🇺🇸 The share of US adults who drink alcohol is at its lowest since 1939…

📉 CHART WATCH 📉

🇨🇳 Chinese house prices fell 0.3% MoM and 2.8% YoY.

This is 3rd straight month of decline and the 25th straight negative YoY reading…

🏠 CHART WATCH 🏠

🌐 Looks like the primary use case for ChatGPT has, rather predictably, been doing kids’ homework.

May this be the impetus for radical reform in American education & accreditation.

🖼 CHART WATCH 🖼

🇺🇸 After a brief 4.5% tumble over the past week, the CME odds of 25bp rate cut have jumped 6.7% to 92.1%.

7.9% odds of no cut at all. More people are discussing a 50bp super-cut, but it’s definitely unlikely.

Since “dropping the ball” on the tremendous inflation of a few years ago, the Fed has engaged in the fastest hiking cycle and the slowest cutting cycle in recent history.

📊 CHART WATCH 📊

🇺🇸 Foreigners’ holdings in U.S. treasuries hit a record $9.13 trillion after rising by $80.2 billion in June.

📈 CHART WATCH 📈

🇺🇸 Allocations to Bitcoin & Ethereum ETFs now make up about 1.6% of total ETF assets.

That’s about 100bp up from the start of 2024…

🪙 CHART WATCH 🔷

🇺🇸 Overall Bill Pay Market Size (in billions of dollars)…

U.S. households spend $4.55 trillion annually on bills. For the 13 most common bills (illustrated here), $3.45 trillion is the yearly total.

These include: Mortgage; Rent; Auto Loan; Gas; Electric, Water & Sewer, Waste & Recycling; Auto Insurance; Cable & Internet & Phone; Health Insurance; Mobile Phone; Alarm & Security; and Life Insurance.

🔠 CHART WATCH 🔠

🇿🇦 🇲🇦 🇪🇬 The African Battery Storage Pipeline

Nearly 600 million Africans lack electricity, and the population is set to double by 2050-2070. Utility-scale batteries will be crucial to bridging the energy gap.

🔋 CHART WATCH 🔋

🇺🇸 The monthly growth in retail sales for May (gray), June (green), and July (blue), in billions & seasonally adjusted.

Auto dealers & online retailers are leading the pack…

🚖 CHART WATCH 🚖

🇺🇸 Trump has begun discussions of announcing the new Fed chair before Powell’s term is up next year.

Outside of occasional spikes from Kevin Hassett & Christopher Waller, the prediction market has almost exclusively been led by Kevin Warsh since December.

In the past few weeks, that’s all changed. Warsh started to roll over as Hassett peaked, and then Hassett joined in the rollover, leaving Waller out in front (a lead he has extended to 10 points in the past few days).

🏦 CHART WATCH 🏦

🌎 Central bank rate decisions this week include Uruguay, Sweden, New Zealand, Indonesia, Iceland, Jamaica, Israel, Botswana, and Paraguay.

Tuesday: 🇺🇾
Wednesday: 🇸🇪🇳🇿🇮🇩🇮🇸🇯🇲🇮🇱
Thursday: 🇧🇼
Friday: 🇵🇾

📆 CHART WATCH 📆

🌎 Returns Leaderboard for the week ending on 8/15 (in USD)…

🥇 🇯🇵 Japanese Equities
🥇 🇺🇸 U.S. Small Caps
🥇 🇨🇳 Chinese Equities

⬇️ Gold, WTI Crude, 30Y U.S. Treasuries

📊 CHART WATCH 📊

🇺🇸 The S&P 500 ($SPX) and the CNN Fear & Greed Index back to July 2021…

🌐 CHART WATCH 🌐

🇨🇳 China’s growth momentum has weakened. Expansion in output, consumption, and investment all slowed sharply…

📉 CHART WATCH 📉

🪙 $1.82 billion in stablecoins flowed into Binance.

🔶 CHART WATCH 🔶

🌐 This is the past year in total social mentions of cryptocurrencies.

Call that what you will, but it’s no irrational exuberance…

🪙 CHART WATCH 🔷

🇺🇸 The Nail Salon Boom

💅 CHART WATCH 💅

🇺🇸 The S&P 500 ($SPX) has had -21% fall and a 34% rally to a series of all-time highs so far this year…

🌐 CHART WATCH 🌐

🌐 Change in consensus forecast for GDP growth in 2026 (from Jan 2025).

🔺️ CHART WATCH 🔺️