early April, so are we in a new bull market? If down 20% is a bear market then is up 20% a new bull market? I’d say no, as we never left the bull market is my take. As the quote from Karr above implies, things might have changed some earlier this year, but we are now right back to your regularly scheduled bull market.

Here’s a nice chart we’ve shared before that shows bull markets tend to be choppy and frustrating right around now, which sure played out this time. The good news though is once you can get past this rough part of the bull, better times are coming and they can last many years.



Lastly, we found 17 bear or near bear markets going back to World War II and once stocks were up more than 20% off those lows (like what just happened last week), continued good times usually were right around the corner. You’d think up 20% would mean you’ve missed the rally, but history would say the bull still has plenty of gas left in the tank. Incredibly, stocks were higher a year later 16 out of 17 times, with a very impressive average return of nearly 19%. Oh, and that one time that didn’t work? It was a 100-year pandemic.





Thanks for reading. It isn’t lost on us you can get financial research from so many other places and we are honored you are coming to our team. We won’t always be right, we won’t always be wrong, but we will always be honest. And honestly, things still look pretty darn good.

Sentiment Around New Highs
Thu, Jun 12, 2025

In Tuesday's Closer, we provided an update on monthly sentiment gauges, noting broad improvements since the April low. Of those inputs that have perked up is the weekly AAII survey. This week's release saw the percentage of respondents reporting as bullish rise once again, to a two-week high of 36.7%.



The other side of the equation—the percentage of respondents reporting as bearish—had a more notable move this week. Only 33.6% of respondents were bears, which was the lowest reading since the week of January 23.



Put together, the bull-bear spread came in at 3.1, or alternatively, bulls outnumber bears by 3.1 percentage points. There was another positive reading in the spread a couple weeks ago, but this is the highest spread since the last week of January when it was at 7. In all, this indicates that investors have begun to shift more bullish rather than the consistent bearish tones from the past few months.



Also worth noting is that investors' sentiment has made this improvement in tandem with a push in stock prices back near record highs. As the S&P 500 is about 1.5% below its February 19 peak, the current level of sentiment is actually lower than what might be expected. Historically, AAII sentiment (measured by the bull-bear spread) has averaged more bullish readings when the S&P is closer to a record, and readings become more bearish as it falls further from the highs (save for extreme drawdowns where sentiment actually begins to pivot to be more bullish). For the present distance from a high, the bull-bear spread has historically averaged in the high single digits compared to 3.1 today. In other words, sentiment does not appear to have gotten over its skis as the index attempts to break out.

Benign May CPI Reading Unlikely to Spur June Fed Rate Cut

Although today’s Consumer Inflation Index (CPI) report came in below consensus estimates, a Fed rate cut later this month still remains highly unlikely. Headline CPI increased 0.1% from April to May pushing year-over-year inflation to 2.4%, up from 2.3% in April. Although there was a tick higher in year-over-year inflation the overall trend in CPI back towards 2% (and possibly less) appears to still be on track for interest rate cuts in the second half of 2025.

The Rocky Balboa Market


“You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life, but it ain’t about how hard you can hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done!” Rocky Balboa in Rocky Balboa (aka Rocky VI from 2006)

First things first, I’m a huge Rocky IV fan, I just wanted to get that out right away. We all have a favorite Rocky movie, but him taking down Captain Ivan Drago had to have been a top highlight from my youth.

What does Rocky have to do with this market rally you ask? Well, much like when Rocky took a hard hit and sometimes got knocked down, he’d always get back up (except in his first fight with Clubber Lang in Rocky III, but he won the climactic rematch). This is quite similar with how the market has been acting lately. A perfect example is last Thursday. The S&P 500 fell over worries about President Trump and Elon Musk’s bromance deteriorating in real time for all of us to see. Then a funny thing happened—the next day the index soared right back and then some, closing above 6,000 for the first since February 21. Incredibly, the S&P is only about two percent away from a new all-time high, something that even the staunchest of bulls wasn’t expecting this time two months ago.

