Daily Chartbook #69

Welcome back to Daily Chartbook: macro market charts, data, and insights pulled from various sources around the Internet by a solo retail investor.

1. Positive signals from rent prices. “This may take some time to show up in data sets like CPI that rely on owner's equivalent rent surveys, but nevertheless it is an encouraging development in the economy”.

2. Inventory gains. "Seeing unprecedented inventory gains in homes for sale for late October. Available supply grew by 1% this week, normally inventory shrinks by 1-2% per week".

3. Delinquency rates. Delinquency rates for credit cards increased 9% quarter-to-quarter, “the largest jump since 2008”, but remain “quite low relative to history”.

4. Inflation takes (I). From Stifel: "Inflation momentum has topped...Energy, food and goods are all slowing, and together they constitute the majority of inflation above what may be an acceptable inflation rate for the Fed".

5. Inflation takes (II). From BofA: "Based on both the original and the updated forecasts YoY headline CPI inflation should fall below 4% by mid2023 and below 3% by Dec-2022 / early 2023".

6. Inflation takes (III). From Goldman: "Inflation will remain uncomfortably high next year, especially core services inflation, and we see some risk that the FOMC will feel obligated to keep hiking for too long in response".

7. S&P Global US PMI (I). The S&P Global US Composite Output Index dropped to 47.3 from 49.5 for the second-fastest fall since 2009. Both services and manufacturing flash PMI showed contraction.

8. S&P Global US PMI (II). Survey "data for the US show that inflation pressures have eased markedly in recent months but, thanks to wages and energy, remained stubbornly high in October".

9. S&P Global US PMI (III). "The recent slump in demand signaled by the US PMI new orders index is clearly already feeding through to slower jobs gains".

10. Cheat sheet. "Nice sector cheat sheet in relation to real rates and ISM".

11. Peak bond yields ahead? "The gap between breakevens and bond yields that was in force for the past two years has fully closed now. This suggests bond yields do not need to keep moving much higher".

12. Strong dollar. "We've taken out all the previous peaks in the USD other [than] March 1985".

13. Fx headwinds. From BofA: "Following a 16% rise in the USD in 3Q YoY, we calculate FX was a 3ppt hit to sales from translation, representing the biggest headwind since 2015".

14. Margins under pressure (I). “Historically, comparing core inflation to unit labor costs has been a good harbinger for economy-wide profits”.

15. Margins under pressure (II). "Analysts expect [net margins] to trough this quarter, but that seems premature if the US economy slows".

16. Margins under pressure (III). Sector profit margins in Q3 2022 (blue) compared to one year ago (grey).

17. Increased positioning. Positioning across different cohorts of investors has moved up significantly. "We did not even reach this levels at the peak of the summer squeeze".

18. Big buybacks ahead. "This week the buyback programs are back in full swing. >$5bn per day of every trading day up until Christmas. Chart depicts historic buybacks".

19. Mutual funds year-end. "October is the year-end for 24% of mutual funds, representing $1.7 Trillion in assets. Starting next week, that big net seller goes away".

20. Worst ever. "This is the largest equity market cap loss ever, down around $30 tn according to GS".

21. Volume requirements. "Volume demand needs to eclipse volume supply for the rally to be sustainable".

22. Sloppy stability. From BofA: "One could argue that the SPX has found sloppy stability near its June low and rising 200-week MA in the low 3600s. Oversold readings below 1.0 for the 3-month VIX vs VIX in late September and last week have offered some support for the SPX near its 200-week MA".

23. Peak earnings season. This week will see 43% of earnings reports.

24. Don’t miss. Companies missing on EPS and sales estimates are getting severely punished.

25. Post-peak EPS sector performance. The energy sector "has performed best after [peaking] in EPS growth".

26. Hypotheticals. From Goldman: "Hypothetical sector P/E multiples in a recessionary scenario".

27. Cheap small-caps. With relative P/E at 20-year lows, small-cap stocks are trading at a discount to the S&P 500

28. Outlook. Morgan Stanley and consensus earnings estimates and price targets.

29. Returns on schedule. And finally, “the S&P 500 is up nearly 6% this October, living up to it's reputation as the best month of the year during a midterm year”.

Thanks for reading!