To The Moon

The optimism investors exhibited during President Trump’s first week back in the White House tempered a bit on Fri, 24 jan 2025.

By the time trading ended for the holiday-shortened trading week: (see above)

(1) DJIA:

• -0.32% (-140.82 to 44,424.25).

(2) S&P 500:

• -0.29% (-17.47 to 6,101.24).

• Notched 1st record close of 2025 on Thursday.

• The S&P 500 rallied from a 2-month low to a record high over just 8 sessions.

• Marking the 2nd-fastest reversal since 1928.

(3) Nasdaq:

• -0.50% (-99.38 to 19,954.30).

For the week, the 3 indexes performances have been “credible” : (see above)

• Dow : up +2.2% or 936.42 points.

• S&P 500 : up +1.7% or 104.58 points.

• Nasdaq : up +1.7% or 324.10 points.

Similarly, Year-to-date, the 3 indexes performances have been “great” :

• Dow : up +4.4% or 1,880.03 points.

• S&P 500 : up +3.7% or 219.61 points.

• Nasdaq : up +3.3% or 643.51 points.

Mag 7 Performances.

You will be surprised to learn that not all Magnificent 7 stocks contributed to Nasdaq’s weekly gains.

Effectively, only 4 of 7 had significant gains during the week of Jan 21-24.

They are:

• $Amazon.com(AMZN)$ : +1.79%.

• $Meta Platforms, Inc.(META)$ : +5.03%.

• $Alphabet(GOOG)$ : +1.14%.

• $Microsoft(MSFT)$ : +3.63%.

The 3 stocks that did not (really) contribute were:

• $NVIDIA(NVDA)$ : +0.75%.

• $Apple(AAPL)$ : +0.06%.

• Tesla(TSLA)$ : -4.12%.

It is a “strange” case for Nvidia, given that it was part of the quintet stocks that formed the cornerstone to Trump’s announced $500 billion Stargate AI project.

The other 4 stocks being - Oracle (ORCL)$, OpenAI, SoftBank and Microsoft (with a 3.63% gain).

As we enter into the last trading week of January 2025, the question all investors’ have (as well as me) is “will US market rally persists” for another week ?

I have doubts because:

• Chinese new year celebration - Jan 29 - 30, with reunion dinner commencing on 28 Jan evening.

• Economic reports due out again.

• Quarterly earnings continue.

Chinese New Year.

It has been estimated that almost 2.0 billion people will be celebrating Chinese New Year in 2025, globally, making it one of the most celebrated festive occasions.

Predominantly in East and South-East Asia.

Over time, its been prominent beyond Asia, especially in Australia, Canada, Mauritius, New Zealand, Peru, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States, as well as various European countries.

Will Asian investors be able to stay away from US market over the crucial 3 days - Tue (28 Jan) to Thu (30 Jan) ?

Or will they celebrate during the day (Asia time) and trade during the evenings ?

US Economic Reports.

There will be a few important economic reports out this week.

On the run up to these reports being published, US market tends to be jittery. That said, it was during the Biden administration of the past 4 years.

Its the dawn of a new administration by returning president Trump. Will things be any different for the next 4 years ? Its still to be seen.

Some of the significant reports out this week includes:

• Tue, 28 Jan 2025 - Consumer confidence.

• Wed, 29 Jan 2025 - FOMC meeting outcome on US interest rates and Fed chair, Mr Powell afternoon press conference.

• Thu, 30 Jan 2025 - US weekly jobless claims.

• Thu, 30 Jan 2025 - US Gross domestic product (GDP) Q4 2024 first reading.

• Fri, 31 Jan 2025 - Personal consumption expenditure (PCE) inflation report.

As of 18 Dec 2024, the Fed was expecting December 2024’s PCE inflation will be higher than November 2024 data, both headline and core inflation ? (see above)

However, based on Fed Reserves Bank of Cleveland’s January readings (latest), both headline and core inflation month-over-month (MoM) readings are expected to rise higher.

While headline and core inflation year-over-year (YoY) are expected to remain status quo and dipped respectively. (see above)

Quarterly earnings.

Almost half of the Magnifcent 7 reporting their earnings this week, along with some other US stocks of interest.

With Mag 7’s last week’s residual momentum (see above), will be interesting to see how they fare this week.

Dates to lookout :

• Mon, 27 Jan 2025 - SoFi (SOFI) and AT&T (T).

• Tue, 28 Jan 2025 - Boeing (BA), Lockheed Martin (LMT), Starbucks (SBUX), Chubb (CB)

• Wed, 29 Jan 2025 - Microsoft (MSFT), Meta Platforms (META), Tesla (TSLA), ASML Holding (ASML),

• Thu, 30 Jan 2025 - Apple (AAPL), Visa (V), Mastercard (MA), Caterpillar (CAT).

• Fri, 31 Jan 2025 - Exxon Mobil (XOM), Chevron (CVX), Abbvie (ABBV).

Thoughts on selected stocks reporting earnings this week:

• SOFI - Will Sofi be able to pull off another set of stellar earnings to exceed or keep up with the big 5 US banks ?

• BA - Latest report will show the extent of the losses endured due to union labour strike in Q4 2024, that lasted almost 2 months.

• SBUX - Is it cruch time for CMG’s ex CEO Brian Niccol who assumed the CEO position in August 2024?

• CAT - It is closely watched by investors due to its role as an economic indicator, cyclical nature of business, competitive landscape and many more reasons…

• CB - Since the reveal on 15 May 2024 on Berkshire major stake in Chubb, the insurer stock price has seen its high and low. (see below) Is the insurance sector a profitable investment ?

With so many activities this week, especially from Wednesday onwards, will it be the calm before the storm OR will new records be broken again for the 3 Composite indexes?

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• Do you think the four Mag 7 stocks will continue to shine this week ?

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