AM Brew, May 17th 2022

Shanghai has now had 3 days of zero community covid - accurate measurement is bullish for the markets :-). Also, Chinese tech leaders are to meet Beijing officials today and there is optimism that Beijing will start rolling back some of the restrictions against Chinese tech companies. These stocks are so low, we will wait until the news before offering any opinion. Hong Kong is rolling back some covid curbs on May 19th, as Mayor Lam said "its reasonable to have 200 to 300 cases a day". China is in the midst of embracing Omicron, which is a much needed return to normalcy. The global supply chain needs China.

SpaceX employees are trying to sell shares in a private placement round at a $125 billion valuation, or 25% higher than October's $100 billion round. Its doubtful that they will pull off an up round in this environment.

Stock Futures are up strongly implying a 1.5% pop on the open. Other risk assets like gold, silver, crude and the pound are up over 1% heading into the open. Tech names like NVDA, TSLA and AMD are strong in the pre-market. Is this the start of a risk-on rally? We would wait for a confirmation day and pay attention to action on the close today.

Tesla has put in a double bottom and is up 20 points in the pre-market:

Google is forming a 3 week base. Given that it has been a nasty 3 weeks for both the market & technology, this is a good sign that Google, at 20X earnings, is now priced in-line with the fundamentals:

Walmart, WMT, is down 7% pre-market. The company is cutting its outlook, citing supply chain pressures, labor, fuel and cutting back on higher margin merchandise to spend on groceries. This is further evidence that recession is likely, with the low-end consumer pulling back.

The traders connundrum is that, although valuations are a lot more reasonable, recession appears imminent and allocating capital is quite risky given all the volatility - you could be wrong by 10% in a week. The market is catching a bid with the S&P500 at the 4,000 mark - look for a confirmation day or fundamental data that confirms the bid. China re-opening is a good start and the first good fundamental news in a while.