ADDX GO Market Morning Wrap - 12th Aug

Counting today, the S&P 500 has now climbed above 6,400 points four times, only to disappointingly slide back each time.

 

At close, the S&P 500 fell 0.25% to 6,373.45 points; the Nasdaq Composite dropped 0.3% to 21,385.4 points; and the Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 0.45% to 43,975.09 points.

 

 

(S&P 500 daily chart, source: TradingView)

 

Most major tech stocks ended lower, with Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Google, Amazon, Meta, and AMD seeing slight declines; Intel rose over 3%, Tesla gained more than 2% for a fourth straight day of gains. Fannie Mae surged over 15%, Freddie Mac rose more than 13%, both hitting closing highs since 2008.

 

Lithium miners saw a collective rally, with Lithium Americas up over 9%, Chile’s Mining & Chemicals up more than 8%, and Sigma Lithium jumping over 22%.

 

In the AI sector, notable application stock C3.ai plummeted 25.58%. CEO Thomas Siebel bluntly called this quarter’s sales performance “completely unacceptable,” blaming organizational restructuring and his ongoing health issues, while announcing a search for the next CEO.

 

Incidentally, another AI application stock, BigBear.ai, released a weaker-than-expected report after Monday’s close, with its stock crashing nearly 30%.

 

Influenced by policy rumors, cannabis stocks showed significant movement, with Tilray Brands up 41.82%, Canopy Growth rising 26.40%, and Cronos Group gaining 16.09%.

 

Chocolate maker Hershey dropped 4.8%, driven by a sharp intraday surge in cocoa futures.

 

Meanwhile, due to a cryptocurrency pullback early Tuesday, “reserve” stocks showed mixed results: Ethereum reserve Bitmine Immersion rose 14.68%, while SharpLink Gaming fell 6.63%; Strategy hit a peak intraday gain of over 4% but closed up just 1.30%.

 

The upcoming U.S. July CPI report is not only a sentiment catalyst for U.S. stocks but also a global gauge of the tariff impact on the U.S. economy. JPMorgan’s market intelligence team predicts that if the core CPI month-over-month growth is below 0.25%, the S&P 500 could rise 1.5%-2%; conversely, if it exceeds 0.4%, the index could drop 2%-2.75%.

 

Meanwhile, Bank of America’s monthly fund manager survey revealed that about 91% of respondents believe “U.S. stocks are overvalued,” the highest since the survey began in 2001.

 

UBS Global Wealth Management’s Chief Investment Officer Mark Haefele summed it up: “Investors already aligned with their strategic benchmarks should consider short-term hedging, while those under-allocated should prepare to increase exposure during a potential market dip.”

Global Hotspots

Denmark Becomes “Worst-Performing Stock Market Globally”

 

As of Monday’s close, the OMX Copenhagen 25 Index (OMXC25), covering the 25 largest Danish stocks, has fallen 7.5% year-to-date, with a cumulative drop of 20% from its 12-month high.

 

Statistically, Denmark’s index is the worst-performing developed market benchmark this year. In contrast, the Stoxx Europe 600 and S&P 500 have gained about 8% year-to-date.

 

Fed Chair Candidate List Expands, Three More Central Bank Officials Added

 

White House officials revealed that the list of Fed Chair candidates has grown, potentially now at eight. New contenders include two current Fed Vice Chairs, Michelle Bowman and Philip Jefferson, as well as Dallas Fed President Lorie Logan.

 

$1.9 Trillion Giant Moves: Norway’s Sovereign Wealth Fund Dumps 11 Israeli Company Stocks

 

One of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds, Norway’s Government Pension Fund Global (NBIM), announced it has divested from 11 Israeli companies and terminated contracts with all external Israeli managers.

 

On Monday, NBIM stated on its website that it has sold off all Israeli company stocks not included in its benchmark index.

Company News

EV Sales Under Pressure, Tesla Eyes UK Power Business

 

Electric vehicle giant Tesla has applied for a household electricity supply license from the UK’s energy regulator. If approved, Tesla will compete with major energy firms serving UK residents.

 

Tesla Energy Ventures Limited submitted the application to Ofgem last month, signed by director Andrew Payne, who oversees Tesla’s energy operations in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.$TSLA 

 

Nvidia Launches Embodied AI Reasoning Model Cosmos Reason

 

At the SIGGRAPH conference unveiled on Monday, Nvidia introduced a suite of world models, libraries, and infrastructure for robot developers.

 

The highlight is the open-source physical AI application and robotic vision reasoning model Cosmos Reason, with 7 billion parameters.

 

With memory and comprehension capabilities, Cosmos Reason enables robots and AI agents to “reason like humans” and act in the real world.$NVDA 

 

Ford Boosts EV Investment, Pushes Affordable Models

 

On Monday, Ford announced a $2 billion investment plan, bringing its total EV investment to $5 billion, aimed at launching a series of affordable electric vehicles to democratize its EV business.$F 

Forex & Commodities

WTI crude futures rose 0.13% to $63.96 per barrel. Brent crude futures gained 0.06% to $66.63 per barrel.

 

COMEX gold futures for the current month fell $86.60, or 2.48%, to $3,404.7 per ounce.

 

At New York’s close, the U.S. Dollar Index rose 0.24% to 98.50, with most non-U.S. currencies declining.

Key Events

Trump Announces Tariff Exemption for Gold Imports, Prices See Biggest Single-Day Drop in Three Months

 

On Monday, U.S. President Trump posted on social media, stating, “Gold will not be subject to tariffs!” offering temporary relief to the global gold market, which had been rattled by tariff uncertainty.

 

However, prior to this statement, gold prices experienced their largest single-day drop in three months.

Cryptocurrency

Major digital assets showed mixed performance on Monday.

 

Bitcoin edged up slightly to $118,767, with 24-hour trading volume surging 41.5% to $88.59 billion.

 

Ethereum (ETH-USD), the second-largest digital asset by market value, eased 0.3% to $4,239.

 

XRP (XRP-USD) lost 1.7%, BNB (BNB-USD) gained 0.02%, and Solana (SOL-USD) dropped 3.8%.

 

Dogecoin (DOGE-USD) shed 3.7%, and Cardano (ADA-USD) dipped 2.8%.

 

The total market value of the cryptocurrency industry rose 0.01% in the past 24 hours to $3.97 trillion, with trading volume up 30.8% to $211.58 billion.

Key Events

U.S. Micro-Cap Raises $1.5B to Buy Trump Family Coin

 

On Monday, medical technology firm Alt5 Sigma announced plans to sell shares to raise $1.5 billion, with proceeds earmarked to purchase WLFI cryptocurrency issued by World Liberty.

 

Alt5 Sigma will issue 200 million common shares, with 100 million sold privately to World Liberty Financial using WLFI tokens.

 

Post-transaction, Eric Trump will join the board, and Zach Witkoff, son of U.S. Middle East envoy Witkoff, will become chairman. As of Monday’s close, Alt5 Sigma fell 26.42%.