End of and era?

More jobs weakness coming according to Goldman, BofA: The era of megacap dominance 'may be done', Powell has reason to hedge rate signal at Jackson Hole, Vanguard plans for its costliest ETFs yet, and Soho House to go private in $2.7B deal...

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Market Briefing
August 19, 2025

Good morning.

The Fast Five → More jobs weakness coming according to Goldman, BofA: The era of megacap dominance 'may be done', Powell has reason to hedge rate signal at Jackson Hole, Vanguard plans for its costliest ETFs yet, and Soho House to go private in $2.7B deal…

📌 'AI Bottleneck' Now Threatens Entire Magnificent 7 — A new critical failure has appeared in the AI market, and has now reached every AI company in America... including Nvidia, Microsoft, and Meta. Click here to see what this could soon mean for your money → (ad)

Calendar: (all times ET) - Full Calendar

  • Today:
    none scheduled

  • Tomorrow:
    FOMC Meeting Minutes, 2:00P

Your 5-minute briefing for Tuesday, Aug 19:

BEFORE THE OPEN

As of market close 8/18/2025.

Pre-Market:

US Investor % Bullish Sentiment:
↓ 29.88% for Week of AUG 14 2025

Previous week: 34.87%

Market Wrap:

  • Futures flat as traders await Fed signals.

  • Powell to speak at Jackson Hole in final appearance as Chair.

  • Markets expect 83% chance of Sept. rate cut (CME FedWatch).

  • Big-box earnings: Home Depot today; Lowe’s, Walmart, Target later in week.

  • S&P 500 closed fractionally lower, just below record high.

EARNINGS

Here’s what we’re watching this week:

Is This Stock the 'Next Nvidia'?

Billionaire Warren Buffett has been loading up on millions of shares of this single stock. Is he preparing for the next, biggest, and possibly final phase of the AI boom?

- a message from Brett Aitken -

HEADLINES

Goldman economists warn job growth is stalling, and the slowdown could deepen.

“If the Fed's next move is a rate cut, and if the Regime indicator is shifting to a Recovery, we think the run may be closer to done," BofA's head of US equity wrote in a note to clients.

  • Dow, S&P slip as Ukraine talks, road to rate cut remain uncertain (more)

  • Powell has reason to hedge rate signal at Jackson Hole (more)

  • Trump tariffs seen fostering new China-global south trade order (more)

  • US homebuilder sentiment dips back to lowest level since late 2022 (more)

  • Oil prices settle higher as investors focus on Trump-Zelenskiy meeting (more)

  • Foreigners are buying US homes again while Americans get sidelined (more)

  • SoftBank makes $2B investment in Intel (more)

  • Soho House to go private in $2.7B deal, Ashton Kutcher to join board (more)

  • OpenAI’s Altman warns the US is underestimating China’s AI threat (more)

  • Vanguard plans to launch its first active stock-picking ETFs (more)

  • Nu Holdings CEO Velez sells 33 million shares of the company (more)

  • ‘SPAC King’ Chamath Palihapitiya is back with a new one (more)

  • Basic Capital raises $25 million to reinvent 401(k)s (more)

DEALFLOW

M+A | Investments

  • Soho House to go private in $2.7B deal

  • SoftBank to invest $2B in Intel

  • Thoma Bravo nears deal to acquire Dayforce

  • Mediobanca gets ECB approval to acquire Banca Generali

  • Ideagen acquires Reactec

  • Saab acquires Deform

  • CourseRev.ai receives investment from The Walden Golf Group

VC

  • IVIX, an AI-focused platform, raised $60M in Series B funding

  • Medallion, an AI-powered provider network, raised $43M in new funding

  • SpinLaunch, a space technology company, raised $30M in funding

  • Tote.ai, an AI-native point-of-sale system for convenience stores, raised $22.6M in funding

  • Sola, an AI developer of a co-pilot for Robotic Process Automation, raised $17.5M in Series A funding

  • Polestar Analytics, an AI-driven data analytics and planning company, raised $12.5M in funding

  • Paradigm, an agentic spreadsheet startup, raised $5M in Seed funding

CRYPTO

  • Michael Saylor eases stock-sale limits as Bitcoin premium falls (more)

  • Bitcoin at ‘mild danger zone’ as BTC investors eye profit-taking (more)

  • Ethereum’s big backers unleash billions to push into Wall Street (more)

BULLISH BITES

🚨 Crash coming Sept 30? Analysts warn of new crisis. * 

🤖 Sam Altman believes we're in an AI bubble.

💡 Teenage engineering did it again.

🤗 ‘Job hugging’ has replaced job-hopping.

🚘 The 10 most exciting cars at the Pebble Beach Concours D’Elegance.

DAILY SHARES

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