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Bernie Sanders for President

2015.07.31 19:41 AvadaKedavra03 Bernie Sanders for President

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2023.06.03 07:55 TheLegendKeithDeroux The Indus Connection (Part 1 - India/Brahmin History): The Relationship Queen Victoria II has to Early Sikh Canadian Settler, Kesur Singh - Pierre Elliot Trudeau's Close Relationship to Indian President Indira Ghandi Before her Assassination & Operation Bluestar, Strengthened Indus Bonds (1897-1985)

The Indus Connection (Part 1 - India/Brahmin History): The Relationship Queen Victoria II has to Early Sikh Canadian Settler, Kesur Singh - Pierre Elliot Trudeau's Close Relationship to Indian President Indira Ghandi Before her Assassination & Operation Bluestar, Strengthened Indus Bonds (1897-1985)
Disclaimer: The point of these stories is to uncover missed and hidden tales that many new generation Canadians are unaware of and overlook. The storied histories of people, ethnicities, neighborhoods are never told and for good reason. The information presented will be sourced and open to full discussion. This 3 Part series will uncover The Indus Connection - The Bind that Punjab (Informally Khalistan), India and Sri Lanka have to the Canadian Government, RCMP & CSIS. I've done my best to piece the significant information together in a timeline that allows the reader to understand these events clearer. (Information is cited; avoiding going full in depth)
Kesur Singh was a Sikh officer of the 5th Cavalry who represented his regiment at Queen Victoria's diamond jubilee celebrations in London in 1897. This photo of him featured in The Navy and Army Illustrated of 10th Dec 1897. The description says 'He has on many occasions earned the praise of his superiors. He wears the medal and clasp for the Jowaki Expedition of 1877-78 and the medal with two clasps for Afghanistan (1878-80) where he was specially commended for devotion and courage on several occasions, and received the Order of Merit, and a special certificate from lord Roberts for his work at Sherpur.

Kesur Singh & The First Sikh Canadian Settlers in Canada - Ties to the British Raj & How the Queen Elizabeth II Awarded him for his Valor in the British Indian Cavalry (1897)

Kesur Singh, a Risaldar Major in the British India Army, is credited with being the first Sikh settler in Canada. He was amongst a group of Sikh officers who arrived in Vancouver on board Empress of India in 1897. They were on the way to Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. Sikhs found employment in laying the tracks of the Canadian Pacific Railway, in lumber mills and mines. Though they earned less than white workers, they made enough money to send some of it to India and make it possible for their relatives to immigrate to Canada.
Indian Cavalry Passing the House of Parliament for Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee (1897)
A notable moment in early Sikh history in Canada was in 1902 when settlers first arrived in Golden, British Columbia to work at the Columbia River Lumber Company. This was a theme amongst most early Punjabi Sikh settlers in Canada to find work in the agricultural and forestry sectors in British Columbia. Punjabi Sikhs became a prominent ethnic group within the sawmill workforce in British Columbia almost immediately after initial arrival to Canada.
Punjabi Sikhs in Whitehorse, Yukon (April,1906)
The early settlers in Golden built the first Gurdwara (Sikh Temple) in Canada and North America in 1905, which would later be destroyed by fire in 1926. The second Gurdwara to be built in Canada was in 1908 in Kitsilano (Vancouver), aimed at serving a growing number of Punjabi Sikh settlers who worked at nearby sawmills along False Creek at the time. The Gurdwara would later close and be demolished in 1970, with the temple society relocating to the newly built Gurdwara on Ross Street, in South Vancouver.
As a result, the oldest existing Gurdwara in Canada today is the Gur Sikh Temple, located in Abbotsford, British Columbia. Built in 1911, the temple was designated as a national historic site of Canada in 2002 and is the third-oldest Gurdwara in the country. Later, the fourth Gurdwara to be built Canada was established in 1912 in Victoria on Topaz Avenue, while the fifth soon was built at the Fraser Mills (Coquitlam) settlement in 1913, followed a few years later by the sixth at the Queensborough (New Westminster) settlement in 1919, and the seventh at the Paldi (Vancouver Island) settlement, also in 1919.
Early Sikh pioneers also settled in the Abbotsford area in 1905 and originally worked on farms and in the lumber industry. By 1906, there were about 1,500 Sikh workers living in Canada, among about 5,000 East Indians in total. Although most of the immigrants from South Asia at the time were Sikhs, local ignorance of Eastern religions led to them frequently being assumed to be Hindus. About 90% of these Sikhs lived in British Columbia. While Canadian politicians, missionaries, unions and the press were opposed to Asian workers. British Columbia industrialists were short of labor and thus Sikhs were able to get an early foothold at the turn of the 20th century in British Columbia.
As with the large numbers of Chinese workers already present in Canada, many white workers resented those immigrants and directed their ill-will toward the Sikhs, who were easily recognized by their beards and turbans. Punjabis were accused of having a caste system, an idea that goes against the foundations of Sikhism. They were portrayed as being riddled with trachoma and as being unclean in general. To strengthen these racist characterizations, a song called White Canada Forever was created. All this eventually led to a boat of Sikhs arriving in Vancouver being sent to Victoria. In 1907, the year that Buckam Singh came to British Columbia from Punjab at the age of fourteen, Punjabis were forced to avoid the Anti-Oriental Riots of 1907 by staying indoors.
Punjabi & Canadian Boy Drinking Soda (1972)
Most of the Sikhs in Canada in 1907 were retired British army veterans and their families. These Punjabis had proved themselves as loyal soldiers in the British colonies in Asia and Africa. However, the Canadian Government did not prevent the use of the illegal scare tactics being used to monitor immigration and prevent Sikhs from seeking employment, and this soon resulted in the cessation of all Indian immigration to Canada. The Canadian Prime Minister, Sir Wilfrid Laurier claimed that Indians were unsuited to life in the Canadian climate. However, in a letter to the viceroy, The Earl of Minto, Sir Wilfred voiced a different opinion, stating that the Chinese were the least adaptable to Canadian ways, whereas Sikhs, which he mistakenly referred to as Hindus, were the most adaptable. This sentiment changed after Buckam Singh's role in World War 1, which enabled more Sikhs to migrate to Canada.
Takeaways During this Period:
  1. The Immigration Act, 1910 came under scrutiny when a party of 39 Indians, mostly Sikhs, arriving on a Japanese ship, the Komagata Maru, succeeded in obtaining habeas corpus against the immigration department's order of deportation. The Canadian Government then passed a law intended to keep labourers and artisans, whether skilled or unskilled, out of Canada by preventing them from landing at any dock in British Columbia. As Canadian immigration became stricter, more Indians, most of them Sikhs, travelled south to the United States of America.
  2. The Komagata Maru Incident involved the Japanese steamship Komagata Maru, on which a group of people from British India attempted to immigrate to Canada in April 1914, but most were denied entry and forced to return to Budge Budge, Calcutta (present-day Kolkata). There, the Indian Imperial Police attempted to arrest the group leaders. A riot ensued, and they were fired upon by the police, resulting in the deaths of 22 people.
  3. Buckam Singh - Buckam Singh enlisted with the Canadian Expeditionary Force in the spring of 1915. Buckam Singh was one of the earliest known Sikhs living in Ontario at the time as well as one of only 9 Sikhs known to have served with Canadian troops in the First World War. Private Buckam Singh served with the 20th Canadian Infantry Battalion in the battlefields of Flanders during 1916. Here, Buckam Singh was wounded twice in battle and later received treatment at a hospital run by one of Canada's most famous soldier poets the Doctor Lt. Colonel John McCrae. While recovering from his wounds in England, Private Buckam Singh contracted tuberculosis and spent his final days in a Kitchener, Ontario military hospital, dying at age 25 in 1919. His grave in Kitchener is the only known First World War Sikh Canadian soldier's grave in Canada. Despite being forgotten for ninety years and never getting to see his family again, Buckam Singh is now being celebrated as not only a Sikh hero, but a Canadian hero.
Legacy of Buckam Singh (1972)

The Events Leading Up To an Independent Punjab State Precursor to Operation Bluestar - Post Independence Period of India (1956)


Punjabi Suba Speeches (1956)
The Punjabi Suba Movement After Independence from British Rule (1956)
The Punjabi Suba movement was a long-drawn political agitation, launched by Punjabi speaking people (mostly Sikhs) demanding the creation of autonomous Punjabi Suba, or Punjabi-speaking state, in the post-independence Indian state of East Punjab. The movement is defined as the forerunner of Khalistan movement.
Borrowing from the pre-partition demands for a Sikh country, this movement demanded a fundamental constitutional autonomous state within India. Led by the Akali Dal (a centre-right Sikh-centric state political party in Punjab, India. The party is the second-oldest in India, after Congress, being founded in 1920.), it resulted in the formation of the state of Punjab. The state of Haryana and the Union Territory of Chandigarh were also created and some Pahari-majority parts of the East Punjab were also merged with Himachal Pradesh following the movement. The result of the movement failed to satisfy its leaders due to regions in Northern Haryana with Punjabi speaking and Sikh populations like Jind, Karnal, Ambala, Fatehabad and Sirsa being left out of Punjab. Many Sikh leaders saw this as falling short of the promise of a fully autonomous Sikh State that they felt was promised to them by Nehru and Gandhi in exchange for joining the Indian Union.
In the 1950s the Punjabi Suba movement for linguistic reorganization of the state of Punjab and status for the Punjabi language took place, which the government finally agreed to in 1966 after protests and recommendation of the States Reorganization commission. The state of East Punjab was later split into the states of Himachal Pradesh, the new state Haryana and current day Punjab.
The process of Sikh alienation from the national mainstream was set in motion shortly after Independence due to the communalism of national and regional parties and organization including the RSS, Jan Sangh, and the Arya Samaj, exacerbated by Congress mishandling and local politicians and factions. According to Indian general Afsir Karim, many observers believed that separatist sentiments began in 1951 when Punjabi Hindus disowned the Punjabi language under the influence of radical elements, and "doubts on the concepts of a Punjabi Suba" created mutual suspicion, bitterness, and further misunderstanding between the two communities. The 1966 reorganization left the Sikhs highly dissatisfied, with the unresolved status of Chandigarh and the distribution of river waters intensifying bitter feelings.
While the Green Revolution in Punjab had several positive impacts, the introduction of the mechanized agricultural techniques led to uneven distribution of wealth. The industrial development was not done at the same pace of agricultural development, the Indian government had been reluctant to set up heavy industries in Punjab due to its status as a high-risk border state with Pakistan. The rapid increase in the higher education opportunities without adequate rise in the jobs resulted in the increase in the unemployment of educated youth. The resulting unemployed rural Sikh youth were drawn to the militant groups, and formed the backbone of the militancy.
After being routed in 1972 Punjab election, the Akali Dal put forward the Anandpur Sahib Resolution in 1973 to address these and other grievances, and demand more autonomy to Punjab. The resolution included both religious and political issues. It asked for recognizing Sikhism as a religion It also demanded that power be generally devaluated from the Central to state governments. The Anandpur Resolution was rejected by the government as a secessionist document. Thousands of people joined the movement, feeling that it represented a real solution to demands such as a larger share of water for irrigation and the return of Chandigarh to Punjab.
The 1978 Sikh-Nirankari clashes had been within the Sikh community, but the pro-Sant Nirankari stance of some Hindus in Punjab and Delhi had led to further division, including Jan Sangh members like Harbans Lal Khanna joining the fray, who, in a protest against holy city status for Amritsar, raising inflammatory slogans like "Kachha, kara, kirpan, bhejo inko Pakistan" ("those who wear the 5Ks (Sikhs), send them to Pakistan"), led to aggressive counter demonstrations.

Prime Minister of Canada, Pierre Elliot Trudeau Visits India; Prime Minister of India, Indira Ghandi Visits Canada - The India-Canada Bonds Stay in Tact (1971)


Indira Gandhi of India and Pierre Trudeau of Canada-walk through the lobby of the new $3 million Shaw festival Theatre at Niagar-on-the-Lake last night during intermission. After the play; Mrs. Gandhi joined Trudeau and his wife; Margaret; on state for presentation of a plaque.
Prime minister Pierre Trudeau touched down in India. For five days in January, 1971, Pierre Elliott Trudeau toured the country, rode a camel, petted a bullock, went up the Ganges and into a locomotive factory, visited the tombs of Indian notables, saw the Taj Mahal and wore a hat that would have made a Rajput proud. He then sat down with the emerging, redoubtable Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to discuss the state of the world and the sorry state of Canada’s economic relationship with India. Even nuclear weapons were discussed in 1971 with the Canadian prime minister in a press conference opining “there is no expressed desire on (the Indian) part to explode such a (nuclear) device nor I believe the technological ability to do so.” Three years later, in May 1974, the Indians did explode such a device – cheekily codenamed Smiling Buddha – in the Rajasthan desert, using plutonium from the research reactor Canada had built for it in 1956 for peaceful purposes. The bilateral relationship dropped into a diplomatic pit with every leader since expressing sorrowful but hopeful words that things would improve.
The one issue not on Pierre Elliott Trudeau’s agenda was anything to do with the Punjab and Sikhs. At the time, both were good news stories. The Punjab, home to most Sikhs, was the centre of an agricultural Green Revolution with new strains of wheat moving India from a food-deficient country to one of self sufficiency, with exports contemplated. Economically, Sikhs were the main beneficiaries and their biggest political problem was whether or not their beards met the requirements of flying fighter jets for the Indian Air Force. The emergence of India as a legitimate and serious geopolitical counterweight to China, not only in Asia but globally, has dramatically changed the bilateral agenda. Over the years, very little energy was expended by either India or Canada to put the relationship on a footing reflective of this changed status. There have been large and small bumps on that road since. Sikhs have been a significant part of the Canadian mosaic since the late 19th century. Their numbers increased dramatically with the mid-1970s changes to the Immigration Act and today they represent close to half of the 1.2 million Canadians with ancestry from the subcontinent. Their wealth, energy and self-deprecating humour, along with a monotheistic theology, were dominant features and over time the use of Sardar and Sardarji became terms of appreciation for the community as a whole. Towards the end of European colonial dominance, they were a military mainstay of the British Raj. As one Indian researcher wrote, “the success-story of the Sikh community as a whole has taken the form of a deep-rooted anxiety in the collective minds of the non-Sikh majorities especially the Hindus of India.” The present prime minister of India, Narendra Modi, has achieved political success exploiting this and other anxieties alongside the promotion of Hindu ascendency.
IMPORTANT EXCERPT BY CSE AFTER AIR INDIA BOMBING (1985):India’s government knows more of what goes on in the Canadian Sikh community than the combined forces of the RCMP, CSIS and CSE. This was evident in the aftermath of the 1985 Air India bombings and it was rare if a visit by the Indian High Commissioner (he a Sikh) to the Department of Foreign Affairs did not provide details on some nefarious action within the community.

