Breakfast | Fund flow shows market enthusiasm for US stocks is not high, Goldman Sachs says $100 billion buyback will make US stocks promising in May and June

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Overnight Morning Market

The rise in US stocks has slowed down. Some tech giants once again dragged down the market. The Dow rose by 0.44%, marking its longest consecutive increase in over four months for the sixth day. The S&P 500 closed flat, while the Nasdaq fell by 0.18% after two consecutive days of decline following a three-day rise.

Tesla fell by 1.7% for the second consecutive day. Alphabet dropped nearly 1.1%; Amazon fell by 0.4%, Apple rose by nearly 0.2% for the second consecutive day, Meta rose for the sixth consecutive day, and Netflix rose for the sixth consecutive day. Nvidia fell by nearly 0.2%, Intel fell by 2.2%.

Popular Chinese concept stocks continued to decline overall. XPeng fell by over 6%, Nio fell by over 5%, Li Auto fell by over 4%, and Xiaomi Fan Dian rose by 7%. Alibaba, Tencent Fan Dian, Bilibili fell by over 1%, Baidu fell by over 0.8%, JD.com fell by nearly 0.6%, NetEase fell by 0.3%, Pinduoduo rose by over 1%.

Educational software provider PowerSchool rose by 15%. According to the Wall Street Journal, Bain Capital is in talks to privatize PowerSchool.

Blue Chips and Hot Stocks

According to data from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, Apple's iPhone shipments in China in March increased by 12%.

Apple Loses Another Senior Designer as Designer Exodus Continues

Apple's senior designer Duncan Kerr is planning to resign soon, with almost the entire design team that worked under Jony Ive leaving. Kerr joined Apple in 1999. In the years following Jony Ive's departure in 2019, several top designers have also left, with most team members joining his new design company LoveFrom.

Media: US prosecutors are investigating whether Tesla misled investors and consumers in its electric vehicle's autonomous driving capabilities, potentially committing securities or telecommunications fraud.

JD.com announced that the 618 shopping festival will return in June, with sales starting directly at 8 p.m. on May 31.

Amazon reached a cloud agreement with Spanish telecom to enter the European 5G network market.

Shopify's first-quarter revenue was $1.9 billion, exceeding market expectations of $18.4 billion, compared to $15.08 billion in the same period last year.

Uber's first-quarter revenue was $10.13 billion, slightly above market expectations of $10.11 billion; gross bookings were $18.67 billion, below the market expectation of $19.15 billion. The total bookings for the second quarter are expected to be between $38.75 billion and $40.25 billion, with the market expecting $40.04 billion.

Robinhood's key financial indicators exceeded expectations, turning losses into profits. Cryptocurrency revenue surged by 232%. First-quarter total revenue was $618 million, higher than analysts' expectations of $546.8 million; net profit was $157 million, achieving profitability for the second consecutive quarter; earnings per share (EPS) were $0.18, surpassing analysts' expectations of $0.06, compared to a loss of $0.57 per share in the same period last year. Robinhood rose by approximately 7.17% after hoursArm's total revenue and royalty income both hit record highs in the fourth quarter, with full-year revenue for 2024 surpassing $3 billion for the first time. The guidance for the next quarter exceeded expectations, but the forecast for revenue in 2025 barely met expectations, causing concerns among Wall Street about AI capital expenditures across the industry.

BeiGene's first-quarter total revenue was $752 million, a 68% year-on-year increase, mainly driven by sales of BeiYueZe in the United States and Europe, which grew by 153% and 243% respectively year-on-year. Adjusted operating loss was $147 million, a 47% decrease year-on-year.

Game developer Activision Blizzard was ordered to pay $23.4 million to Acceleration Bay for patent infringement.

Market news: Intel expects second-quarter revenue to be below the midpoint of the expected range. Revenue for the second quarter of 2024 is expected to remain within the original range of $12.5 billion to $13.5 billion.

"Nio's Li Bin: Users buy cars because of the product, not because of traffic."

"We did a live broadcast before Xiaomi, the traffic was okay, but in the end, it still depends on the product, which is the first competitive advantage," said Li Bin, Chairman and CEO of Nio. "Enterprises ultimately need to return to the essence of products and services." "When defining ET7 in 2020, we were too optimistic about intelligent driving, which was the biggest lesson. Due to the ordinary rear seats, ET7 was penalized."

Chips and Artificial Intelligence

Market news: Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai presented Google's artificial intelligence roadmap.

Microsoft: $3.3 billion investment in Wisconsin for cloud computing and artificial intelligence.

SoftBank is reportedly in talks to acquire UK artificial intelligence chip company Graphcore.

Startups

According to The Information: Just 3 months after announcing the last round of financing, DatologyAI raised nearly $50 million to help developers manage their training data.

Macro: Taking You Around the World

Atlanta Fed's GDPNow model predicts U.S. second-quarter GDP growth at 4.2%, up from the previous estimate of 3.3%.

Fed's Collins: Economic cooling may be needed to achieve the 2% inflation target. Keeping rates stable for longer will slow economic growth.

"Citi strategist: Fund flows show lukewarm enthusiasm for US stocks' rally."

Investors' positioning in US stocks reveals cautious signs, casting doubt on the strength of the S&P 500's rally. Recent short covering has brought the S&P 500 index close to a one-sided net long position, but investors seem hesitant to further increase their holdings on the existing long basis. The Nasdaq 100 index, which has a significant weighting in tech stocks, has turned net short, even though the index strengthened last week. New long positions are trickling in slowly, and the rise in risk appetite is also weak.

Goldman Sachs: "The biggest buyer" returns to the market, with a trillion-dollar "ammunition" to help US stocks through May and June. US companies are expected to repurchase $934 billion in stocks this year, a 13% increase from last year, with an estimated one-sixth, about $155.5 billion, of repurchases to be executed in May and JuneShedding the "low configuration" label, fund investment in Hong Kong stocks reignites enthusiasm

Recently, mainland public funds have overall increased their positions in Hong Kong stocks, with some funds significantly increasing their positions from underweight to heavily overweight. Some funds have even raised their Hong Kong stock positions to as high as ninety percent. In the first quarter report this year, apart from QDII products, a total of 302 Hong Kong stocks appeared in the top holdings of public funds, including Shanghai-Hong Kong-Shenzhen funds. The top ten most heavily weighted Hong Kong stocks include Tencent Holdings, CNOOC, Meituan, China Mobile, Kuaishou, Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing, CR Beer, Xiaomi Corporation, Li Auto, and Kingdee International.

The Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology is soliciting opinions: it plans to guide lithium battery companies to reduce manufacturing projects that simply expand production capacity.

A spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Commerce responded to questions from reporters regarding the U.S. revoking export licenses to Huawei: China firmly opposes this