To The Moon

As the old saying goes, "After the extreme comes the turn for the better!" 🧐 $SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust(SPY)$ $iShares Semiconductor ETF(SOXX)$

With the worst of the negative news now behind us, positive developments are beginning to emerge!

First up is tonight’s CPI inflation data.

Nine top-tier U.S. investment banks have released their forecasts for October’s CPI, all pointing toward a favorable outcome—coming in below the official expectation of 0.3%.

That said, core inflation remains somewhat sticky!

US October CPI: Reading the Institutional Forecasts

Consensus and structure

Headline CPI MoM 0.23% (September 0.65% → expected slowdown of 42bp); core CPI MoM 0.22% (September 0.33% → expected slowdown of 11bp). The two distributions look quite different:

• Headline forecasts are widely dispersed (0.19%–0.28%, a 9bp spread). Morgan Stanley is the most dovish (0.19%), Wells Fargo the most hawkish (0.28%), with UBS (0.26%) and JPMorgan (0.25%) also sitting in the shaded "hot" zone. This mostly reflects noise in energy and food — banks differ on the pass-through path from oil prices.

• Core forecasts are tightly clustered (0.16%–0.24%; all nine round to 0.2%). Goldman Sachs (0.16%) is the only notable outlier below consensus; Barclays (0.22%) sits exactly on the median; HSBC, JPMorgan and UBS converge at 0.23%; Jefferies (0.24%) hugs the upper edge.

The key issue: one decimal place hides the surprise

This is the crux of tonight's read. Whether core prints 0.16% or 0.24%, the headline figure may display as just 0.2% — yet the implications are entirely different:

• Below 0.20% (unrounded): cool — at least ~2bp under consensus. Rate expectations turn dovish; risk assets get support. Only Goldman's forecast currently falls in this zone.

• 0.20% to below 0.25%: in line — the quality of the report depends on the components. Watch shelter (OER/rent), core goods, and core services. If the slowdown comes from shelter while supercore services stay sticky, markets will discount the dovish read.

• 0.25% and above: hot — above all nine forecasts, rounds up to 0.3% on the headline. Rate expectations turn hawkish; risk assets come under pressure.

Two caveats on methodology

1. No year-over-year print this time: with the October 2025 base missing (a legacy of the earlier government shutdown), YoY rates won't be published for affected indexes. The unrounded MoM figure is the only anchor.

2. The 0.23% core PCE estimate is a standalone reference, not part of this release — it only gets updated once CPI and PPI are both in hand.

How to watch it: ignore the one-decimal headline and go straight to the unrounded MoM figure and the component contributions. The 8bp between 0.16% and 0.24% is the entire distance between dovish and hawkish.

Bottom line

The nine banks in the brief have formed a clear consensus ahead of tonight's release (08:30 ET / 21:30 Beijing) — disinflation. The disagreement is not about direction, but about whether the core print lands in a "cool enough" range.

Furthermore, there has been a breakthrough in negotiations regarding the U.S.-Iran situation: Washington has granted Iran permission to enrich uranium to a concentration of 3.67% within its borders, rather than imposing a total ban.

Following this news, Brent crude oil has fallen for five consecutive sessions 📉, dropping from a peak of $117 per barrel to $91 per barrel!

While the U.S. stock market has already rebounded, the crypto market remains in a deep slumber—but the moment for a breakout should be just around the corner! 🤔