The Path to Operation Bluestar: How the Assassination of Indira Ghandi led to the 1984 Anti-Sikh Riots (Black November)

Deceased Sikhs - Result of the Clashes
The Sikh-Nirankari clashes - Precursor to Operation Bluestar (1978)
The 1978 Sikh-Nirankari clash occurred between the Sant Nirankari Mission (An Indian backed Sikh Organization) and Sikhs of Damdami Taksal and Akal Kirtani Jatha on 13 April 1978 at Amritsar, Punjab, India. Sixteen people—thirteen traditional Sikhs and three Nirankari followers—were killed in the ensuing violence, occurring when some Akhand Kirtani Jatha and Damdami Taksal members led by Fauja Singh protested against and tried to stop a convention of Sant Nirankari Mission followers. This incident is considered to be a starting point in the events leading to Operation Blue Star and the 1980s insurgency in Punjab.
Operation Bluestar - Indhira Ghandi's Plot to Eliminate Akhan Kirtani Jatha & Damdami Taksal Leaders (1984)
Visual Depiction of Operation Bluestar (Preliminary Footage - AP News)
Operation Blue Star was an Indian military operation carried out between 1 and 8 June 1984, ordered by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to remove religious leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his armed followers from the buildings of the Harmandir Sahib complex in Amritsar, Punjab. In July 1983, the Sikh political party Akali Dal's President Harcharan Singh Longowal had invited Bhindranwale to take up residence in Golden Temple Complex. Bhindranwale later on made the sacred temple complex an armoury and headquarters. In the violent events leading up to the Operation Blue Star, the militants had killed 165 Nirankaris, Hindus and Nirankaris, even 39 Sikhs opposed to Bhindranwale were killed. The total number of deaths was 410 in violent incidents and riots while 1,180 people were injured.
Counterintelligence reports of the Indian agencies had reported that three prominent figures in the operation, Shabeg Singh, Balbir Singh and Amrik Singh had made at least six trips each to Pakistan between the years 1981 and 1983. Intelligence Bureau reported that weapons training was being provided at gurdwaras in Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh. Soviet intelligence agency KGB reportedly tipped off the Indian agency RAW about the CIA and ISI working together on a Plan for Punjab with a code name "Gibraltar". RAW from its interrogation of a Pakistani Army officer received information that over a thousand trained Special Service Group commandos of the Pakistan Army had been dispatched by Pakistan into the Indian Punjab to assist Bhindranwale in his fight against the government. A large number of Pakistani agents also took the smuggling routes in the Kashmir and Kutch n for three days ending on 8 June. A clean-up operation codenamed as Operation Woodrose was also initiated throughout Punjab.
The army had underestimated the firepower possessed by the militants. Militants had Chinese made rocket-propelled grenade launchers with armor piercing capabilities. Tanks and heavy artillery were used to attack the militants using anti-tank and machine-gun fire from the heavily fortified Akal Takht. After a 24-hour firefight, the army finally wrested control of the temple complex. Casualty figures for the Army were 83 dead and 249 injured. According to the official estimate presented by the Indian government, 1592 were apprehended and there were 493 combined militant and civilian casualties. High civilian casualties were attributed by the state to militants using pilgrims trapped inside the temple as human shields. According to Indian army generals, it was "doubtful" that Bhindranwale had any assurance of help or promise of asylum from Pakistan, as he made no attempt to escape with any associates, in additions to traditions of martyrdom.
Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale (Damdami Taksal Leader - Killed)

Assassination of Indian Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi By Her Sikh Bodyguards (1984)

Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated at 9:30 a.m. on 31 October 1984 at her residence in Safdarjung Road, New Delhi. She was killed by her bodyguards. Satwant Singh and Beant Singh in the aftermath of Operation Blue Star, an Indian military action carried out between 1 and 8 June 1984 ordered by Indira Gandhi to remove Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his followers from the Golden Temple of Harmandir Sahib in Amritsar, Punjab. The collateral damage included the death of many pilgrims, as well as damage to the Akal Takht. The military action on the sacred temple was criticized both inside and outside India.
https://preview.redd.it/x3ee2xdzrq3b1.jpg?width=440&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=438619a4afceb2005ca06799dc057de538203653

The 1984 Anti-Sikh Riots (Sikh Genocide/Black November) in Response to Indian Prime Minister Indira Ghandi's Assasination - 17,000 Sikhs Dead [This Event Gave Rise to the Punjabi Insurgency Movement, Babar Khalsa & Flight Air India 182 Bombing in Canada]


The 1984 Anti-Sikh Riots - Resulted in 17,000 Deceased Sikhs
The 1984 Anti-Sikh Riots, also known as the 1984 Sikh Genocide, 1984 Sikh Massacre or Black November, was a series of organized pogroms against Sikhs in India following the assassination of Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards. Government estimates project that about 2,800 Sikhs were killed in Delhi and 3,350 nationwide, whilst independent sources estimate the number of deaths at about 8,000–17,000.
The assassination of Indira Gandhi itself had taken place shortly after she had ordered Operation Blue Star, a military action to secure the Harmandir Sahib Sikh temple complex in Amritsar, Punjab, in June 1984. The operation had resulted in a deadly battle with armed Sikh groups who were demanding greater rights and autonomy for Punjab and the deaths of many pilgrims. Sikhs worldwide had criticized the army action and many saw it as an assault on their religion and identity. In the aftermath of the pogroms, the government reported that 20,000 had fled the city; the People's Union for Civil Liberties reported "at least" 1,000 displaced persons. The most-affected regions were the Sikh neighborhoods of Delhi. Human rights organizations and newspapers across India believed that the massacre was organized. The collusion of political officials connected to the Indian National Congress in the violence and judicial failure to penalize the perpetrators alienated Sikhs and increased support for the Khalistan movement. The Akal Takht, Sikhism's governing body, considers the killings a genocide.
In 2011, Human Rights Watch reported that the Government of India had "yet to prosecute those responsible for the mass killings".According to the 2011 WikiLeaks cable leaks, the United States was convinced of Indian National Congress' complicity in the riots and called it "opportunism" and "hatred" by the Congress government, of Sikhs. Although the U.S. has not identified the riots as genocide, it acknowledged that "grave human rights violations" occurred. In 2011, the burned sites of multiple Sikh killings from 1984, were discovered in Hondh-Chillar and Pataudi areas of Haryana. The Central Bureau of Investigation, the main Indian investigative agency, believes that the violence was organized with support from the Delhi police and some central-government officials. After 34 years of delay, in December 2018, the first high-profile conviction for the 1984 anti-Sikh riots took place with the arrest of Congress leader Sajjan Kumar, who was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Delhi High Court. Very few convictions have taken place in the pending 1984 cases, with only one death penalty conviction for an accused, Yashpal in the case of murdering Sikhs in the Mahipalpur area of Delhi.
To Be Continued in Indus Connection (Part 2 - Punjabi/Sikh History) - Flight Air India 182
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2023.06.03 00:14 Anonymous_q13838484 Tell your opinion on each piece of evidence. No judgement on this post, give your honest opinion.

Tell your opinion on each piece of evidence. No judgement on this post, give your honest opinion.
  1. February 14, 2000, 3:45 AM Jeff Ruppe’s eyewitness account: He claims he seen a little girl walking down the road with her bookbag.She had on a little dress and white tennis shoes, and her hair was in pigtails. He went back, but she never did look up at him. She looked like she knew where she was going. She was walking at a pretty good pace. He turned the truck around again and passed her for a third time as he resumed his normal route. As he passed by a third time, he noticed the girl veering off the highway into the fog and darkness.
  2. February 14, 2000, 4:15 AM Roy Blanton Sr and Roy Blanton Jr’s eyewitness accounts: They claim they were on a trucking run for Porter’s Transport Inc, heading north up N.C. 18 when they spotted someone walking south along the road. They were worried she might get hit by a truck so they used their CB radio to warn nearby truckers to be on the alert. It was a small figure wearing light colored clothing, they thought it was a woman. They couldn’t tell if it was a child. The pair thought it may have been a domestic-violence thing where a woman left the house and was out walking.
  3. February 15, 2000 Items found in a barn: Rallie and Debbie Turner entered an old barn in their backyard which normally housed discarded furniture and a Red Cub Farmall tractor. They found a yellow hair bow, a white Atlanta Olympics pencil, a green marker, candy wrappers and a wallet sized photo of a young girl.
  4. August 2, 2001 The discovery’s of Asha’s bookbag: Terry Fleming was cutting a new road through woods beside the highway, and he uncovered a bag that looked strange to him. He noticed it for a while and didn’t bother it. Terry goes in and cleans up areas all the time and he never thinks about, but this looked strange to him. He thought something could be in it that he didn't want to open up in the heat. But something kept drawing him back to it. He used his 47,000-pound track hoe to maneuver the bag, thinking it would come open. It didn't. He finally threw it over and opened it. A black and beige book bag was inside. He would not describe everything he found, but when he looked at the contents, it was strange enough that he didn't feel comfortable with it. He tried to call someone but he was under power lines and his phone wouldn’t go out. He saw writing inside the book bag, copied it down on a piece of paper and took the paper home with him. He did not remove any of what he saw in the book bag.
  5. May 15, 2016 Vehicle of Interest: The FBI and the Cleveland County Sheriff’s Office announce they have received information that someone matching Asha’s description may have been seen getting into a distinctive vehicle along North Carolina Highway 18 where she was last seen. The vehicle was believed to be an early 1970’s Lincoln Mark IV or possibly a Ford Thunderbird, dark green, with rust around the wheel wells. The car was occupied two times on the day of Asha’s disappearance. The FBI have done many interviews with the witness.
  6. October 8, 2015. Unidentified Items: The FBI announced they had discovered two items in Asha’s bookbag that weren’t hers. The first one was a McElligot’s Pool book and the second was a concert t-shirt from the New Kids On The Block Band. The FBI hope these items could possibly provide new leads about Asha’s disappearance.
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2023.06.02 23:41 bigbear0083 Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023

Good Friday evening to all of you here on StockMarketChat! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

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S&P Sectors for this past week:

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Major Indices for this past week:

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Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

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Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

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Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

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S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

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Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

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Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

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Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

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Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

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A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!
  • March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
  • April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-
($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)
([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())
(N/A.)
Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead StockMarketChat. :)
submitted by bigbear0083 to u/bigbear0083 [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 23:40 bigbear0083 Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023

Good Friday evening to all of you here on WallStreetStockMarket! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!
  • March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
  • April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-
($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)
([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())
(N/A.)
Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead WallStreetStockMarket. :)
submitted by bigbear0083 to WallStreetStockMarket [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 23:39 bigbear0083 Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023

Good Friday evening to all of you here on StockMarketForums! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!
  • March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
  • April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-
($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)
([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())
(N/A.)
Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead StockMarketForums. :)
submitted by bigbear0083 to StockMarketForums [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 23:39 bigbear0083 Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023

Good Friday evening to all of you here on EarningsWhispers! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!
  • March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
  • April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-
($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)
([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())
(N/A.)
Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead EarningsWhispers. :)
submitted by bigbear0083 to EarningsWhispers [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 23:38 bigbear0083 Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023

Good Friday evening to all of you here on StocksMarket! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!
  • March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
  • April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-
($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)
([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())
(N/A.)
Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead StocksMarket. :)
submitted by bigbear0083 to StocksMarket [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 23:37 bigbear0083 Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023

Good Friday evening to all of you here on FinancialMarket! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!
  • March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
  • April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-
($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)
([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())
(N/A.)
Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead FinancialMarket. :)
submitted by bigbear0083 to FinancialMarket [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 23:35 bigbear0083 Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023

Good Friday evening to all of you here on stocks! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!
  • March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
  • April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-
(*T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)
([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())
(N/A.)
Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?
I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead stocks. :)
submitted by bigbear0083 to stocks [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 23:33 bigbear0083 Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023

Good Friday evening to all of you here on StockMarketChat! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

