Market Signals

Financial updates, market data, economic tracking, and blog posts.

AI output is getting cheaper while the machines needed to produce it keep getting more expensive

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The $7.5 trillion argument says the AI boom isn’t anywhere near the historical spending limit yet. Fine. But I think the more interesting problem is happening underneath that number. AI is getting cheaper incredibly fast while the cost of building the AI machine is still exploding. That means the bull case now needs usage to … Read more

Japanese 10 year bonds hit 3%

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The boiler is smoking, the bolts straining. She’s getting ready to blow. https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/JP10Y Word round the campfire is, when she hits 3.5% all bets are off. View post on imgur.com October looms : View post on imgur.com   h/t jjjjj

One California bill just wiped billions off utility stocks, it removes a $6 billion wildfire cap.

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One bill in Sacramento torched billions in utility market cap. PG&E fell as much as 21%, Edison 23%, its worst day since 2018. California's new wildfire bill updates response but leaves the liability sitting on the utilities, the one thing investors were begging to avoid. Three… pic.twitter.com/0uAx763bvq — Kurt S. Altrichter, CRPS® (@kurtsaltrichter) August 31, … Read more

More Americans are borrowing just to get through the month, banks are closing credit cards of people who never missed a payment

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This is how people get trapped. The paycheck comes in, the card gets paid down, then the same bills go right back on it. Credit cards used to be for things you couldn't afford. Now they're for things you can't avoid. Groceries. Gas. Car repairs. Medical bills. Utilities. Then payday comes. You pay down the … Read more

Big Tech’s profit boom may not be as strong as it looks, every single “legend” is losing to the S&P 500 this year.

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Big Tech hyperscalers posted record pre-tax profits last quarter, but much of the increase at Alphabet and Amazon came from paper gains on AI investments rather than actual business growth. Big Tech’s collective “other income” from AI investments surged to over $160 billion in Q2 2026, more than double the ~$69 billion recorded in Q1, … Read more

The CFO exodus is getting younger

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Companies are getting younger at the checkbook right when the checks are getting bigger. A record wave of CFOs is heading for the exit, and boards are handing the checkbook to the youngest finance chiefs in a decade. New CFOs now average 48.2 years old, down from 51.9 in 2025. Turnover is tracking 18.3%, the … Read more

AI borrowing is getting so big it’s pushing Treasury yields higher

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AI companies have borrowed so much money this year that they’re pushing up interest rates for the entire economy. Nomura estimates tech borrowing alone now equals 25% of what the US Treasury issues in bonds, five times more than last year. Bank of America says the surge has added about 0.3 percentage points to the … Read more

Investors are starting to bet against America without shorting the dollar, Warsh may be the man who inflates America’s debt away

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The dollar debasement trade is back, and it flipped the script. Money is fleeing the dollar into gold, Bitcoin, and emerging-market bonds. EM local-currency bonds are up about 6% over the past year while the dollar went nowhere, and they have returned 3.3% in 2026 against a 1.9%… pic.twitter.com/UdzofOgreR — Kurt S. Altrichter, CRPS® (@kurtsaltrichter) … Read more

Two boring industries are telling the same story: companies prepared for more demand, and the demand never showed up.

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The box story is no longer just about Amazon using smaller packaging. US corrugated box demand has weakened enough that 2025 shipments fell to their lowest per-capita level in decades, while domestic pulpwood prices have collapsed in several major timber regions. Cardboard box demand is one of the cleanest reads on the real goods economy. … Read more

The $40 trillion debt number may be the smallest part of America’s fiscal problem

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The $40 trillion headline gets all the attention. The harder problem is that Washington keeps adding debt while the promises sitting outside that number keep growing too. The US National Debt has increased by over $700 billion since July 1st. The Federal Government is borrowing from our future to spend like drunken sailors today. Everything … Read more

Affirm is booming while consumers increasingly need four payments

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Great quarter for Affirm. However, that $14.1 billion in BNPL purchases also shows just how hard consumers are stretching their finances. Consumers just financed a record $14.1B of purchases through Affirm in a single quarter. The stock rose 9% on its first GAAP profit. Buy-now-pay-later scales fastest when households are stretching a paycheck across four … Read more

Victoria’s Secret may have accidentally found the dumbest stock catalyst that actually makes sense

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The GTA VI thesis sounds ridiculous. Lucia appears to be wearing Victoria’s Secret. The game has an enormous audience. The stock could get free exposure every time millions of players see the brand. Fine. But here’s the part I think is more interesting. Victoria’s Secret was already turning around before GTA VI. Q1 sales jumped … Read more

The 65 billion barrel Venezuela deal sounds huge. It can’t replace the oil being burned right now.

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Truth … 😆💯🔽 pic.twitter.com/3RFOxVdrZs — John (@market_sleuth) August 30, 2026 It would take 56 years to fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve with Venezuelan oil through the Venezuelan deal per mathematical simulation. This is the upper limit. It assumes that infrastructure is already built and fully functional and that the draw is curbed significantly. The “good … Read more

We’re probably asking the wrong question about the next trillion dollar company

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Everyone wants to know: What’s the next Nvidia? But the discussion around this question misses something important. The biggest winners usually weren’t obvious because they belonged to some magical “next big thing.” People didn’t need to predict AI to buy AMD. They didn’t need to predict the Arab Spring to buy Facebook. They didn’t need … Read more