Rocky might have lost at the end of Rocky I against the great Apollo Greed, but he came back bigger and better and won in Rocky II. In a lot of ways, this 2025 market is Rocky II, as a down day has seen the S&P 500 up an average of 0.29% this year, which would rank as one of the best years ever for average performance after a down day. Since 1980, only 2020 would be better than 2025 so far. Other years that saw big returns after down days were 2003, 2008, 2009, 2020, and of course now. Yes, 2008 was a horrible year for stocks, but those other three years were all solid after hiccups in the first quarter. Come to think of it, 2008 is a lot like Tommy Gunn in Rocky V, something no one has very positive memories of after all these years. The bottom line is this resilient market is yet another reason we expect to potentially see this bull market continue with a solid second half of the year.



Just like the amazing Rocky spin off Creed (and Creed II and III) starring Michael B. Jordan, sometimes it is good to diversify your storylines, just like it is to diversify your equity holdings. Although US returns have been fairly muted this year after the back-to-back 20% gains the previous two years, what might surprise many US investors is that most global stock markets are up nicely, with many making new 52-week or all-time highs. This is why having a globally diversified portfolio can benefit US-centric investors, as the US won’t always lead. The good news is we do anticipate the US may play catch up the rest of 2025, but big picture, this is a global bull market and investors are being rewarded for being in risk assets.



Thanks for reading and I’ll leave you with this hilarious back-and-forth between Rocky and his beloved trainer Mickey.

Small Caps Rocking Typical Post-Election June

In post-election years since 1950, early June strength has been notably stronger for NASDAQ and Russell 2000 while DJIA and S&P 500 have typically struggled. 2025 June gains so far of 3.8% for Russell 2000 ($IWM) and 2.5% for NASDAQ ($QQQ) sets up a typical brisk, mid-month drop followed by a month-end rally led by technology and small caps.

CPI on Tap
Tue, Jun 10, 2025

Tomorrow's report on May CPI will help to shape the inflation narrative for the rest of the summer. A stronger-than-expected report will be quickly seized upon by the anti-tariff contingency, and if there's a weaker-than-expected report, you can bet that President Trump will be on Truth Social singing the praises of tariffs. Earlier today, we tweeted that the Fed's CPI Nowcast was predicting headline CPI to rise 0.13% compared to a Wall Street consensus forecast of 0.2%, so if the Nowcast is right, get ready for some Truth Social posts!

Besides the Nowcast, seasonal trends suggest that a stronger-than-expected inflation print is less likely. The table and chart below show the frequency of stronger-than-expected, weaker-than-expected, and inline headline CPI prints from 1999 through 2024. Since 1999, the May CPI report (released in June) has only been stronger than expected 31% of the time. That ranks as the fifth-highest percentage of higher-than-expected readings of any month. Weaker-than-expected reports, however, are more common at 46% of the time. The only other month with a higher frequency of lower-than-expected headline CPI reports is November (released in December) at 50%.

$1,000 in the Stock Market at Birth
Mon, Jun 9, 2025

There's a real chance that newborn children in the US will begin receiving $1,000 in an investment account at birth if President Trump's budget bill passes Congress in the months ahead. CEOs of some major public companies are actually meeting at the White House today to discuss the "$1,000 at birth" provision.

Below is a chart we created showing how much $1,000 at birth would be worth today if it were invested in the S&P 500 at the end of each month going back 50 years (with dividends re-invested).



As shown above, $1,000 invested in the S&P fifty years ago and not touched would be worth nearly $350,000 today. That number drops to roughly $127,000 if the $1,000 were invested at the end of November 1980 and $40,000 if the start date is August 1987. Even still, there are a lot of 37-year olds out there born just before the 1987 crash that wouldn't mind having $40k in an investment account right now!

The second chart above shows the same data over just the last 25 years for better scale. Because of the Dot Com bubble and burst of the late 1990s and early 2000s and the Financial Crisis of the late 2000s, people born in various months during this period would have quite different account values right now. $1,000 invested in August 2000 just after the Dot Com peak would be worth roughly $6,200 today, while $1,000 invested nearly ten years later in February 2009 would be worth nearly $5k more at $11,000. If this provision comes to pass, we may see birth rates go up during lengthy bear markets!