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S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

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Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

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Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

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Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

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Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

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Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!
  • March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
  • April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000
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We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.
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Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

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Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.
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What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.
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Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.
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May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.
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How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
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Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.
(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
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STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())
(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-
($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)
(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)
([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())
(N/A.)
Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

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DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead StockMarketChat. :)
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2023.06.02 22:58 Joadzilla America Is Headed Toward Collapse

History shows how to stave it off.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/06/us-societal-trends-institutional-trust-economy/674260/
How has America slid into its current age of discord? Why has our trust in institutions collapsed, and why have our democratic norms unraveled?
All human societies experience recurrent waves of political crisis, such as the one we face today. My research team built a database of hundreds of societies across 10,000 years to try to find out what causes them. We examined dozens of variables, including population numbers, measures of well-being, forms of governance, and the frequency with which rulers are overthrown. We found that the precise mix of events that leads to crisis varies, but two drivers of instability loom large. The first is popular immiseration—when the economic fortunes of broad swaths of a population decline. The second, and more significant, is elite overproduction—when a society produces too many superrich and ultra-educated people, and not enough elite positions to satisfy their ambitions.
These forces have played a key role in our current crisis. In the past 50 years, despite overall economic growth, the quality of life for most Americans has declined. The wealthy have become wealthier, while the incomes and wages of the median American family have stagnated. As a result, our social pyramid has become top-heavy. At the same time, the U.S. began overproducing graduates with advanced degrees. More and more people aspiring to positions of power began fighting over a relatively fixed number of spots. The competition among them has corroded the social norms and institutions that govern society.
The U.S. has gone through this twice before. The first time ended in civil war. But the second led to a period of unusually broad-based prosperity. Both offer lessons about today’s dysfunction and, more important, how to fix it.
To understand the root causes of the current crisis, let’s start by looking at how the number of über-wealthy Americans has grown. Back in 1983, 66,000 American households were worth at least $10 million. That may sound like a lot, but by 2019, controlling for inflation, the number had increased tenfold. A similar, if smaller, upsurge happened lower on the food chain. The number of households worth $5 million or more increased sevenfold, and the number of mere millionaires went up fourfold.
On its surface, having more wealthy people doesn’t sound like such a bad thing. But at whose expense did elites’ wealth swell in recent years?
Starting in the 1970s, although the overall economy continued to grow, the share of that growth going to average workers began to shrink, and real wages leveled off. (It’s no coincidence that Americans’ average height—a useful proxy for well-being, economic and otherwise—stopped increasing around then too, even as average heights in much of Europe continued climbing.) By 2010, the relative wage (wage divided by GDP per capita) of an unskilled worker had nearly halved compared with mid-century. For the 64 percent of Americans who didn’t have a four-year college degree, real wages shrank in the 40 years before 2016.
As wages diminished, the costs of owning a home and going to college soared. To afford an average house, a worker earning the median wage in 2016 had to log 40 percent more hours than she would have in 1976. And parents without a college degree had to work four times longer to pay for their children’s college.
Even college-educated Americans aren’t doing well across the board. They made out well in the 1950s, when fewer than 15 percent of 18-to-24-year-olds went to college, but not today, when more than 60 percent of high-school grads immediately enroll. To get ahead of the competition, more college graduates have sought out advanced degrees. From 1955 to 1975, the number of students enrolled in law school tripled, and from 1960 to 1970, the number of doctorate degrees granted at U.S. universities more than tripled. This was manageable in the post–World War II period, when the number of professions requiring advanced degrees shot up. But when the demand eventually subsided, the supply didn’t. By the 2000s, degree holders greatly outnumbered the positions available to them. The imbalance is most acute in the social sciences and humanities, but the U.S. hugely overproduces degrees even in STEM fields.
This is part of a broader trend. Compared with 50 years ago, far more Americans today have either the financial means or the academic credentials to pursue positions of power, especially in politics. But the number of those positions hasn’t increased, which has led to fierce competition.
Competition is healthy for society, in moderation. But the competition we are witnessing among America’s elites has been anything but moderate. It has created very few winners and masses of resentful losers. It has brought out the dark side of meritocracy, encouraging rule-breaking instead of hard work.
All of this has left us with a large and growing class of frustrated elite aspirants, and a large and growing class of workers who can’t make better lives for themselves.
The decades that have led to our present-day dysfunction share important similarities with the decades leading to the Civil War. Then as now, a growing economy served to make the rich richer and the poor poorer. The number of millionaires per capita quadrupled from 1800 to 1850, while the relative wage declined by nearly 50 percent from the 1820s to the 1860s, just as it has in recent decades. Biological data from the time suggest that the average American’s quality of life declined significantly. From 1830 to the end of the century, the average height of Americans fell by nearly two inches, and average life expectancy at age 10 decreased by eight years during approximately the same period.
This popular immiseration stirred up social strife, which could be seen in urban riots. From 1820 to 1825, when times were good, only one riot occurred in which at least one person was killed. But in the five years before the Civil War, 1855 to 1860, American cities experienced no fewer than 38 such riots. We see a similar pattern today. In the run-up to the Civil War, this frustration manifested politically, in part as anti-immigrant populism, epitomized by the Know-Nothing Party. Today this strain of populism has been resurrected by Donald Trump.
Strife grew among elites too. The newly minted millionaires of the 19th century, who made their money in manufacturing rather than through plantations or overseas trade, chafed under the rule of the southern aristocracy, as their economic interests diverged. To protect their budding industries, the new elites favored high tariffs and state support for infrastructure projects. The established elites—who grew and exported cotton, and imported manufactured goods from overseas—strongly opposed these measures. The southern slaveholders’ grip on the federal government, the new elites argued, prevented necessary reforms in the banking and transportation systems, which threatened their economic well-being.
As the elite class expanded, the supply of desirable government posts flattened. Although the number of U.S. representatives grew fourfold from 1789 to 1835, it had shrunk by mid-century, just as more and more elite aspirants received legal training—then, as now, the chief route to political office. Competition for political power intensified, as it has today.
Those were cruder times, and intra-elite conflict took very violent forms. In Congress, incidences and threats of violence peaked in the 1850s. The brutal caning that Representative Preston Brooks of South Carolina gave to Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts on the Senate floor in 1856 is the best-known such episode, but it was not the only one. In 1842, after Representative Thomas Arnold of Tennessee “reprimanded a pro-slavery member of his own party, two Southern Democrats stalked toward him, at least one of whom was armed with a bowie knife,” the historian Joanne Freeman recounts. In 1850, Senator Henry Foote of Mississippi pulled a pistol on Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri. In another bitter debate, a pistol fell out of a New York representative’s pocket, nearly precipitating a shoot-out on the floor of Congress.
This intra-elite violence presaged popular violence, and the deadliest conflict in American history.
The victory of the North in the Civil War decimated the wealth and power of the southern ruling class, temporarily reversing the problem of elite overproduction. But workers’ wages continued to lag behind overall economic growth, and the “wealth pump” that redistributed their income to the elites never stopped. By the late 19th century, elite overproduction was back, new millionaires had replaced the defeated slave-owning class, and America had entered the Gilded Age. Economic inequality exploded, eventually peaking in the early 20th century. By 1912, the nation’s top wealth holder, John D. Rockefeller, had $1 billion, the equivalent of 2.6 million annual wages—100 times higher than the top wealth holder had in 1790.
Then came the New York Stock Exchange collapse of 1929 and the Great Depression, which had a similar effect as the Civil War: Thousands of economic elites were plunged into the commoner class. In 1925, there were 1,600 millionaires, but by 1950, fewer than 900 remained. The size of America’s top fortune remained stuck at $1 billion for decades, inflation notwithstanding. By 1982, the richest American had $2 billion, which was equivalent to “only” 93,000 annual wages.
But here is where the two eras differed. Unlike the post–Civil War period, real wages steadily grew in the mid-20th century. And high taxes on the richest Americans helped reverse the wealth pump. The tax rate on top incomes, which peaked during World War II at 94 percent, stayed above 90 percent all the way until the mid-1960s. Height increased by a whopping 3 inches in roughly the first half of the 20th century. Life expectancy at age 10 increased by nearly a decade. By the 1960s, America had achieved a broad-based prosperity that was virtually unprecedented in human history.
The New Deal elites learned an important lesson from the disaster of the Civil War. The reversal of elite overproduction in both eras was similar in magnitude, but only after the Great Depression was it accomplished through entirely nonviolent means. The ruling class itself was an important part of this—or, at least, a prosocial faction of the ruling class, which persuaded enough of their peers to acquiesce to the era’s progressive reforms.
As the historian Kim Phillips-Fein wrote in Invisible Hands, executives and stockholders mounted an enormous resistance to the New Deal policies regulating labor–corporate relations. But by mid-century, a sufficient number of them had consented to the new economic order for it to become entrenched. They bargained regularly with labor unions. They accepted the idea that the state would have a role to play in guiding economic life and helping the nation cope with downturns. In 1943, the president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce—which today pushes for the most extreme forms of neoliberal market fundamentalism—said, “Only the willfully blind can fail to see that the old-style capitalism of a primitive, free-shooting period is gone forever.” President Dwight Eisenhower, considered a fiscal conservative for his time, wrote to his brother:
Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things … Their number is negligible and they are stupid.
Barry Goldwater ran against Lyndon Johnson in 1964 on a platform of low taxes and anti-­union rhetoric. By today’s standards, Goldwater was a middle-of-the-road conservative. But he was regarded as radical at the time, too radical even for many business leaders, who abandoned his campaign and helped bring about his landslide defeat.
The foundations of this broad-based postwar prosperity—and for the ruling elite’s eventual acquiescence to it—were established during the Progressive era and buttressed by the New Deal. In particular, new legislation guaranteed unions’ right to collective bargaining, introduced a minimum wage, and established Social Security. American elites entered into a “fragile, unwritten compact” with the working classes, as the United Auto Workers president Douglas Fraser later described it. This implicit contract included the promise that the fruits of economic growth would be distributed more equitably among both workers and owners. In return, the fundamentals of the political-economic system would not be challenged. Avoiding revolution was one of the most important reasons for this compact (although not the only one). As Fraser wrote in his famous resignation letter from the Labor Management Group in 1978, when the compact was about to be abandoned, “The acceptance of the labor movement, such as it has been, came because business feared the alternatives.”
We are still suffering the consequences of abandoning that compact. The long history of human society compiled in our database suggests that America’s current economy is so lucrative for the ruling elites that achieving fundamental reform might require a violent revolution. But we have reason for hope. It is not unprecedented for a ruling class—with adequate pressure from below—to allow for the nonviolent reversal of elite overproduction. But such an outcome requires elites to sacrifice their near-term self-interest for our long-term collective interests. At the moment, they don’t seem prepared to do that.
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2023.06.02 22:51 hodsct59 Belmont Park And Woodbine Choices For 06-03-2023

