Breakfast | US CPI may cause significant volatility in US stocks, Jensen Huang, Bezos once again heavily reduce holdings to cash out

Good morning! A great day starts with making money.

Overnight Morning Market

Fed Chairman Powell warned of the risks of maintaining high interest rates in congressional testimony. Comments suggest that this may imply the Fed is considering easing its policy stance, with Fedwatch showing a 73.3% probability of a rate cut in September, supporting new highs in U.S. stock indices. The S&P, Nasdaq, and Nasdaq 100 have hit new highs for six consecutive days, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq hitting historical highs for the 36th and 26th times this year, respectively.

Tesla rose by 3.71%, marking a 10-day consecutive increase and a nearly 44% cumulative increase, setting a new record for the longest consecutive increase in a year. NVIDIA rose by 2.48%, ranking third in U.S. stocks with a market value of $3.23 trillion; Apple rose by 0.38%, hitting a new closing high for six consecutive days, maintaining its position as the most valuable company; Meta rose by 0.13%, and Amazon rose by 0.03%.

Chinese concept stocks outperformed the U.S. market. JD.com rose by 1.3%, Baidu rose by 8.5%, and Pinduoduo rose by over 2%. Alibaba rose by about 3%, Tencent ADR rose by 1.5%, Bilibili rose by 4.4%, NIO rose by nearly 1%, Li Auto fell by 0.4%, and XPeng rose by 0.7%.

Blue Chips and Hot Stocks

NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang sold $30.7 million worth of stock.

Amazon founder Bezos sold $863.5 million worth of stock.

About 14,000 Disney employees will vote on strike action.

"Bond King" Gross: Tesla is behaving like a meme stock, with weakening fundamentals but a straight upward stock price trajectory. It seems like a new internet-famous stock appears every other day, with most being pumped and dumped.

According to IDC data, Apple's personal computer shipments grew by 21% in the second quarter, the largest increase among global PC manufacturers. Acer's PC shipments in the second quarter grew by 14%, following closely behind. Global desktop and laptop computer shipments increased by 3% year-on-year in the second quarter.

Volkswagen adjusted its annual forecast, expecting a full-year sales profit margin between 6.5% and 7%, down from the previous forecast of 7% to 7.5%; the total burden of operational results is expected to reach up to €2.6 billion. Audi's Brussels factory may be closed.

Vanke: It is expected to incur a net loss of ¥7-9 billion in the first half of 2024, with 1,862 key employees self-raising ¥200 million to increase their holdings of Vanke A shares.

Chips and Artificial Intelligence

Market news: The U.S. has launched a $1.6 billion chip packaging research project competition.

According to The Information: Musk's xAI and Oracle have ended negotiations on server-related transactions, opting to purchase chips to build their own data centers, and are currently building a data center system consisting of 100,000 H100 chips.

NIO, XPeng, and other self-developed smart driving chips are about to be mass-produced, entering the final countdown.

Macro: Taking You Around the World

Key Points of Fed Chairman Powell's Congressional Testimony

1. Inflation Situation: Firmly committed to the 2% inflation target, significant progress has been made, waiting for more positive data to boost confidence.

2. Labor Market: The labor market appears to have fully recovered balance, with the unemployment rate still at historic lows, and a response will be made in case of unexpected weakness

3. Economic Situation: GDP growth in the first half of the year seems to have slowed down, but the economy is still growing at a steady pace.

4. Interest Rate Policy: The next step is unlikely to be a rate hike, adjustments will be made cautiously as premature or excessive policy easing could undermine progress already made.

5. Market Expectations: The likelihood of a Fed rate cut in September is slightly above 70%, with two 25 basis point cuts expected within the year.

6. Other Contents: Series of discussions have been conducted on the final version of Basel III agreement; many banks are facing risks in commercial real estate; the independence of the Federal Reserve is crucial.

Fed Whisperer Nick Timiraos: Powell's Pivot Hints at Rate Cut

Fed Chair Powell stated that the balance between lowering inflation and maintaining a stable labor market is shifting, a cautious yet significant change that brings the Fed closer to a rate cut. This comment is noteworthy as the Fed has always viewed an overheated labor market as the main risk to lowering inflation. Powell admitted that just two months ago, he would not have made such a judgment. In fact, his comments at a conference in Portugal last week were more cautious even before the June employment report from the U.S. Labor Department was released.

JPMorgan Warns: CPI Report Could Cause Significant Volatility in S&P 500

Thursday's CPI inflation report may disrupt the calm in the stock market, with a forecast of a 0.2% month-on-month increase in core CPI for June in the U.S. If the data exceeds 0.3%, it could trigger selling of risk assets, leading to a 1.25% to 2.5% decline in the S&P 500 index. However, the likelihood of this scenario is low.

Goldman Sachs Asset Management: Expects U.S. stock market returns to stabilize, with market breadth increasing.

BNP Paribas: Expects the European Central Bank to resume rate cuts in September.

According to data from S3 Partners LLC, short sellers made $10 billion in profits in the second quarter, with profits from industries such as industrial, healthcare, and finance offsetting the $15.7 billion loss in market value of tech stocks.

The U.S. Republican Party released a draft of its election platform, marking the first time in 40 years that it has downplayed the national abortion ban.

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology: Guiding photovoltaic companies to reduce the scale of pure capacity expansion in photovoltaic manufacturing projects, with the minimum capital ratio for new and expanded photovoltaic manufacturing projects set at 30%