IPO Momentum Continues


Strong recent activity and returns in the IPO market continue to provide a gauge that investor sentiment is high. As I wrote previously, IPO activity across major U.S. exchanges has largely rebounded to long-term average levels. Post-IPO returns reveal a meaningful divergence between technology and non-technology companies, mirroring the recent bull market in tech-related stocks. A deeper dive into a recent technology IPO may help illustrate why.

Recent technology-related IPOs have outperformed their non-technology counterparts. Since the beginning of 2024, there have been 23 ‘large IPOs’ – defined as deals raising more than $500 million in proceeds – with 11 coming from tech-related companies and 12 from non-tech sectors. On average, tech IPOs have seen a share price appreciation of 108% compared to their deal price. In contrast, the average non-tech IPO has ‘only’ appreciated by 49% relative to their deal price, as shown in the chart below.



The chart also shows a more favorable distribution of outcomes for tech IPOs. Technology’s best performing IPO, CoreWeave, has returned 237% compared to its deal price, whereas Amer Sports’ 188% return since its deal is the best performer in the non-tech cohort (price return data from FactSet as of 6/5/2025 closing prices).

A closer look at CoreWeave highlights why some technology IPOs have delivered such strong performance. CoreWeave exhibits several distinguishing characteristics compared to its peers. Public market investors appear willing to pay premium valuations for businesses they perceive as uniquely positioned to sustain long-term competitive advantages.

CoreWeave’s specialized cloud computing architecture has become a key enabler for emerging AI applications. According to company reports, OpenAI is one of CoreWeave’s largest customers, selecting the company to help them train and host their latest AI models. CoreWeave also earned the #1 ranking in SemiAnalysis’ March 2025 GPU Cloud ClusterMAX™ Rating – a third party scoring system evaluating cloud providers on factors such as security, reliability, and usability, among other factors. CoreWeave’s rating even exceeded those of major incumbents like Microsoft Azure and Amazon AWS.

This recognition may help explain CoreWeave’s ambitious growth outlook. Analysts polled by FactSet estimate CoreWeave can grow revenue to $16.4 billion in 2027, up from 2024’s $1.9 billion (data as of 6/6/2025). If the company can achieve this estimate, it would represent a 105% compounded annual growth rate, a growth rate that is significantly above many other technology companies. Outsized growth of this nature may help investors point to unique operating abilities. With hardware and software engineered to work in tandem, CoreWeave may be able to maintain a performance edge over its peers and continue fueling its outsized expansion.

The IPO market has largely recovered and underscores the market’s appetite for innovation-driven growth stories. Companies like CoreWeave have captured investor enthusiasm by offering not just scale, but also differentiated capabilities in fast-growing sectors like AI infrastructure. Investors should remain selective, distinguishing between companies with durable value propositions and those benefiting from short-term hype. The IPO market’s recent rebound may be just the beginning of a longer-term rotation toward next-generation technology platforms.

Want some good news?

May Payrolls Were OK, but There’s Weakness Under the Hood


On the face of it, the May payroll report was ok. The economy created 139,000 jobs in May (above expectations for a 126,000 increase) and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 4.2%. But pop the hood and there’s cause for concern.

For one thing, we got a net 95,000 downward revision of jobs created in March and April:

• March was revised down by 65,000, from 185,000 to 120,000. Remarkably, this was first reported as a 228,000.
• April was revised down by 30,000 from 177,000 to 147,000.

This brings the 3-month average to 135,000. That’s well below the 209,000 average we saw back in December, and even below the 2019 pace of 166,000.

Here’s the other thing — the payroll data is based on surveys of over 120,000 businesses representing over 630,000 worksites. These are much larger than any private surveys but there’s still noise associated with it (which is why we get large revisions). The “statistical significance at the 90 percent confidence level” is 136,000. What does that mean? If you’re well above this number, you can be fairly sure job growth is positive. If you’re at this number, like right now (and also seeing downward momentum), we can’t be sure the economy is actually creating any net jobs. Not a certainty, but it’s an uncomfortable place.

Now, immigration has more or less completely collapsed, and so the economy probably needs about 100,000 jobs (if not less) to keep up with population growth, since it’s growing more slowly. And if it does this, as seems to be the case if you take the 3-month average at face value (and assume no more downward revisions), the unemployment rate shouldn’t increase.