I have chosen five races at Belmont Park and 2 races at Woodbine on Saturday June 3, 2023 that I am willing to take a shot at and hopefully find my next nice score. I will not be betting the last race at Belmont individually, but it is the last race of the late P5 which I will take a couple of small shots at. I have always preferred to get as many shots as I can to hit some type of exotics in one or two races but believe spreading in any pick type sequences is not the best use of my money. Much prefer using a few dollars every race and get more opportunities every day compared to putting all my eggs in one sequence and watching them all break when one horse or race does not go as expected.
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Belmont Park 4th Race: Maiden Special Weight --- Purse $75,000 --- 3 YOs & Up NY Bred Fillies & Mares --- 7 Furlongs Turf:
1)Ace Up Her Sleeve (12-1) Has 10 lifetime starts with 4 starts and 3 thirds since the beginning of this year. In her last three starts she was tried twice on the AWT in sprints against open company and then shipped back to NY to face state breds in a turf sprint, but race was moved to a muddy dirt track where she was well beaten but managed to get up for third. One slow work since at Delaware Park. Dialed In - Clearly Cheating by Broken Vow. 3x3 to Storm Cat, 4(C)x5(F)x5(F) to Mr. Prospector, 5x5 to Blushing Groom, 5(C)x5(C)x5(F) to Secretariat. As usual, most interested in her broodmare sire, Broken Vow, to figure out what distance is best for this runner, and I believe turf sprinting is the answer for this one. Broken Vow as a G2 SW on dirt but plenty of his progeny has won on grass up to a mile and he has a daughter (Broken Dreams) similar bred to this one's dam that won 3 stakes turf sprints including 2 of them G3 stakes and banked just shy of $400K. Fits with these.
6)La Chance (50-1) Has started 10 times in her career and has one second in 4 starts this year as her only board finish in her first ten starts. She will need her best effort yet but has the bloodlines to upset this field at a huge price. Her last two races and her recent works gives a clue that improvement is on the way after getting a trainer that acts like he knows what he is trying to achieve and gets her first real chance on grass. Looking At Lucky - One Wise Cowgirl by Wiseman's Ferry. 4x5 to Clever Trick. Her sire, Looking at Lucky, was a Champion 2 YO and Champion 3 YO on dirt in the U.S. and broodmare sire, Wiseman's Ferry, won a couple of G3 dirt stakes at 9 furlongs but is best remembered as sire of Wise Dan, who was good on dirt to begin his career but took his popularity to an entirely different level by winning 14 of his last 15 starts on grass with 1 second and 15 of 17 overall, with every grass start against either G1 or G2 competition. La Chance's dam, One Wise Cowgirl, has also produced a G1 sprint SW on dirt (Haveyougoneaway).
4)Cerretta (8-1) has started once this year finishing 3rd in a grass sprint but also started 7 times last year with a second and a third her other two board finishes. Has four decent to useful works since her last start which should move her forward. Midnight Lute - Lift by Pulpit. 5x4 to Mr. Prospector, 5x5 to Raise A Native & Secretariat.
7)Souffle (2-1) started twice last year, finishing second in her first start on grass as the favorite before returning as an odds-on heavy favorite and finished 4th after getting beaten to the early lead and then coming up empty late. This is her first start this year and trainer Clement is good at hiding which one of his trainees is ready to win first back or may need a race or two but normally uses Rosario when he thinks one is live and he does so here also. Will also race with lasix for the first time. Candy Ride - Portmagee by Hard Spun. 5x4 to Mr. Prospector. Both Candy Ride and Hard Spun are known for their high speed in mid-distance races especially but dam, Portmagee, won one 6 furlongs grass sprint in her career but falter both times when asked to go just slightly further.
My Risks: $4 Ex Box 1-6, $1 Ex Box 1-4-6, $1 Tri Box 1-4-6, $.10 Super Box 1-4-6-7, $.50 Super Key 4 with 1-6-7 with 1-6-7 with 1-6-7. Total Risks $25.40.
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Race 6: $.50 Pick 5 ---- 6 with 8 with 7 with 2,4,5 with 3,4,5,6,8,9,10,12. Total Risk $12.00.
Race 6: $.50 Pick 5 ---- 6,9 with 8 with 7 with 2,4,5, with 3,6,9,12. Total Risk $12.00.
Race 6: Allowance --- Purse $95,000 --- 3 YOs UP F&M N/W 1x or N/W 2 Lifetime --- 6 Furlongs Turf:
6) Anna Karenine (9-2) was shipped to U.S. late last year and was given the rest of the year off. Returned in March in a G3 stakes and sat close up early behind a crawling pace and faded after a half mile on grass. Cut back to 6 furlongs in her next start, she sat just behind the two early leaders in third, was sent after a half after the front runner had put only early challenger away but could not get by and hung in deep stretch to lose 2nd nearing the wire in this class and conditions. She has 4 more works in typical Brown style but should be getting close to her best effort. Tornado - Ivory Style by Desert Style. 4(C)x5(F)x5(F)x5(F) to Northern Dancer, 5x4 to Danzig, 5x5 to Special. Anna Karenine's 4th dam, Ivory Wand, is also 2nd dam of Elusive Quality, and this dam line flows back through Frizette, an important member of family #13.
9) Redifined (5-1) has one start this year where she tracked a fast early pace but came up empty in the stretch run in an O/C allowance race. However, she broke her maiden in the first start of her career, then competed in 3 stakes races, 2 of them listed and the other a G3 stakes where she placed in all three. She has recorded 3 very good works since her last race and is the one to beat. More Than Ready - Mrs. Boss by Wild Event. 4x5 to Northern Dancer, 5x5 to Nearctic.
5) Dekanter (12-1) has started twice this year which was also her first two starts of her career and finished 3rd on dirt, then won a maiden special weight race on grass in fairly fast time but it was during a small period when Aqueduct's grass course was blistering fast. Has 4 more works since her last start, none that are eye catching but all done on a 7-day then 6-day splits which is what you (or at least I) want to see from grass runners instead of fast works. Kantharos - Morning Rush by Unbridled's Song. 4x4 to Storm Cat, 5(C)x5(C)x5(F)x5(F) to Mr Prospector.
8) Michele M. (15-1) started twice last year, both time on the AWT, breaking her maiden in her first start before finishing unplaced in a Canadian listed stake. She will be making her first start of this year, first start on grass in her career and first start for a new trainer that wins often on grass but tends to struggle with trainees first start on grass. West Coast - Juliamarie by Mizzen Mast. 4x4 to Mr. Prospector, 5x5 to Secretariat, 5(C)x5(C)x5(F) to Raise A Native. Dam line traces back to Penelope/Prunella and the most influential family #1 in bloodlines history, without a doubt.
My Risks: $5 Ex Box 6-9, $1 Tri Box 5-6-9, $5 Tri Straight 6 with 9 with 5, $1 Super Straight 5-6-9 with 5-6-9 with 5-6-9 with 8. Total Risk $27.00.
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7th Race: Maiden Special Weight --- Purse $90,000 --- 3 YOs & Up --- 1 1/16 Mile Turf:
8)Redistricting (3-1) is a first-time starter. It looks like his training started under another barn, then was a private purchase by current owner (private or purchases away from sales are not reported in most cases), then has a consistent work pattern for current trainer Brown with only one small break in his training that lasted 10 days until the day after the Ky Derby (likely concentrating on runners already entered to race). None of his works are eye catching but his last 9 works have all been at 4 furlongs officially, which is the normal Brown pattern. Kingman - Cascata by Montjeu. 4x4 to Kris, 5x4 to Northern Dancer.
1)Certified Loverboy (20-1) has started once this year where he tracked the early pace for 6 furlongs, then faded near the rail as the slow early pace quicken in a maiden race at 1 1/8 mile on grass, which is likely a little further than he is bred to excel at. Now cuts back 1/16 mile, which fits his bloodlines better and has one useful work since that start and returns to jockey who likely knows him better than others. Mendelsohn - Tasha's Moon by Malibu Moon. 4x4 to Mr. Prospector. Dam family traces back to family #3 which is the family of Sister One To True Blue, a daughter of a Byerley Turk mare who, along with her full brother Young True Blue, is most responsible for the formation of the 2nd X-factor gene family.
6)Ohana Honor (8-1) has two starts this year, the first on GP speed favoring dirt track where he tried to impact the race from well off the pace but had no real opportunity to do so. Next out, he was shipped to Aqueduct and moved to grass for the first grass start of his career where he was rolling in the stretch to just miss winning but also encountered enough trouble to make him late arriving to compete. Trainer Shug has put 6 more works in him since that effort, the first 4 useful works and then 2 easy works just to let him stretch his legs until a spot could be found to race him. Has the look of a trainer who is serious about breaking this one's maiden. Honor Code - Spacy Tracy by Awesome Again. 4x5 to Mr. Prospector, 5x5 to Bold Ruler, 5(C)x5(F)x5(F) to Northern Dancer. Dam has already produced 3 stakes winners from 6 known foals to race, including this one.
7)Fly Right (6-1) is making his first start of the year after making three starts last year and drew near the rail in every start, thereby forcing jockey to send him early for the lead to avoid being trapped (at least perceived by most). He has 10 works for his return, including last 9 at Belmont Park, but his last 4 works should have him fit and ready. Also goes first-time lasix. Astern - Fly By by Johar. 4x5 to Sadler's Wells, 5x5 to Danzig. 6th dam, Where You Lead, is an important and influential broodmare.
My Risks: $5 Ex Box 1-8, $1 Tri Box 1-6-8, $1 Super 8 with 1-6-7 with 1-6-7 with 1-6-7, $3 Super Straight 8 with 1 with 6 with 7. Total Risk $25.00.
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8th Race: Allowance --- Purse $80,000 --- 3 Yos & Up N/W 1x or N/W 2 lifetime NY Bred --- 1 1/16 Mile:
7) Shadow Dragon (2-1) has three starts this year, finishing 2nd in a G3 stakes in his first start then giving a half-hearted effort in his next two in G2 stakes company, races he was clearly overmatched in and thrown against them much too soon in his young career. Will find these fits his current ability much better and looks like a solid key in the pick exotics. Has 6 works since his last start and most of them shows he still has a desire to be competitive. Army Mule - Fire Assay by Medaglia D'Oro. 5x5 to Northern Dancer but also has Somethingroyal crossing in the sire line through Secretariat and in the broodmare sire line and dam line through another son Sir Gaylord(x2). Has even more crossing influence through Turn-To & Teddy through multiple sons and daughters on both sides.
6) Ormstown (5-1) broke his maiden in his last start against NY bred in the third start of his career and now tries state-bred winners for the first time. This is a fairly weak field for an allowance race and the reason I landed on this one is I feel he has an ability to rate though he went gate to wire against easier in this last (or at least his bloodlines suggest he should). Bernardini - Sandra by Bluegrass Cat. 2x4 to A.P. Indy, 4x5 to Secretariat, 5(C)x4(F)x5(F) to Mr. Prospector, 5(C)x5(F)x5(F) to Northern Dancer.
My Risks: $8 Ex Straight 7-6. Total Risk $8.00.
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Race 9: Pennine Ridge Stakes(G2) --- Purse $200,000 ---- 3 YOs ---- 1 1/8 Mile Turf:
4) Silver Knott (2-1) has one start this year and was overmatched against much better than he will see here. Will be looking to make amends for such a poor showing in last. Probably a little more eager than normal as he was fresh off a break and ended up burning all his energy before the real running began on a slow grass course. Europe does not record works between races as most works on private property and normally have to rely on what trainers tells everyone. Brings a substitute jockey along as main rider stays in England for the Epsom Derby. Lope De Vega - God Given by Nathaniel. 5(C)x5(C)x5(F) to Mr. Prospector. Lope De Vega is a son of Shamardal (from 1st crop of Giant's Causeway and dam was a full sister to Street Cry). Broodmare sire, Nathaniel, is also a 2-time G1 stakes winner on grass but is more famously known as the sire of Enable (15 wins in 19 lifetime starts).
5) Congruent (10-1) has started four times this year with a win on the AWT 2 starts back his only board finish. He switches trainers since his last start and new trainer has put 7 works in him, the first 4 looks like they were leg stretching type works to let him get a good feel of Belmont dirt surface followed by 3 good solid works with two of them grass works. Tapit - Part The Seas by Stormy Atlantic. 4x4 to Seattle Slew, 4(C)x5(C)x4(F) to Mr. Prospector, 5x5 to Northern Dancer, In Reality & Secretariat.
2) Sharar (12-1) is making his U.S. debut after shipping over from Dubai, switching trainers and given plenty of time to rest and become familiar with U.S. racing. Like a typical Pletcher trainee, he put in a few non-descript works but works improved in his last two after he was switched to grass, which he had already suggested in his first two starts he did not like the feel of Dubai's dirt (possibly did not care from Belmont dirt either). Upset potential at good odds. Gun Runner - Sacre Coeur by Saint Ballado. 5x4 to Herbager.
8) Far Bridge (9-5) has three starts in his career, with all 3 coming this year and he has 2 wins and a second, losing his perfect record in his last start when beaten a nose. However, I will take a stand against him for the win as his two works are typical Pletcher works, but his last was not an improvement which is normal for one of his trainees just before a start. Could be the track switch but more likely last took a little fitness from him. Your call, as he certainly has the bloodlines to beat these. English Channel - Fitpitcher by Kitten's Joy. 5x5 to Northern Dancer.
My Risks: $5 Ex Box 2-4, $1 Tri Box 2-4-5. Total Risk $16.00.
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Race 10: Maiden Claiming $40K --- Purse $45,000 ---- 3 YOs & Up New York Bred --- 1 1/16 Mile Turf:
3) War Prince (9-2) 4(C)x5(C)x5(F) to Northern Dancer.
4) Atlanta's Acuna (6-1) Complete outcross in first 5 generations.
5) Fluorescent Bay (20-1) 5x3 to Icecapade.
6) Just For Luck (12-1) 5x5 to Northern Dancer.
8) Silent Running (10-1) 5x5 to Secretariat.
9) Thethrillofvictory (5-1) Complete outcross in his first 5 generations.
10) Sea Cruise (30-1) Complete outcross in first 5 generations.
12) Bad Larry (4-1) 4(C)x5(C)x5(F) to Mr. Prospector.
No bets on this race but using these in last race of P5. Total Risk All Bets: $125.40.
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Woodbine June 3,2023:
5th Race: Maiden Special Weight --- Purse $111,600 --- 2 YOs ---- 5 Furlongs:
7) Call The Question (8-1) started once and finished last but had only 3 furlongs works with one poor gate work before that start in 4 1/2 furlongs and did not try after a poor break. Now has two more good works since that start, a 4-furlongs followed by a 3-furlongs gate work that is much better and now stretches out to 5-furlongs where she should get a better break from gate. 5(C)x5(F)x5(F) to Mr Prospector.
6) That Girl Artemus (6-1) is a first-time starter. Her 4-furlongs two back is very good followed by another good 4-furlongs work from the gate. If she breaks as well as she has shown, becomes a candidate to wire the field. 4x5 to Mr. Prospector.
2) Pipit (5-2) is a first-time starter. Has a good gate work two back at 4 furlongs followed by an easy 4 furlongs work. Attracts top jockey with an above average trainer. 4x4 to Mr. Prospector, 5x5 to Secretariat & Sir Ivor, 5(C)x5(C)x5(F) to Raise A Native, 5(C)x5(F)x5(F) to Northern Dancer.
9) Miramichi (15-1) has one start on the AWT at 4 1/2 furlongs, but drew outside on a rainy track which is usually the worst place to be, and the one just inside her got better break and she chased them throughout as they pull away while closest to the rail and she lost third at the wire to a late runner. Returns in two weeks but has another good 4 furlongs work since that start.
My Risks: $5 Ex Box 6-7, $1 Tri Box 2-6-7, $.20 Super Box 2-6-7-9, $.30 Super Straight 2-7 with 2-7 with 6-9 with 6-9. Total Risk $22.00.
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Race 7: Royal North S(Can-2) --- Purse $175,000 --- 4 YOs & Up F&M --- 6 1/2 Furlongs Turf:
2) Bay Storm (3-1) has three starts this year with 2 seconds and one third. She has been an ultra-consistent runner throughout her career, missing a placing once in her 14 lifetime starts. While this looks like a step up for her into G2 company, it is actually a step down in class as she has missed twice to odds-on G1 winning fillies in her last 5 starts while 2nd both times, including beaten a nose by one of them. She will be going back on lasix for the first time in a while. 4x4 to Storm Cat.
8) Baby No Worries (12-1) has started four times this year, winning her first start in an allowance race on the AWT at TP with a good late kick to get up in time, then finishing 2nd in a small stakes race at same track in her third start using a good late kick again to just miss before finishing 3rd in her last start against the probable favorite in here in a G3 stakes race at this track with another good late kick. She has the look of finally putting it all together as she gets more racing experience and is also moving back to grass. 5x5 to Hoist The Flag & My Charmer.
5) Our Flash Drive (9-5) has started once this year and made it a winning effort in a G3 stakes race on the AWT at her home track here. She switches back to turf here where if she has a weakness, it is on grass as only one of her stake wins have come on that surface. However, all her grass tries have been in the U.S. where the competition is usually much tougher and since she is back on her home turf, so she deserves to be the favorite. One useful work since her last start. Outcross in her first 5 generations but has Nasrullah influences on both sides.
6) Sweet Enough (20-1) has started 3 times this year in two G3 stakes and a listed stakes race in the U.S. and has not placed. However, in all three starts, she was beaten by horses that would be vying for favoritism in here and her last indicated she is near to regaining her best form. Trainer is one of Canada's best and he has put 5 more works in her, the last three very good and indicates this filly is still moving forward. She will be racing on lasix for the first time this year. 5(C)x5(C)x5(F) to Mr. Prospector.
My Risks: $5 Ex Box 2-8, $1 Tri Box 2-5-8, $.20 Super Box 2-5-6-8, $1 Super Key 2 with 5-6-8 with 5-6-8 with 5-6-8. Total Risks $26.80.
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Total Risks Both Tracks $174.80.
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2023.06.02 19:06 Raiden720 Where does 261 stand on “ShotSpotter surveillance” gunshot detection systems in high crime areas?

