📈 Shockwaves

Special counsel report sends shockwaves through Congress, Arm surges 60% in windfall for Softbank, Einhorn says markets fundamentally broken, NYCB troubles threaten a new crisis, and Wall Street love sends Disney’s stock soaring. Full briefing ahead, but first…

Author

Smart Owl
February 09, 2024

Good morning.

The Fast Five → Special counsel report sends shockwaves through Congress, Arm surges 60% in windfall for Softbank, Einhorn says markets fundamentally broken, NYCB troubles threaten a new crisis, and Wall Street love sends Disney’s stock soaring…

Your 5-minute briefing for Friday, February 9:

BEFORE THE OPEN

As of market close 2/8/2024

PRE-MARKET

MARKETS

  • US stocks slightly rose, with the S&P briefly breaking the 5,000 milestone for the first time

  • The Nasdaq led indices with a 0.24% gain

  • Asian stocks mostly rose, as Chinese stocks capped off their best week in over a year ahead of the Lunar New Year holidays

EARNINGS

  • Pinterest shares fell ~9% after issuing a weaker-than-expected Q1 forecast and reporting disappointing Q4 revenue (link)

  • Cloudflare shares jumped ~20% after beating Q4 earnings and revenue expectations and issuing a stronger-than-expected Q1 forecast (link)

  • What we're watching this week:

    • Today: PepsiCo 

  • Full calendar here

NEWS BRIEFING

A special counsel report released Thursday detailing memory lapses by President Biden sparked swift and fierce reactions from members of Congress.

Arm reported better-than-expected earnings for the third quarter, and issued an optimistic forecast. SoftBank still owns about 930 million shares or roughly 90% of its outstanding stock, and founder Masayoshi Son is Arm’s chairman.

  • Goldman is facing CFTC probe over fees charged for futures trading (link)

  • Einhorn says markets ‘fundamentally broken’ by passive, quant investing (link)

  • Top US venture firms funded blacklisted Chinese companies, House Committee says (link)

  • Sam Altman seeks trillions of dollars to reshape business of chips and AI (link)

  • Shaky commercial loans threaten a new regional bank crisis (link)

  • Wall Street love sends Disney stock soaring (link)

  • Google rebrands Bard AI to Gemini and launches a new app and subscription (link)

  • Activision had planned layoffs before merger, Microsoft says (link)

  • States crack down on social media for teens: “There are no guardrails” (link)

  • Big Tech’s $140B cash haul points to shareholders returns (link)

  • J&J accused of mismanaging its employees’ drug benefits (link)

  • Mark Zuckerberg’s dividend could solve his Meta control dilemma (link)

  • Biden’s age back in spotlight after special counsel report, verbal flubs (link)

CRYPTO

  • Payments from crypto-related ransom attacks nearly doubled to $1B in 2023 (link)

  • BlackRock iShares Bitcoin Trust became one of the top five ETFs of 2024 based on inflows (link)

You Can Sponsor this Newsletter details here.​

BULLISH BITES

🏈 PE + NFL: Inside the succession crisis brewing at the NFL.

🐭 Muskateer: Wait, did Elon Musk just hint he's going to buy Disney?

🌎 Discovery: NASA found a super-Earth. It's in a tantalizing place.

FEATURED TRADES

Paramount: Ride The Bids Higher

Paramount Global, operating under the ticker PARA, is a multinational media conglomerate that produces and distributes television programs and films, owns and operates various broadcast networks, including CBS, Showtime, and Nickelodeon, and provides streaming services such as Paramount+. The company was previously known as ViacomCBS before rebranding to Paramount Global in 2022.

Ticker: PARA | Price: $13.01 | Price Target: $21 (+62%)

Market Cap: $9.8B | Timeframe: N/A

🎥 Entertainment/Media | 🤝 Potential Acquisition | 📈 Bullish Idea

Read the full article here. Read time: 3 min

DAILY SHARES

Keep the curation going! Buy the team a coffee ☕️