PPI Has Nothing On Investors As S&P Squeezes Out Third Day of Gainz…

They had us in the first half, not gonna lie… 

Well, the S&P 500 managed to close green for a third straight session Thursday, squeezing out a microscopic +0.03% gain to 6,468.54… once again, proving that “buy the dip” after not so hot economic news is the play. The Nasdaq finished flat (-0.01%), the Dow dipped -0.02%, and all three were down sharply intraday before staging a late-session comeback that smelled a lot like “greed”. 

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For starters, the morning mood soured when July’s Producer Price Index went scorched-Earth with inflation… +0.9% MoM versus the 0.2% expected, the largest jump since markets started pretending inflation was “cooling.” Wholesale prices are an early warning for consumer prices, and this number screamed, “That September rate cut? Not a sure thing.”

Dig deeper, and the spike was mostly from “portfolio management” costs and airfare. Translation: Wall Street’s charging you more to lose your money, and Delta is still convinced you’ll pay $800 to sit in coach. Strip those out, and inflation looked more in line with forecasts… hence why traders didn’t completely lose their sh*t after the report. 

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With that said, Fed funds futures still see a 91% chance of a September cut, down only slightly from yesterday, but the fantasy of a half-point slasher is dead. Rate-watchers can stop writing love letters to Daddy Powell as 25 bps is the best-case scenario now. In regards to individual cards, Amazon closed up nearly +3% on nothing in particular except Amazon destroying industries (see our article below for context). As for Nvidia, Microsoft, Alphabet, Meta, and Broadcom… all edged higher, although, it was nothing really to write home about.

Elsewhere, Tesla took a -1% ice bath, while Apple stalled -0.22%. However, Deere and Tapestry got the worst end of the stick as shares pummeled -6.5% and -15% on the day. Why? Well, because Deere’s earnings reminded everyone that tractors don’t print money… and Tapestry airballed so hard it send them to the bottom of the S*P 500. But don’t worry, Miami International Holdings’ IPO popped -43% as the “exchange business” is apparently the new AI. Meanwhile, Paramount gave back -6% after its historic +37% face-melting rally Wednesday. Oh, and Amcor shat the bed with horrific earnings. Shares cratered -12%. 

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And in the background of all the mess, Bitcoin reminded everyone it’s still the attention hog of degenerates… setting a new record high of $124,500 overnight before drifting back to $118,200. Even Michael Saylor’s Pandora Box, that is Microstrategy, couldn’t keep it up as shares dropped -4% in sympathy with… reality. 

As for the bigger picture of the day, investors are doing what they’ve done all year… treating bad news as a mild inconvenience rather than a directional shift. The Fed’s job isn’t any easier after this PPI print, but the market’s job is apparently just to keep pretending that rate cuts are inevitable. Of course, we might all get our way… but inflation keeps overshooting like this, the “buy-the-dip” muscle could finally cramp. Meaning, keep your head on the swivel and place your bets accordingly as we go into Friday’s session. Until next time, friends… 

If you read all of this, congrats for having a 10 second attention span (better than me). As always, here’s our heatmap for today.

At the time of publishing, Stocks.News holds positions in Amazon, Tesla, Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, and Meta as mentioned in the article