On the one hand, yes, we have to admit that these are being installed in minority areas pretty much 100% of the time. On the other hand, that is where a lot of the crime takes place and a lot of the gunfire, so it makes sense to install these systems in these areas where these happen the most? This article is clearly critical of the system, and it says that there are only arrests made in 1% of the times when it “spots” gunfire. But wouldn’t removing these systems hurt the communities that these are in? Someone help me understand the counter-argument here, thank you!
https://www.minnpost.com/other-nonprofit-media/2023/05/minneapolis-schools-secretly-partnered-with-shotspotter-surveillance-company-cyber-attack-reveals/
Minneapolis schools secretly partnered with ShotSpotter surveillance company, cyber attack reveals
Data breach unmasks locations of gunshot detection sensors on rooftops of schools that predominantly serve Black youth
By Mark Keierleber, The 74
Shortly after a dozen gunshots erupted from a stolen red SUV on the northside of Minneapolis this month, emergency dispatchers were notified of the drive-by shooting that shattered a window at the school district’s administrative headquarters.
District officials promptly reported the shooting to the cops, who briefly halted their chase when they encountered a school bus dropping off students. A second police report, this one from a California-based surveillance company, had also alerted authorities to the ear-piercing pops.
The incident resulted in the arrest of three teenagers, who were ultimately chased down by cops on foot and a state police helicopter in the air. Shootings and car thefts have surged in Minneapolis over the last several years and, in a press release, Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said that out-of-control youth had become “a danger to themselves and to anyone who happens to be around them.”
Yet in some ways, the teenage arrests were an anomaly: The controversial ShotSpotter surveillance sensors that notified police to the blasts, multiple reports have found, rarely direct police to the scenes of firearm crimes. Concerns about ShotSpotter false alarms and their disproportionate effects on Black residents didn’t stop the city’s school district from secretly partnering with the company, an investigation by The 74 has revealed.
For nearly a decade, Minneapolis Public Schools has made northside campus buildings available to bolster a massive surveillance network that peppers neighborhoods with microphones designed to detect, analyze and geolocate gunfire.
Since at least 2014, the school district has agreed to host nondescript ShotSpotter sensors on the rooftops of campus buildings, according to contracts that were leaked as part of a massive cyber attack on Minneapolis Public Schools earlier this year. Six agreements, signed in 2014 and 2019, authorize the sensors to be mounted atop school buildings “in an ‘out of sight’ fashion. The city maintains the primary contract to station ShotSpotter sensors throughout Minneapolis; the school district simply agreed to host the devices on their property. Last year, the city’s latest contract for the sensors totaled $168,000, according to GovSpend, a database that tracks government procurement.
Subjected to a relentless stream of mass school shootings, school districts nationwide spend billions of dollars each year on campus security, including on gun-detection hardware. Yet ShotSpotter’s footprint in education remains largely unknown. The locations of the gun-detection sensors in Minneapolis and urban communities nationwide have for years been intentionally hidden.
In the leaked contracts, Minneapolis school officials agreed to withhold from the public information about its participation in the surveillance program. Details about the sensor locations, officials agreed, “cannot be disclosed under any circumstances.”
In Minneapolis, campus ShotSpotter locations were uncovered during The 74’s investigation into the fallout from the February cyber attack. Highly sensitive information about students and educators, as well as confidential campus security information, were published online in March after the district failed to pay the Medusa cyber gang’s $1 million ransom demand.
ShotSpotter’s efforts to thwart bloodshed from gun violence is commendable, said Teresa Nelson, the legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota. But, she said, privacy and racial disparities in ShotSpotter locations, as well as reports calling into question the sensors’ effectiveness, outweigh their potential benefits. And efforts to withhold the school district’s ShotSpotter agreement from the public, stifle resident’s ability to engage in conversations about how to keep their communities safe, Nelson said.
Ultimately, “it adds a layer to the idea of policing in our schools” that could be problematic, she said. ShotSpotter coverage of schools, she worried, could send police who are “ready for an extremely dangerous confrontation” to campuses “for no reason” due to false alarms from fireworks, backfiring cars and other loud noises.
“That changes the tenor of policing in that area,” she said. “Police have tremendous power and so the community is entitled to know how they’re using that power and how they’re using new technologies that allow them to effectively conduct general mass surveillance.”
The Minneapolis school district didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment. The district has been criticized for not sharing more information with the public about the nature and extent of the breach — its most recent statement on its website is from April 11. It declined interview requests from The 74 for a May 15 investigation about the breach of closely guarded campus security information and didn’t respond to questions for a May 5 article on the leak of highly sensitive information about students and staff.
In an email, Minneapolis Police Department spokesperson Garrett Parten declined to disclose the number of ShotSpotter sensors deployed across Minneapolis, adding that the company selects installation locations. The technology, he said, “has been an excellent tool in aiding the quick location of shooting victims” so they can receive medical attention “when seconds count.”
“In general, ShotSpotter pinpoints the location of gunfire,” Parten said. “This allows officers to respond directly to a location rather than doing a grid search looking for evidence. As such, Officers are able to quickly locate and secure evidence that might otherwise be removed, compromised, or missed altogether.”
Thomas Chittum, the senior vice president of analytics and forensic services at ShotSpotter owner SoundThinking, said the data breach in Minneapolis is a rare occurrence but the publicly traded company is taking the incident seriously. Though the sensors are regularly placed on municipal buildings like police departments and schools, he declined to specify how many are stationed on campuses in Minneapolis or nationwide. Sensor locations are confidential, he said, to prevent vandalism, retaliation against businesses and agencies that agree to host the devices, and efforts by gunmen to get around the system.
“Now that these things are known publicly, we have to assess whether or not we think it poses a risk to the efficacy of the system,” said Chittum, who retired last year as acting deputy director of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. “The sensors are not hard to relocate but we’ll have to assess whether or not that’s feasible and necessary.”
Few arrests, little evidence of gun-related crimes
Researchers and civil rights groups have warned for years that the technology, which is disproportionately deployed in communities of color, could do more harm than good by routinely sending militarized police into high alert over false alarms. SoundThinking maintains that its ShotSpotter sensors are 97% accurate.
The most comprehensive study on ShotSpotter’s efficacy, published in 2021 in the peer-reviewed Journal of Urban Health, reported dismal findings. The analysis of ShotSpotter in 68 metropolitan counties from 1999 to 2016 found the sensors had no significant impact on firearm-related homicide rates or arrest outcomes.
ShotSpotter deployments have been especially contentious in Chicago, where the sensors are disproportionately installed in neighborhoods with large percentages of Black residents. In more than 31,000 incidents each year, ShotSpotter alerts send Chicago police to locations where they failed to find evidence of gun crimes, according to research by the MacArthur Justice Center at Northwestern University’s law school. Between April 2021 and April 2022, researchers found, 90% of ShotSpotter dispatches failed to find evidence of guns. In a 2022 lawsuit, the group accused the city of relying on a surveillance tool that enables discriminatory policing without a clear public safety benefit.
A separate report from the city’s Office of Inspector General, published in 2021, reached similar results, concluding that the alerts rarely produced evidence of gun-related crimes, investigatory stops or recovered firearms. Yet the sensors led police to make more aggressive stops in certain neighborhoods, the office found, offering fodder for advocates who argue the devices lead to the over-policing of Black residents.
In a company-funded report by Edgeworth Analytics, researchers called the MacArthur analysis “misleading” and concluded that, “based on client reports,” ShotSpotter sensors were 97% effective in detecting gunfire.
Chittum said the sensor locations are selected based on historical crime data and rejected advocates’ concerns over racial disparities.
“The people that balk at the idea that you would deploy public safety infrastructure in the place where it could do the greatest good boggles my mind,” he said. “Of course you’re going to deploy it in the place where it’s most likely to help the people that have had the greatest impact from gun violence. I just don’t understand why you wouldn’t want law enforcement to know about shootings that occur in those neighborhoods.”
While the City of Chicago has long been a key ShotSpotter customer and former Democratic mayor Lori Lightfoot called the tool “a lifesaver,” that could soon change. New progressive Mayor Brandon Johnson campaigned on a promise to end the city’s $33 million ShotSpotter contract, vowing to instead “invest in new resources that go after illegal guns without physically stopping and frisking Chicagoans on the street.” After Johnson’s election, the company’s stock prices tumbled more than 25%.
After weighing the costs against their benefits, officials in several cities — including San Antonio, Texas, and Charlotte, North Carolina — have ended their ShotSpotter subscriptions. In San Antonio, officials spent more than $500,000 for the sensors, an expenditure that led to four arrests and seven weapons seizures in a two-year period.
Similarly in Minneapolis, ShotSpotter alerts have rarely led to arrests or evidence of gun-related crimes, according to a local television news investigation. An analysis found that Minneapolis police responded to about 8,500 ShotSpotter activations from January 2020 to September 2021. About 80% of the time, police didn’t locate evidence of a gun-related crime and only 32 activations — less than 1% of the total — led to an arrest.
On one occasion, in 2012, the city temporarily disabled the sensors on New Year’s Eve because the system became overwhelmed by alerts from the blasts of fireworks.
‘Still losing our young people’
The six Minneapolis campus ShotSpotter locations disclosed in the breach are clustered in the city’s northside. Districtwide, about a third of Minneapolis students are Black. At the campuses where ShotSpotter sensors were disclosed, nearly two-thirds of students are Black.
The roughly 33,000-student district operates just shy of 100 schools. It’s unclear whether the devices were placed at a limited number of district locations or whether information about other campuses that serve as ShotSpotter hosts were spared in the data leak. Though police said ShotSpotter alerted them to the recent drive-by shooting — along with calls from educators — the leaked contracts don’t outline a sensor location at the district’s administrative offices.
While the specific locations of ShotSpotter sensors citywide haven’t been publicly disclosed, residents are well aware of their presence in certain neighborhoods, said Marika Pfefferkorn, a Twin Cities-based student privacy advocate and executive director of the Midwest Center for School Transformation. Yet the devices, she said, haven’t done enough to keep people safe.
“It’s not preventing the shots (from being) fired,” Pfefferkorn said. “We’re still losing our young people.”
In Minneapolis, homicides have surged by 166% since 2019 and the number of gunshot victims has more than doubled, according to city data. More than four-fifths of shooting victims in the city are Black, according to the data, as are 89% of suspects.
Outside Minneapolis, three school districts — one in Texas and two in Massachusetts — have purchased ShotSpotter services, according to GovSpend.
In 2021, the Newark, New Jersey, school district agreed to install the sensors on 30 school buildings in predominantly Black neighborhoods, according to a Chalkbeat investigation. Information about the agreement was removed from the school system’s website after the school board received an email inquiry from the education news outlet.
In a 2022 email also exposed in the Minneapolis data breach, a ShotSpotter employee declined to disclose to a school district facilities official the on-campus locations of its sensors, arguing that could allow the information to “fall into the wrong hands.”
“If the location of all sensors became known to the public,” the employee wrote, “criminals would have the capability to disable the gunshot location and detection functionality of the system, or otherwise seriously compromise the law enforcement utility of the system.”
As communities nationwide debate efforts to bolster security in school buildings, parents are demanding a seat at the table, said Kenneth Trump, president of the Cleveland-based National School Safety and Security Services.
“Parents expect authentic, transparent communication from school officials,” he said. When schools and cities equip communities with emerging security technology, officials “had better be transparent about expectations and limitations, and I’m not sure that’s occurring.”
Ultimately, it’s up to the City of Minneapolis to assess whether the sensors work as intended, said Nelson of the ACLU’s Minnesota chapter.
“Without strict limitations and auditing, we can never really be certain that it’s not being abused,” she said. “There needs to be more transparency and more assurances that it’s not going to be abused.”
submitted by Raiden720 to gamefaqs261 [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 16:41 Thingstodo919 Things to do this weekend!

