l'esprit d'escalier

market vibes

March 27 …)

“Time and tide wait for no man.” Chaucer

Data this morning a little soft. Not much of a reaction. Housing numbers at 10:00 EDT.

In the markets

On Sunday evening, stocks gapped higher and stayed higher in a narrow range on a narrative that tariffs would be lighter than previously thought. On Monday, stocks ripped vertically up for an entire session, bell to bell, without a single downtick. Open interest was unchanged, and volume was light.

On Tuesday, the equity markets traded a little higher on even lighter volume, and open interest went down. The tariff-lite narrative was still ensconced in the mind of the market. Peace talks were progressing, and the "signal messaging" hair-pulling was just getting underway.

Yesterday, stocks lost 100% of their gains on a bit higher, albeit still very low, volume, and OI was unchanged. The news was noisy, but the tariff-lite narrative was still intact. After the close, Trump imposed a sort-of-surprise 25% tariff on foreign-made cars and added deductible interest on car loans for buyers of cars made here. He said the usual, "stealing our jobs," etc., and that was it. Stocks dropped in the after market and recovered.

Unfolding this morning are some quarterly ruminations about gold, copper and platinum, bonds under pressure, and oil all in various time samples ..including quarterly data. Here we go…