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Briefing.com Summary:
*Alphabet and Apple are up big after Google gets favorable ruling in antitrust case.
*Broader market not looking too energetic at the moment.
*Fed Governor Waller reiterates that Fed should be cutting rates at September FOMC meeting.
September got off to an inauspicious start, but by the end of the day things looked less inauspicious thanks to yet another buy-the-dip campaign that pared yesterday's opening losses.
Those losses were attributed to tariff concerns after the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that President Trump imposing global tariffs is illegal given that tariffs are solely a Congressional power. The fact that the market rebounded nicely during the session exposed the notion that the early selling may not have been so much about the tariff concerns as it was about a mechanical exercise following a huge run by the market.
Moreover, the thinking that the Trump administration will be successful with its appeal to the Supreme Court and/or its majority in the Senate tempered some of the knee-jerk negativity coming off the long weekend.
The S&P 500 declined 0.7% yesterday when it was all said and done. That is not the mark of a market overly concerned by the tariff situation. If anything, it was the mark of a market that knows it has been on quite a bender and needs a bit of a break.
It took one, cognizant that valuations are stretched and that September has a history of being a losing month. Today, however, the market's fortunes are looking a little better.
Currently, the S&P 500 futures are up 21 points and are trading 0.3% above fair value, the Nasdaq 100 futures are up 155 points and are trading 0.7% above fair value, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average futures are down 107 points and are trading 0.2% below fair value.
The catalyst for the outperformance of the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures is the news that U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled in the Alphabet (GOOG) antitrust case that Google will not have to divest Chrome. Additionally, the company can still pay companies to preload products, according to CNBC. That was also music to Apple's (AAPL) ears.
Shares of GOOG are up 6.7%, and shares of AAPL are up 3.6% in pre-market trading. Those gains, and gains in other mega-cap stocks, are doing the upside driving.
The question is, will this be an isolated trade that favors only the mega-cap stocks, or will the broader market come along for the ride? The underperformance of the Dow Jones Industrial Average futures and the fact that the S&P 500 futures are only 0.3% above fair value despite the big gains in GOOG and AAPL could be an early signal that the broader market may take a backseat on today's drive.
We'll see. Market rates aren't posing much of an obstacle at this juncture. The 2-yr note yield is down one basis point to 3.65%, and the 10-yr note yield is unchanged at 4.28%. Participants will be attuned in particular to the action at the back end of the curve as the day unfolds.
In other developments, Macy's (M) better-than-expected earnings results have been well received; Dollar Tree (DLTR) is down after its earnings report; Reuters reports that OPEC+ may be weighing an early output hike; and Fed Governor Waller, FOMC voter and Fed Chair candidate, reiterated to CNBC that the Fed should be cutting rates at the September 16-17 FOMC meeting.