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

SUNDAY

Join the Thingstodo919 email list here for a weekly events newsletter. Doing anything interesting this weekend? Let us know your plans in the comments!
submitted by Thingstodo919 to raleigh [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 14:43 danisenkina So we are leeches?

So we are leeches?
“Scientific Miracles of the Quran”🤓
submitted by danisenkina to exmuslim [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 13:46 London-Roma-1980 NON-CONFERENCE FINAL MATCHDAY (12) PREVIEW

The long road of Swiss is almost over. This is the last chance for teams that hope to get an at-large berth to get a big win to impress the committee before conference play begins. Can UCLA finish the sweep against Illinois? Can Top 25 newcomers solidify their position against those who used to be ranked? Will the mid-majors get the scalp they need?
Let's look at that last question, as the top mid-major team the last few seasons takes on a contender to the throne.
*****
UNLV Runnin' Rebels vs. Princeton Tigers.
If ever the phrase "contrast of styles" applied, it applies here. UNLV, as the name implies, loves to get out in the fast break lanes and emphasize their athleticism. Princeton, meanwhile, is cagey and intellectual, slowing the game down and making their defense a puzzle. Something has to give.
"We're going to see this in conference play [with Air Force], so I'm glad we're getting a taste of it now," Rebels coach Jerry Tarkanian said. "This is our chance to show the selection committee the strength we have and the depth that mid-majors provide. We're a mid-major in name only."
Princeton, meanwhile, is in a tenuous position. Whereas many pundits are predicting UNLV will be strong enough to make the NIBL tournament with or without the Mountain West's automatic bid, there's no certainty for the Tigers. The Ivy League doesn't have as much depth; as such, Princeton needs all the wins they can get.
"We know this is a big game for us," guard Geoff Petrie told reporters. "We have to have a win."
ROSTERS

UNLV Runnin' Rebels (7-4) # Princeton Tigers (7-4)
Stacey AUGMON 0 Bill BRADLEY
Marcus BANKS 1 Devin CANNADY
Keon CLARK 2 Brian EARL
Armen GILLIAM 3 Steve GOODRICH
Glen GONDREZICK 4 Armond HILL
Sidney GREEN 5 Ian HUMMER
Larry JOHNSON 6 John HUMMER
Derrick JONES Jr 7 Mike KEARNS
Shawn MARION 8 Gabe LEWULLIS
Tyrone NESBY 9 Ted MANAKAS
Isaiah RIDER 10 Bud PALMER
Robert SMITH 11 Geoff PETRIE
Ricky SOBERS 12 Brian TAYLOR
Reggie THEUS 13 Judson WALLACE
Christian WOOD 14 Chris YOUNG
LINE: UNLV by 21
*****
TOP 25 GAMES
#1 UCLA (11-0) at #25 Illinois (9-2)
#3 Kentucky (10-1) at #8 Michigan (9-2)
#4 Duke (9-2) at #15 Southern Cal (9-2)
#10 Indiana (9-2) at N.C. State (9-2)
#5 Kansas (9-2) at #9 Notre Dame (9-2)
#2 North Carolina (9-2) at Arkansas (9-2)
#17 DePaul (8-3) at #16 Maryland (8-3)
#22 Florida (8-3) at Louisville (8-3)
#23 Iowa (8-3) at Houston (8-3)
#18 LSU (8-3) at West Virginia (8-3)
#20 Minnesota (8-3) at California (8-3)
#11 Ohio State (8-3) at Arizona State (8-3)
Saint John's (8-3) at #13 Texas (8-3)
#7 Syracuse (8-3) at #14 Arizona (8-3)
Tennessee (8-3) at #12 Connecticut (8-3)
Washington (8-3) at #21 Alabama (8-3)
#6 Michigan State (8-3) at Saint Louis (7-4)
Tulsa (7-4) at #19 Georgetown (7-4)
#24 UNLV (7-4) at Princeton (7-4)
submitted by London-Roma-1980 to BestOfDivI [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 12:00 BM2018Bot Daily Discussion Thread: June 2, 2023

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submitted by BM2018Bot to VoteDEM [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 10:48 andimuhammadrifki my ideal united North American bid for the 2031 FIBA Basketball World Cup

since the 2027 edition is already awarded to Qatar, the next closest edition available for bidding is the 2031 edition (as the FIBA World Cup is held every four years just like the football/soccer counterpart). following the successful bid for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, I think they should also continue it for basketball, as it is (arguably) the second most popular sport in the world (of course only behind football/soccer). and here are my ideal details for the bid:
-there will be eight venues in total, as there were in China in 2019.
-three venues in Canada, the other three in the United States and two in Mexico.
-each of the eight venues will host two groups each: one in the first round (one of those from A to H) and another in either the second round or the 17th-32nd classification round (one of those from I to P).
-the knockout stages (Quarterfinals, semifinals, seventh-fifth-third-place playoffs and final) will all be in the United States, using all the venues proposed in the bid. two of them are usual indoor arenas (only for quarterfinals) and another is a huge purely-indoor American-football-based stadium (for the subsequent rounds) usually used for NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament.

and here is my ideal list of proposed venues:
Canada

United States

Mexico
submitted by andimuhammadrifki to Basketball [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 06:05 AutoModerator Weekly Discussion: History of the Democratic Party

19th century:
Further information: Second Party System and Third Party System Martin Van Buren was the eighth president of the United States (1837–1841) and the second Democratic president.
The Democratic-Republican Party split over the choice of a successor to President James Monroe. The faction that supported many of the old Jeffersonian principles, led by Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren, became the modern Democratic Party. Historian Mary Beth Norton explains the transformation in 1828:
Jacksonians believed the people's will had finally prevailed. Through a lavishly financed coalition of state parties, political leaders, and newspaper editors, a popular movement had elected the president. The Democrats became the nation's first well-organized national party ... and tight party organization became the hallmark of nineteenth-century American politics.
11th United States president James K. Polk (1845-1849), who significantly extended the territory of the United States
Behind the platforms issued by state and national parties stood a widely shared political outlook that characterized the Democrats:
The Democrats represented a wide range of views but shared a fundamental commitment to the Jeffersonian concept of an agrarian society. They viewed the central government as the enemy of individual liberty. The 1824 "corrupt bargain" had strengthened their suspicion of Washington politics. ... Jacksonians feared the concentration of economic and political power. They believed that government intervention in the economy benefited special-interest groups and created corporate monopolies that favored the rich. They sought to restore the independence of the individual—the artisan and the ordinary farmer—by ending federal support of banks and corporations and restricting the use of paper currency, which they distrusted. Their definition of the proper role of government tended to be negative, and Jackson's political power was largely expressed in negative acts. He exercised the veto more than all previous presidents combined. ... Nor did Jackson share reformers' humanitarian concerns. He had no sympathy for American Indians, initiating the removal of the Cherokees along the Trail of Tears.
Opposing factions led by Henry Clay helped form the Whig Party. The Democratic Party had a small yet decisive advantage over the Whigs until the 1850s when the Whigs fell apart over the issue of slavery. In 1854, angry with the Kansas–Nebraska Act, anti-slavery Democrats left the party and joined Northern Whigs to form the Republican Party.
The Democrats split over slavery, with Northern and Southern tickets in the election of 1860, in which the Republican Party gained ascendancy. The radical pro-slavery Fire-Eaters led walkouts at the two conventions when the delegates would not adopt a resolution supporting the extension of slavery into territories even if the voters of those territories did not want it. These Southern Democrats_Democratic) nominated the pro-slavery incumbent vice president, John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky, for president and General Joseph Lane, of Oregon, for vice president. The Northern Democrats_Democratic) nominated Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois for president and former Georgia Governor Herschel V. Johnson for vice president. This fracturing of the Democrats led to a Republican victory and Abraham Lincoln was elected the 16th president of the United States.
As the American Civil War broke out, Northern Democrats were divided into War Democrats and Peace Democrats). The Confederate States of America deliberately avoided organized political parties. Most War Democrats rallied to Republican President Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans' National Union Party) in the election of 1864, which featured Andrew Johnson on the Union ticket to attract fellow Democrats. Johnson replaced Lincoln in 1865, but he stayed independent of both parties.
The Democrats benefited from white Southerners' resentment of Reconstruction after the war and consequent hostility to the Republican Party. After Redeemers ended Reconstruction in the 1870s and following the often extremely violent disenfranchisement of African Americans led by such white supremacist Democratic politicians as Benjamin Tillman of South Carolina in the 1880s and 1890s, the South, voting Democratic, became known as the "Solid South". Although Republicans won all but two presidential elections, the Democrats remained competitive. The party was dominated by pro-business Bourbon Democrats led by Samuel J. Tilden and Grover Cleveland, who represented mercantile, banking, and railroad interests; opposed imperialism and overseas expansion; fought for the gold standard; opposed bimetallism; and crusaded against corruption, high taxes and tariffs. Cleveland was elected to non-consecutive presidential terms in 1884 and 1892.
submitted by AutoModerator to democraticparty [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 04:40 Alzerkaran Following my Previous Posts on NHS Ukraine, I will talk about the Gra Valkas Empire, the nation that I compare to WWII Italy than anything else.

