Reality check

Market faces reality check when Fed updates rate forecasts, White House urges Senate to ‘move swiftly’ on TikTok bill, Putin wins what Russia claims was an "election", Reddit’s IPO as much as five times oversubscribed, and SpaceX is building a spy satellite network for US intelligence…

Author

Market Briefing
March 18, 2024

Good morning.

The Fast Five → Market faces reality check when Fed updates rate forecasts, White House urges Senate to ‘move swiftly’ on TikTok bill, Putin wins what Russia claims was an "election", Reddit’s IPO as much as five times oversubscribed, and SpaceX is building a spy satellite network for US intelligence…

Calendar:

  • WED 3/20: Fed interest-rate decision, 2:00pm ET

    • Fed Chair Powell press conference, 2:30pm ET

  • THU 3/21: Jobless claims, 8:30am ET

Your 5-minute briefing for Monday, March 18:

BEFORE THE OPEN

As of market close 3/15/2024. Bitcoin as of 3/17/2024.

Pre-Market:

US Investor % Bullish Sentiment:
45.90% for Wk of Mar 14 2024 (Last week: 51.73%)

Market Recap:

  • S&P 500 dips 0.65% for second straight weekly loss.

  • Dow down 0.49%, Nasdaq slips 0.96%.

  • Tech giants like Amazon and Microsoft fall over 2%.

  • Nvidia sees volatile week, ends slightly lower.

  • February's PPI exceeds expectations.

  • Benchmark 10-year Treasury climbs 22 basis points.

  • Today: Fed's two-day policy meeting begins.

  • Fed funds futures predict 99% chance of unchanged rates next week.

EARNINGS

What we’re watching this week:

  • Wednesday: General Mills (GIS)

    • Micron (MU) - anticipating a loss of $.26 per share (a vast improvement over its year-ago loss of $1.91 per share). Revenue forecast to arrive at $5.3Bn(+43.2% YoY)

  • Thursday: Darden Restaurants (DRI), Lululemon Athletica (LULU)

    • FedEX (FDX) - earnings of $3.53 per share (+3.5% YoY) on revenue of $22.1B (-0.5% YoY)

    • Nike (NKE) - earnings of $.74 per share for Nike's fiscal Q3 (-6.3% YoY), on $12.3B revenue (-0.8% YoY)

Full earnings calendar here

HEADLINES

How the ‘dot plot’ changes — and how Fed Chair Jerome Powell addresses those changes — will be the questions investors want answered this week.

The bill’s momentum has been slowed in the Senate, which is more divided on the issue and also faces thorny budget negotiations this week to avert a partial government shutdown.

  • Putin wins what Russia claims was an "election" for its presidency (more)

  • Court halts SEC climate disclosure rule (more)

  • Dollar steady, yen soft as BOJ policy shift beckons (more)

  • US investigating Meta for role in illicit drug sales (more)

  • Reddit’s IPO as much as five times oversubscribed (more)

    • FTC conducting inquiry into Reddit’s AI data-licensing practices ahead of IPO (more)

  • Boeing’s pain spreads to travelers as airlines cut back on plans (more)

  • Exxon chief goes on the offensive as Wall Street sours on ESG (more)

  • Apple’s new CarPlay becomes last hope to crack the auto industry (more)

    • Apple without AI looks more Like Coca-Cola than high-growth tech (more)

  • LinkedIn plans to add gaming to its platform (more)

  • SpaceX is building spy satellite network for US intelligence agency (more)

  • Tesla to increase Model Y price in the US next month (more)

  • Laid-off techies face ‘sense of impending doom’ with job cuts at highest since dot-com crash (more)

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DEALFLOW

M+A | Investments

  • Vodafone wraps overhaul with €8 Billion Italy deal, buyback (more)

  • JPMorgan says clean tech can deliver a $100 Billion company (more)

  • KKR said to weigh $1 Billion sale of school chain EuroKids (more)

  • Virtuos, a video game development company, acquired Beyond-FX, a visual effects studio (more)

  • PSQ Holdings, Inc. (PSQH), a marketplace of patriotic businesses, acquired Credova Holdings, Inc., a point-of-sale financing platform for the shooting sports and firearms industries (more)

  • Accenture (ACN) acquires Udacity, a digital education company with expertise in the development and delivery of proprietary technology courses (more)

  • Pace Life Sciences purchases New Jersey Lab from Curia (more)

  • Valsoft buys Servico (more)

  • RFE-backed ZRG acquires Wiser Partners (more)

  • TA Associates invests in PowerGEM (more)

  • Kayne Anderson invests in TeleMed2U (more)

VC

  • Luminary Cloud, a cloud-native, computer-aided engineering software provider, raised $115M in funding (more)

  • X-Therma, a biotechnology company developing a platform for regenerative medicine and organ preservation, raised $22.4M in Series B funding (more)

  • DraftWise, provider of an AI-powered contract and negotiation platform for lawyers, raised $20M in Series A funding (more)

  • Lily AI, a provider of a retail tech platform specializing in AI solutions for retailers and brands, raised $20M in Series B-1 funding (more)

  • Omni, a provider of a business intelligence platform, raised additional $20M in funding (more)

  • Pure Lithium, a lithium metal battery technology company, raised $15M in Series A funding (more)

  • Clique, an infrastructure company empowering data computing for blockchains, raised $8M in Series A funding (more)

  • Paylode, a company that provides, manages, and monetizes perks programs for their customers, raised $5.5M in Seed funding (more)

  • Bone Health Technologies, a health technology company, raised $5M in funding (more)

CRYPTO

  • Binance CEO Teng Sees Bitcoin Topping $80,000 on ETF Inflows (more)

  • Ether could be a meaningful earnings driver for Coinbase, JPMorgan says (more)

  • Bitcoin price consolidation preps NEAR, APT, RNDR and MKR for more upside (more)

BULLISH BITES

✈️ Boeing timeline: Inside the air giant’s turbulent journey in recent years.

✅ Pursuits: Want to be ‘Certified Crypto Expert?’ You need 11 hours and $229.

💼 Nvidia GTC 2024: What to expect from the AI giant's big conference.

🍨 The scoop: The tiny $2 million Groq SPV that drew Chamath's ire and led his firm, Social Capital, to terminate two of its partners.

DAILY SHARES

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