The unemployment rate actually comes from a survey of about 60,000 eligible households, and it is much noisier than the payroll survey. That’s why it’s more useful to look at ratios like the unemployment rate or employment-population ratios with this survey. The May household survey showed that employment fell by almost 700,000, but the confidence interval here is 600,000 (like I said, it’s noisy). At the same time, the denominator for the unemployment rate, i.e. the labor force, also fell by 625,000. That’s why the unemployment rate remained unchanged at 4.2%. A labor force that is shrinking is not great for the economy, but it will hide weakness when calculating the unemployment rate.

Meanwhile, the prime-age (25-54) employment population ratio pulled back from 80.7% to 80.5%. By itself, that’s still pretty good and higher than anything we saw from 2001-2019, but the question is whether it sticks around here. I like to look at this metric because it helps offset demographic issues (due to an aging population) and issues around how “unemployment” is defined.



Distribution of Job Growth Isn’t Great
The composition of job growth across sectors also gave less cause for comfort. Close to 63% of jobs created in May were in the non-cyclical sectors of health care and social assistance and private education (+87,000). Employment in cyclical areas like professional and business services, information (including technology jobs), and manufacturing fell by 24,000. The one positive is that leisure and hospitality jobs rose by 48,000 — these aren’t high-paying jobs but it tells you that service sector activity like restaurant spending and travel remain healthy.

The composition of job growth in May follows a theme we’ve seen over the past year, and especially year to date. Over the first 5 months of this year, the economy has created 619,000 jobs (averaging 124,000 per month). Of that…

• Health care, social assistance, and private education: 379,00 (61%)
• Government: 33,000 (5%)
• Leisure and hospitality: 74,000 (12%)

That’s really skewed, and not exactly what you would see if the economy was firing on all cylinders. The big picture is that cyclical areas of the economy are weak, buffeted by both tariffs / tariff uncertainty, and high interest rates.



Tariff Uncertainty + Fed Pause = More Slowing
We still have no idea what the end game is with a big piece of the announced tariffs. They’re simply on pause now. The average effective tariff rate in the US was about 2% at the start of the year. It’s certainly going to much higher than that. It’s currently around 15%, but it’s an open question whether stays here, or moves closer to 10%, or moves even higher than 20%.



Ultimately, American business will figure out how to live with these tariffs. Either they take the hit to their margins or pass price increases to consumers. But the ongoing uncertainty, and possibility of inflation flaring up again, is likely to keep the Fed on the sidelines for longer.

Moreover, with the headline data (like the unemployment rate) suggesting the labor market is ok, the Fed may believe it has time to wait for more data. The market’s currently expecting about two more 0.25%-point cuts from the Fed this year, but we may not even see one if the unemployment rate doesn’t move much higher than 4.5% (and given the falloff in immigration, it may not).

So what looks like labor market resiliency on the surface may hide weakness underneath. In my last blog, I discussed how a broad range of economic indicators, as captured in our proprietary economic index for the US, indicates that economic momentum is sliding. Also keep in mind that pausing on rate cuts is not a benign status quo — policy is implicitly getting tighter because wage growth is easing. Historically, the fed funds rate rising well above the pace of wages, i.e. increasingly tight monetary policy, has constricted the economy and ultimately these situations ended up in recessions.





Trouble in Housing
In short, policy is tight right now and it’s going to remain tight until the Fed sees more data. And that’s going to drag even more on cyclical areas of the economy, notably housing. We have a big problem in housing and some of that is because of what happened soon after Covid.

Most homeowners were able to buy or refinance at mortgage rates close to 3% in 2020 – 2021, and that meant more money in household pockets. But once rates surged in 2022, new homebuyers were locked out of the market as affordability collapsed. In addition to high mortgage rates, inventory was low and so prices moved higher. Existing homeowners were reluctant to put their house on the market because that would involve switching from an ultra-low mortgage rate to something well above 6%. Higher home prices is good for homeowners unless you want to move to another home (because that home is also more expensive) with a higher mortgage rate. Of course, this can go on for only so long. If you have to move, you have to move and this year we’re starting to see supply increasing , i.e. inventory is normalizing as more homes are put on the market. But that also means prices are easing in several cities across the country, notably in the South.

