The market strutted into Friday thinking it was at a celebration and stumbled out looking like it had been blindsided at the bar.

If you think that’s Kevin Hassett opining, you’d be wrong. It’s actually CEA Chair Ed Lazear on May 8, 2008. NBER retrospectively determined that the business cycle peak was December 2007, so that a recession was underway for 4 months by that time.

Romania’s second quarter release confirms the economy is in quasi-stagnation. Public investments, mainly from EU funds, remain the main hope for a growth revival. We keep our 2025 growth forecast at 0.3% and revise 2026 to 1.4% from 1.7%

Berkshire Hathaway’s portfolio is filled with quality stocks, many of which pay dividends to shareholders. Some have even paid rising dividends each year, for decades on end.

Broadcom, Inc., a direct competitor to Nvidia in AI chip making, saw its Q3 free cash flow surge again, along with a rise in its FCF margins on strong AI-related chip demand. 

The EU ordered Google to end these behaviors within two months or risk a potential breakup. This marks one of the largest EU fines against a company, following the €4.12 billion Android fine in 2018.

Some decline in the mortgage rates starting to emerge...

The gold miners’ stocks just surged within spitting distance of new record highs. Achieving them will be a momentous technical and sentimental milestone, as their last record close was a shocking 14 years ago.

We started the week at 6460 and closed at 6481. Basically unchanged. Yet underneath that boring surface, we had a 90-point reversal today alone. We exploded to 6530 this morning, then crashed right back to my key 6450 level.