"The Gra Valkas Empire" also known as "The Eighth Empire" where many do not know the reason for its name or where it originated from, an Empire that claims to be so powerful that it could dominate their entire previous world, well, this time it was talk about what this "Mighty Empire" was like in its previous World, let's begin...
Yggdra, the Origin Planet of Gra Valkas, a Planet of a star system of 8 Planets, 4 Rocky and 4 Gas Giants, the Planet of Yggdra was the Third Planet of the star system, one of approximately the same size and diameter as Planet Earth , formed by 8 Continents of which the Third the Great one was so to speak the "Europe" of that World, that continent has vast enormous Peninsulas, and of those peninsulas one of those was the Gra Valkas Empire, being what the "European" Continent "Hence it was approximately 3 times larger than the Europe of our world, it gave rise to many great Empires, all with ambitions to conquer the entire continent at some time in their history.
This "Europe" had access to its equivalent of the Mediterranean Sea in our World. A sea that was more of a small Ocean due to its size but still a Great Sea, and on the other side to the South is a Poor Continent worthy of being the "Africa" ​​of that World "Adfreidy" was called by the "Aerupeans" of that World, while to the east is "Levantia" the equivalent of the Middle East in that world, only unlike ours, that place was still a fertile and green land, and not desert, at least not entirely.
In that land was one of the many Powers of that World, the Divine Kingdom of Kain, a Theocatric State similar to what would be the modern Iran of our world, only with its differences, since the Divine Kingdom of Kain was made up of the Union from North to South and from east to west of all the Peoples who follow the religion of "Ashirism", followers of the God Ashir, another way of calling the God of the arrogant religions of that world, the Ashirites who united centuries ago in a Great Empire that evolved to what it is today, its name "Kain" is due to the Lands of the Ancient "Kainite" People who were the predecessor of all the ethnic groups of that geographical area.
All these Peoples Conformed to the Current Kingdom, being a Federated Kingdom that maintains the Union of all the Peoples under the same religion that they all profess, being their Rival for many Centuries, the Valks, the Valkas, now called Gra Valkas after their Unification ago 80 Years under the same flag and State.
The Gra Valkas, so to speak, are similar to the Italian People of our world, a people that has both historical, cultural and social similarities, one that 2000 years ago was an Empire that encompassed all the Southern Coasts of "Aeuropa" and part of what is the Western coast of Levantia, one that due to its internal problems collapsed and remained for many centuries divided into Multiple Warring Kingdoms and small States, sometimes being clients of the Powerful and emerging Countries, Kingdoms, empires North and Northwest of the Continent.
Being disunited, fragmented under others, until less than 100 years ago, after many diplomatic and military unification struggles, the Unification of the "Valkeania" Peninsula gave birth to the Empire of the Nation of the Valks, or better called " Gra Valkas" nation to consider since for its moment of unification its Continent already had and has many other Powers, both military and economic...
The Republic (and formerly Empire) Galena, an equivalent to the France of our World, the Empire (and former Confederation) of Werrmania, equivalent to the German Empire and former Germanic Confederation, the Arthurian Commonwealth, a Kingdom located in the Northeastern Islands, the Saztru-Zugoro Empire, equivalent to Austria-Hungary in our world, and the Tartar Empire, a Great Empire in the Northeastern Lands being the Gate to the Great Continent of Esya, where it extended further east more and more, and of course , the weaker Kingdoms of Aeuropa, Federate Kingdom of Estalia in the Western Peninsula, equivalent to Spain and Portugal, and the United Kingdom of Sverik, being equivalent to the Nordic Kingdoms of our world.
The Gra Valkas Empire, It is an Empire that, so to speak, entered the board of its World late, since it was an Empire that was born too late to end up being relevant in its world more than its geographical position.
Being that when the Partition of Adfreidy came, Gra Valkas barely obtained colonies in the North (Being an Area Equivalent to Libya and Tunisia) and in the extreme Southeast on the Peninsula of the "Fang" of Adfreidy (Being an Area at least much larger than what that the Italy of our world got) when Gra Valkas tried to Expand his Colonies to the Adfredian Kingdoms it was very expensive, his poorly equipped army, incompetent commanders, repressive policies and ethnic harshness to the natives, plus how expensive it was to face The "weakest" Kingdoms of Adfreidy, made Gra Valkas look like a novice, weak country, incompetent in the colonial race, and unscrupulous in its conquests that was branded as a "Dwarf who wanted to be seen as a Giant" in Aeuropa, only The Werrmans were their Best Ally and the only powerful nation that made an effort to help them and keep them while the rest of the powers advanced.
The Gra Valkas Empire was so weak before the rest of the Powers of its Continent that its closest Rival and equivalent in strength was neither more nor less than the Divine United Kingdom of Kain, a Kingdom from the Other end of the Intermary Sea, close to the Kingdom of Hella de, with the Trapison Peninsula being its most vulnerable territory to the Gra Valkas Empire
And that was the first important target of Gra Valkas in the "Great War" of his World, when all the European Empires and Great Kingdoms, the Federated States on the other Side of the Aclanto Ocean, plus the Karioshini Empire on the other end of Yggdra, In the Ocean of Tranquility, this in its expansionist attempt against the Zhawan Dynasty Empire, everyone went to war in one way or another, and the Gra Valkas Empire targeted the Divine Kingdom of Kain as its main target and contender, and that war lasted 8 long years, being the main powers to achieve peace at age 6, and Gra Valkas and Kain at age 8 being the last.
In the end the World was hurt, but with many rematches of a Second Round for some, the Weerman Empire prevailed, the Galena Republic asked for Revenge, the Arthurian Commonwealth tried to keep their vast empire together, the Federated States came out with many commercial and economic benefits , the Karioshini Empire was left wanting to expand further, the Zhawan Dynasty fell and began a time of Internal Wars, the Tartar Empire imploded and after a bloody civil war a Union of States emerged, the Empire of the Saztru-Zugoro was divided and a part joined Weermania, and Gra Valkas, Gra Valkas obtained accounts of the Great Islands in the Intermary Sea before Kain, after failing again and again to make naval landings on the Kainian coasts, not even Military Free Passage before his New Ally de Hellade was able to make a change on the land front, not even with the help of another Small Kingdom, called Valgaria, could he make a difference before the Bastion that was Kain.
Even so, Gra Valkas celebrated his "Victory" before Kain, despite being small, the Empire used them to show its military power, although mediocre, it was military power.
But that left resentments in the top leaders of Gra Valkas, giving for the next 25 years extreme militarization, Nationalism, right-wing extremism, national supremacism, indoctrination of the masses, propaganda, giving an Empire ready this time to win a War against Kain. Of course, its technological innovations were due to the theft of technologies from other Powers, espionage and part of the cooperation with Weermania, gave an Empire of mixed or more advanced Military technologies than others.
At least the Gra Valkan Navy became the 7th strongest in the world, their new Class of "Super Battleship" being the "Grade" Atlas-tar (being that the Gra Valkas Navy names their designs/models/classes). of ships as "Degrees" to differentiate their difference) their flagship, with Batteries of the highest Caliber, Radar systems and electronics enough to face any Ship in the Intermarine Sea, and Anti-Aircraft systems using the technology they managed to steal from " Proximity Fuzes" gave a New Battleship evolution of the previous Grade "Belteges" and the discarded Grade "Litoral" (Technically the Littorio) gave one of the largest Ships in the world, at least until it was known that the rest of the Powers already had Similar battleships, and better in several parts than the Atlas-tar, in addition to knowing that now the Aircraft Carrier was becoming more relevant than the Battleship, and that the Fifth Galena Republic already had a 50,000-ton Battleship with quadruple 406-millimeter Batteries and better defenses in all kinds than the Atlas-tar, even so, Gra Valkas had Kain as an enemy and rival, whose Ships did not reach the Atlas-tar, although his air force was already highly considered, since despite the fact that the Gra Valkana Royal Air Force had the best aircraft to consider on their Continent, the Kainia was also feared and considered to be equivalent or better.
Hopefully the same could be said of Gra Valkas' land Army, since his Armored Vehicles are not as big or powerful as the rest of the powers, nor are the small arms of his army.
It was already close for the New World War to arrive, soon all the Powers will be involved in a new World War, and Gra Valkas will be feared now.
Until the transfer event occurred
submitted by Alzerkaran to nihonkoku_shoukan [link] [comments]