Even as supply is increasing, elevated mortgage rates close to 7% are creating a demand side problem as well. Mortgage applications are up 17% since last year, but they’re still a whopping 40% below average 2019 levels. Refinancings are down 65% from average 2019 levels. Remember, this a key mechanism by which homeowners can access home equity (which they have more of), but the door is shut because of elevated rates.



The tariff mess in April led some forecasters to predict an economic crash, as early as this summer. We were not in that camp, but that doesn’t mean we’re out of the woods. The whole tariff situation and ensuing uncertainty, along with headline labor market data hiding underlying weakness, simply increases the risk of tight monetary policy, and elevated interest rates becoming a larger and larger drag on the economy. That’s a slow burn, but a burn nonetheless with risks increasing as we get closer to year end and in early 2026.

 

Here are the percentage changes for the major indices for WTD, MTD, QTD & YTD in 2024-



S&P sectors for the past week-

 

Here are the current major indices pullback/correction levels from 52WK highs as of week ending 6.13.25-


Here is also the pullback/correction levels from current prices


Here are the current major indices rally levels from 52WK lows as of week ending 6.13.25-

 

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Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week-

 

Stock Market Analysis Video for June 13th, 2025
Video from AlphaTrends Brian Shannon


ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/15/25
Video from ShadowTrader Peter Reznicek

 

StocksForumers! Come join us on our stock market competitions for this upcoming trading week ahead!-

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StocksForums Weekly Stock Picking Contest & SPX Sentiment Poll (6/16-6/20) <-- click there to cast your weekly market direction vote and stock picks for this coming week ahead!

Daily SPX Sentiment Poll for Monday (6/16) <-- click there to cast your daily market direction vote for this coming Monday ahead!

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It would be pretty sweet to see some of you join us and participate on these!

I hope you all have a fantastic weekend ahead!

 

And finally here is the most anticipated earnings calendar for this upcoming trading week ahead-
($APPS $LEN $KR $ACB $JBL $PETS $ACN $DRI $KMX $AIOT $HITI $XAIR $LZB $SWBI $RNW $TEN $ANTA $VNCE $GMS $KFY $WLY $RFIL $LVO $VTGN)


If you guys want to view the full earnings post please see this thread here-

• Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for the week beginning June 16th, 2025 <-- click there to view!

 

Top of the morning StocksForumers! Happy Monday to all of you and welcome to the new trading week and a frrrrrrrrrrrresh start. Here is a quick check on those futures as we are over an hour into the US cash market open.

GLTA on this Monday, June the 16th, 2025!

 

Here are today's economic calendar events:

 

Here are today's analyst stock upgrades & downgrades:

 

Here are this morning's pre-market earnings results:

 

Morning Lineup - 6/16/25
Mon, Jun 16, 2025

US equity futures are bouncing back pre-market to start the new trading week after a 1%+ drop last Friday. As shown below, the S&P has stabilized with less volatility over the last few weeks, giving it a chance to re-charge for an eventual breakout to new highs. The index needs to gain about 2.9% from its current level to make a new all-time high.

 

Here is a final look at today's market and futures maps, as well as how each sector performed individually at the close on Monday, June 16th, 2025.

 

Top of the morning StocksForumers! Happy Tuesday to all of you and welcome to the new trading day and a frrrrrrrrrrrresh start. Here is a quick check on those futures as we are over an hour into the US cash market open.

GLTA on this Tuesday, June the 17th, 2025!

 

Here are today's economic calendar events:

 

Here are today's analyst stock upgrades & downgrades:

 

Here are this morning's pre-market earnings results:

 

Morning Lineup - 6/17/25
Tue, Jun 17, 2025

After a strong bounce-back day yesterday following Friday's 1% drop, US equity futures are down slightly ahead of today's open on relatively little news. As shown below, market internals remain overbought, but not by much.



Looking at sectors, Energy now has the highest percentage of stocks above their 50-day moving averages at 91.3%, and the Energy sector's valuation relative to the last ten years is on the low side compared to the rest of the market. Financials and Technology currently have the highest valuations relative to readings over the last ten years.

 

Here is a final look at today's market and futures maps, as well as how each sector performed individually at the close on Tuesday, June 17th, 2025.