2023.06.02 00:59 JoshAsdvgi THE FOUR BROTHERS

THE FOUR BROTHERS

THE FOUR BROTHERS; OR INYANHOKSILA (STONE BOY)
Alone and apart from their tribe dwelt four orphan brothers.
They had erected a very comfortable hut, although the materials used were only willows, hay, birch bark, and adobe mud.
After the completion of their hut, the oldest brother laid out the different kinds of work to be done by the four of them.
He and the second and third brothers were to do all the hunting, and the youngest brother was to do the house work, cook the meals, and keep plenty of wood on hand at all times.
As his older brothers would leave for their hunting very early every morning, and would not return till late at night, the little fellow always found plenty of spare time to gather into little piles fine dry wood for their winter use.
Thus the four brothers lived happily for a long time.
One day while out gathering and piling up wood, the boy heard a rustling in the leaves and looking around he saw a young woman standing in the cherry bushes, smiling at him.
"Who are you, and where did you come from?" asked the boy, in surprise.
"I am an orphan girl and have no relatives living.
I came from the village west of here.
I learned from rabbit that there were four orphan brothers living here all alone, and that the youngest was keeping house for his older brothers, so I thought I would come over and see if I couldn't have them adopt me as their sister, so that I might keep house for them, as I am very poor and have no relations, neither have I a home."
She looked so pitiful and sad that the boy thought to himself, "I will take her home with me, poor girl, no matter what my brothers think or say."
Then he said to her: "Come on, tanke (sister).
You may go home with me; I am sure my older brothers will be glad to have you for our sister."
When they arrived at the hut, the girl hustled about and cooked up a fine hot supper, and when the brothers returned they were surprised to see a girl sitting by the fire in their hut. After they had entered the youngest brother got up and walked outside, and a short time after the oldest brother followed him out.
"Who is that girl, and where did she come from?" he asked his brother.
Whereupon the brother told him the whole story.
Upon hearing this the oldest brother felt very sorry for the poor orphan girl and going back into the hut he spoke to the girl, saying: "Sister, you are an orphan, the same as we; you have no relatives, no home.
We will be your brothers, and our poor hut shall be your home.
Henceforth call us brothers, and you will be our sister."
"Oh, how happy I am now that you take me as your sister.
I will be to you all as though we were of the same father and mother," said the girl.
And true to her word, she looked after everything of her brothers and kept the house in such fine shape that the brothers blessed the day that she came to their poor little hut.
She always had an extra buckskin suit and two pairs of moccasins hanging at the head of each one's bed.
Buffalo, deer, antelope, bear, wolf, wildcat, mountain lion and beaver skins she tanned by the dozen, and piled nicely in one corner of the hut.
When the Indians have walked a great distance and are very tired, they have great faith in painting their feet, claiming that paint eases the pain and rests their feet.
After their return from a long day's journey, when they would be lying down resting, the sister would get her paint and mix it with the deer tallow and rub the paint on her brother's feet, painting them up to their ankles.
The gentle touch of her hands, and the soothing qualities of the tallow and paint soon put them into a deep, dreamless steep.
Many such kind actions on her part won the hearts of the brothers, and never was a full blood sister loved more than was this poor orphan girl, who had been taken as their adopted sister.
In the morning when they arose, the sister always combed their long black silken scalp locks and painted the circle around the scalp lock a bright vermillion.
When the hunters would return with a goodly supply of beef, the sister would hurry and relieve them of their packs, hanging each one high enough from the ground so the prowling dogs and coyotes could not reach them.
The hunters each had a post on which to hang his bow and flint head arrows.
(Good hunters never laid their arrows on the ground, as it was considered unlucky to the hunter who let his arrows touch the earth after they had been out of the quiver).
They were all perfectly happy, until one day the older brother surprised them all by saying: "We have a plentiful supply of meat on hand at present to last us for a week or so.
I am going for a visit to the village west of us, so you boys all stay at home and help sister. Also gather as much wood as you can and I will be back again in four days.
On my return we will resume our hunting and commence getting our year's supply of meat."
He left the next morning, and the last they saw of him was while he stood at the top of the long range of hills west of their home.
Four days had come and gone and no sign of the oldest brother.
"I am afraid that our brother has met with some accident," said the sister.
"I am afraid so, too," said the next oldest. "
I must go and search for him; he may be in some trouble where a little help would get him out."
The second brother followed the direction his brother had taken, and when he came to the top of the long range of hills he sat down and gazed long and steadily down into the long valley with a beautiful creek winding through it.
Across the valley was a long plain stretching for miles beyond and finally ending at the foot of another range of hills, the counterpart of the one upon which he sat.
After noting the different landmarks carefully, he arose and slowly started down the slope and soon came to the creek he had seen from the top of the range.
Great was his surprise on arriving at the creek to find what a difference there was in the appearance of it from the range and where he stood.
From the range it appeared to be a quiet, harmless, laughing stream.
Now he saw it to be a muddy, boiling, bubbling torrent, with high perpendicular banks.
For a long time he stood, thinking which way to go, up or down stream.
He had just decided to go down stream, when, on chancing to look up, he noticed a thin column of smoke slowly ascending from a little knoll.
He approached the place cautiously and noticed a door placed into the creek bank on the opposite side of the stream.
As he stood looking at the door, wondering who could be living in a place like that, it suddenly opened and a very old appearing woman came out and stood looking around her. Soon she spied the young man, and said to him: "My grandchild, where did you come from and whither are you bound?"
The young man answered: "I came from east of this ridge and am in search of my oldest brother, who came over in this direction five days ago and who has not yet returned."
"Your brother stopped here and ate his dinner with me, and then left, traveling towards the west," said the old witch, for such she was. "
Now, grandson, come across on that little log bridge up the stream there and have your dinner with me.
I have it all cooked now and just stepped outside to see if there might not be some hungry traveler about, whom I could invite in to eat dinner with me."
The young man went up the stream a little distance and found a couple of small logs which had been placed across the stream to serve as a bridge.
He crossed over and went down to the old woman's dugout hut.
"Come in grandson, and eat. I know you must be hungry."
The young man sat down and ate a real hearty meal.
On finishing he arose and said: "Grandmother, I thank you for your meal and kindness to me.
I would stay and visit with you awhile, as I know it must be very lonely here for you, but I am very anxious to find my brother, so I must be going.
On my return I will stop with my brother and we will pay you a little visit."
"Very well, grandson, but before you go, I wish you would do me a little favor.
Your brother did it for me before he left, and cured me, but it has come back on me again.
I am subject to very severe pains along the left side of my backbone, all the way from my shoulder blade down to where my ribs attach to my backbone, and the only way I get any relief from the pain is to have some one kick me along the side."
(She was a witch, and concealed in her robe a long sharp steel spike. It was placed so that the last kick they would give her, their foot would hit the spike and they would instantly drop off into a swoon, as if dead.)
"If I won't hurt you too much, grandmother, I certainly will be glad to do it for you," said the young man, little thinking he would be the one to get hurt.
"No, grandson, don't be afraid of hurting me; the harder you kick the longer the pain stays away."
She laid down on the floor and rolled over on to her right side, so he could get a good chance to kick the left side where she said the pain was located.
As he moved back to give the first kick, he glanced along the floor and he noticed a long object wrapped in a blanket, lying against the opposite wall.
He thought it looked strange and was going to stop and investigate, but just then the witch cried out as if in pain.
"Hurry up, grandson, I am going to die if you don't hurry and start in kicking."
" I can investigate after I get through with her," thought he, so he started in kicking and every kick he would give her she would cry: "Harder, kick harder."
He had to kick seven times before he would get to the end of the pain, so he let out as hard as he could drive, and when he came to the last kick he hit the spike, and driving it through his foot, fell down in a dead swoon, and was rolled up in a blanket by the witch and placed beside his brother at the opposite side of the room.
When the second brother failed to return, the third went in search of the two missing ones. He fared no better than the second one, as he met the old witch who served him in a similar manner as she had his two brothers.
"Ha! Ha!" she laughed, when she caught the third, "I have only one more of them to catch, and when I get them I will keep them all here a year, and then I will turn them into horses and sell them back to their sister.
I hate her, for I was going to try and keep house for them and marry the oldest one, but she got ahead of me and became their sister, so now I will get my revenge on her.
Next year she will be riding and driving her brothers and she won't know it."
When the third brother failed to return, the sister cried and begged the last one not to venture out in search of them.
But go he must, and go he did, only to do as his three brothers had done.
Now the poor sister was nearly distracted.
Day and night she wandered over hills and through woods in hopes she might find or hear of some trace of them.
Her wanderings were in vain.
The hawks had not seen them after they had crossed the little stream.
The wolves and coyotes told her that they had seen nothing of her brothers out on the broad plains, and she had given them up for dead.
One day, as she was sitting by the little stream that flowed past their hut, throwing pebbles into the water and wondering what she should do, she picked up a pure white pebble, smooth and round, and after looking at it for a long time, threw it into the water.
No sooner had it hit the water than she saw it grow larger.
She took it out and looked at it and threw it in again.
This time it had assumed the form of a baby.
She took it out and threw it in the third time and the form took life and began to cry: "Ina, ina" (mother, mother).
She took the baby home and fed it soup, and it being an unnatural baby, quickly grew up to a good sized boy.
At the end of three months he was a good big, stout youth.
One day he said: "Mother, why are you living here alone? To whom do all these fine clothes and moccasins belong?" She then told him the story of her lost brothers.
"Oh, I know now where they are.
You make me lots of arrows.
I am going to find my uncles." She tried to dissuade him from going, but he was determined and said: "My father sent me to you so that I could find my uncles for you, and nothing can harm me, because I am stone and my name is "Stone Boy."
The mother, seeing that he was determined to go, made a whole quiver full of arrows for him, and off he started.
When he came to the old witch's hut, she was nowhere to be seen, so he pushed the door in and entered.
The witch was busily engaged cooking dinner.
"Why, my dear grandchild, you are just in time for dinner.
Sit down and we will eat before you continue your journey."
Stone boy sat down and ate dinner with the old witch.
She watched him very closely, but when she would be drinking her soup he would glance hastily around the room.
Finally he saw the four bundles on the opposite side of the room, and he guessed at once that there lay his four uncles.
When he had finished eating he took out his little pipe and filled it with "kini-kinic," and commenced to smoke, wondering how the old woman had managed to fool his smart uncles.
He couldn't study it out, so when he had finished his smoke he arose to pretend to go. When the old woman saw him preparing to leave, she said: "Grandson, will you kick me on the left side of my backbone.
I am nearly dead with pain and if you kick me good and hard it will cure me."
"All right, grandma," said the boy.
The old witch lay down on the floor and the boy started in to kick.
At the first kick he barely touched her.
"Kick as hard as you can, grandson; don't be afraid you will hurt me, because you can't." With that Stone Boy let drive and broke two ribs.
She commenced to yell and beg him to stop, but he kept on kicking until he had kicked both sides of her ribs loose from the backbone.
Then he jumped on her backbone and broke it and killed the old witch.
He built a big fire outside and dragged her body to it, and threw her into the fire.
Thus ended the old woman who was going to turn his uncles into horses.
Next he cut willows and stuck them into the ground in a circle.
The tops he pulled together, making a wickieup.
He then took the old woman's robes and blankets and covered the wickieup so that no air could get inside.
He then gathered sage brush and covered the floor with a good thick bed of sage; got nice round stones and got them red hot in the fire, and placed them in the wickieup and proceeded to carry his uncles out of the hut and lay them down on the soft bed of sage. Having completed carrying and depositing them around the pile of rocks, he got a bucket of water and poured it on the hot rocks, which caused a great vapor in the little wickie-up.
He waited a little while and then listened and heard some breathing inside, so he got another bucket and poured that on also.
After awhile he could hear noises inside as though some one were moving about.
He went again and got the third bucket and after he had poured that on the rocks, one of the men inside said:
"Whoever you are, good friend, don't bring us to life only to scald us to death again."
Stone boy then said: "Are all of you alive?" "Yes," said the voice. "Well, come out," said the boy.
And with that he threw off the robes and blankets, and a great cloud of vapor arose and settled around the top of the highest peak on the long range, and from that did Smoky Range derive its name.
The uncles, when they heard who the boy was, were very happy, and they all returned together to the anxiously waiting sister.
As soon as they got home, the brothers worked hard to gather enough wood to last them all winter.
Game they could get at all times of the year, but the heavy fall of snow covered most of the dry wood and also made it very difficult to drag wood through the deep snow.
So they took advantage of the nice fall weather and by the time the snow commenced falling they had enough wood gathered to last them throughout the winter.
After the snow fell a party of boys swiftly coasted down the big hill west of the brothers' hut.
The Stone boy used to stand and watch them for hours at a time.
His youngest uncle said: "Why don't you go up and coast with them?"
The boy said: "They may be afraid of me, but I guess I will try once, anyway."
So the next morning when the crowd came coasting, Stone boy started for the hill.
When he had nearly reached the bottom of the coasting hill all of the boys ran off excepting two little fellows who had a large coaster painted in different colors and had little bells tied around the edges, so when the coaster was in motion the bells made a cheerful tinkling sound.
As Stone boy started up the hill the two little fellows started down and went past him as though shot from a hickory bow.
When they got to the end of their slide, they got off and started back up the hill.
It being pretty steep, Stone boy waited for them, so as to lend a hand to pull the big coaster up the hill.
As the two little fellows came up with him he knew at once that they were twins, as they looked so much alike that the only way one could be distinguished from the other was by the scarfs they wore.
One wore red, the other black.
He at once offered to help them drag their coaster to the top of the hill.
When they got to the top the twins offered their coaster to him to try a ride.
At first he refused, but they insisted on his taking it, as they said they would sooner rest until he came back.
So he got on the coaster and flew down the hill, only he was such an expert he made a zigzag course going down and also jumped the coaster off a bank about four feet high, which none of the other coasters dared to tackle.
Being very heavy, however, he nearly smashed the coaster.
Upon seeing this wonderful jump, and the zigzag course he had taken going down, the twins went wild with excitement and decided that they would have him take them down when he got back.
So upon his arrival at the starting point, they both asked him at once to give them the pleasure of the same kind of a ride he had taken.
He refused, saying: "We will break your coaster.
I alone nearly smashed it, and if we all get on and make the same kind of a jump, I am afraid you will have to go home without your coaster."
"Well, take us down anyway, and if we break it our father will make us another one."
So he finally consented.
When they were all seated ready to start, he told them that when the coaster made the jump they must look straight ahead.
"By no means look down, because if you do we will go over the cut bank and land in a heap at the bottom of the gulch."
They said they would obey what he said, so off they started swifter than ever, on account of the extra weight, and so swiftly did the sleigh glide over the packed, frozen snow, that it nearly took the twins' breath away.
Like an arrow they approached the jump.
The twins began to get a little nervous. "Sit steady and look straight ahead," yelled Stone boy.
The twin next to Stone boy, who was steering behind, sat upright and looked far ahead, but the one in front crouched down and looked into the coulee.
Of course, Stone boy, being behind, fell on top of the twins, and being so heavy, killed both of them instantly, crushing them to a jelly.
The rest of the boys, seeing what had happened, hastened to the edge of the bank, and looking down, saw the twins laying dead, and Stone boy himself knocked senseless, lying quite a little distance from the twins.
The boys, thinking that all three were killed, and that Stone boy had purposely steered the sleigh over the bank in such a way that it would tip and kill the twins, returned to the village with this report.
Now, these twins were the sons of the head chief of the Buffalo Nation.
So at once the chief and his scouts went over to the hill to see if the boys had told the truth.
When they arrived at the bank they saw the twins lying dead, but where was Stone boy? They looked high and low through the gulch, but not a sign of him could they find.
Tenderly they picked up the dead twins and carried them home, then held a big council and put away the bodies of the dead in Buffalo custom.
A few days after this the uncles were returning from a long journey.
When they drew near their home they noticed large droves of buffalo gathered on their side of the range.
Hardly any buffalo ever ranged on this east side of the range before, and the brothers thought it strange that so many should so suddenly appear there now.
When they arrived at home their sister told them what had happened to the chief's twins, as her son had told her the whole story upon his arrival at home after the accident.
"Well, probably all the buffalo we saw were here for the council and funeral," said the older brother.
"But where is my nephew?" (Stone boy) he asked his sister.
"He said he had noticed a great many buffalo around lately and he was going to learn, if possible, what their object was," said the sister. "Well, we will wait until his return."
When Stone boy left on his trip that morning, before the return of his uncles, he was determined to ascertain what might be the meaning of so many buffalo so near the home of himself and uncles.
He approached several bunches of young buffalo, but upon seeing him approaching they would scamper over the hills.
Thus he wandered from bunch to bunch, scattering them all.
Finally he grew tired of their cowardice and started for home.
When he had come to within a half mile or so of home he saw an old shaggy buffalo standing by a large boulder, rubbing on it first one horn and then the other.
On coming up close to him, the boy saw that the bull was so old he could hardly see, and his horns so blunt that he could have rubbed them for a year on that boulder and not sharpened them so as to hurt anyone.
"What are you doing here, grandfather?" asked the boy.
"I am sharpening my horns for the war," said the bull.
"What war?" asked the boy.
"Haven't you heard," said the old bull, who was so near sighted he did not recognize Stone boy.
"The chief's twins were killed by Stone boy, who ran them over a cut bank purposely, and the chief has ordered all of his buffalo to gather here, and when they arrive we are going to kill Stone boy and his mother and his uncles."
"Is that so? When is the war to commence?"
"In five days from now we will march upon the uncles and trample and gore them all to death."
"Well, grandfather, I thank you for your information, and in return will do you a favor that will save you so much hard work on your blunt horns."
So saying he drew a long arrow from his quiver and strung his bow, attached the arrow to the string and drew the arrow half way back.
The old bull, not seeing what was going on, and half expecting some kind of assistance in his horn sharpening process, stood perfectly still.
Thus spoke Stone boy:
"Grandfather, you are too old to join in a war now, and besides if you got mixed up in that big war party you might step in a hole or stumble and fall and be trampled to death.
That would be a horrible death, so I will save you all that suffering by just giving you this.
" At this word he pulled the arrow back to the flint head and let it fly.
True to his aim, the arrow went in behind the old bull's foreleg, and with such force was it sent that it went clear through the bull and stuck into a tree two hundred feet away.
Walking over to the tree, he pulled out his arrow.
Coolly straightening his arrow between his teeth and sighting it for accuracy, he shoved it back into the quiver with its brothers, exclaiming:
"I guess, grandpa, you won't need to sharpen your horns for Stone boy and his uncles."
Upon his arrival home he told his uncles to get to work building three stockades with ditches between and make the ditches wide and deep so they will hold plenty of buffalo.
"The fourth fence I will build myself," he said.
The brothers got to work early and worked until very late at night.
They built three corrals and dug three ditches around the hut, and it took them three days to complete the work. Stone boy hadn't done a thing towards building his fence yet, and there were only two days more left before the charge of the buffalo would commence.
Still the boy didn't seem to bother himself about the fence.
Instead he had his mother continually cutting arrow sticks, and as fast as she could bring them he would shape them, feather and head them.
So by the time his uncles had their fences and corrals finished he had a thousand arrows finished for each of his uncles.
The last two days they had to wait, the uncles joined him and they finished several thousand more arrows.
The evening before the fifth day he told his uncles to put up four posts, so they could use them as seats from which to shoot.
While they were doing this, Stone boy went out to scout and see how things looked.
At daylight he came hurriedly in saying, "You had better get to the first corral; they are coming."
"You haven't built your fence, nephew." Whereupon Stone boy said: "I will build it in time; don't worry, uncle."
The dust on the hillsides rose as great clouds of smoke from a forest fire.
Soon the leaders of the charge came in sight, and upon seeing the timber stockade they gave forth a great snort or roar that fairly shook the earth.
Thousands upon thousands of mad buffalo charged upon the little fort.
The leaders hit the first stockade and it soon gave way.
The maddened buffalo pushed forward by the thousands behind them; plunged forward, only to fall into the first ditch and be trampled to death by those behind them.
The brothers were not slow in using their arrows, and many a noble beast went down before their deadly aim with a little flint pointed arrow buried deep in his heart.
The second stockade stood their charge a little longer than did the first, but finally this gave way, and the leaders pushed on through, only to fall into the second ditch and meet a similar fate to those in the first.
The brothers commenced to look anxiously towards their nephew, as there was only one more stockade left, and the second ditch was nearly bridged over with dead buffalo, with the now thrice maddened buffalo attacking the last stockade more furiously than before, as they could see the little hut through the openings in the corral.
"Come in, uncles," shouted Stone boy.
They obeyed him, and stepping to the center he said: "Watch me build my fence."
Suiting the words, he took from his belt an arrow with a white stone fastened to the point and fastening it to his bow, he shot it high in the air. Straight up into the air it went, for two or three thousand feet, then seemed to stop suddenly and turned with point down and descended as swiftly as it had ascended.
Upon striking the ground a high stone wall arose, enclosing the hut and all who were inside. Just then the buffalo broke the last stockade only to fill the last ditch up again.
In vain did the leaders butt the stone wall.
They hurt themselves, broke their horns and mashed their snouts, but could not even scar the wall.
The uncles and Stone boy in the meantime rained arrows of death into their ranks.
When the buffalo chief saw what they had to contend with, he ordered the fight off.
The crier or herald sang out: "Come away, come away, Stone boy and his uncles will kill all of us."
So the buffalo withdrew, leaving over two thousand of their dead and wounded on the field, only to be skinned and put away for the feasts of Stone boy and his uncles, who lived to be great chiefs of their own tribe,
and whose many relations soon joined them on the banks of Stone Boy Creek.
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