RenMac Off-Script: Fine… For Now

RenMAC offscript originated as a weekly internal research meeting designed to summarize and discuss what happened in Washington, the markets, and the economic data over the past week. It was always intended to be and remains a free-flowing conversation with no discernible objective other than to extract the wisdom and opinion of our analysts and their expertise. This is a conversation among colleagues.

Individual circumstances are unique and nuanced. Do not mistake these conversations for investment advice because it's not. Here we go. All right, welcome to Red Mac Off Script, where you openly discuss markets, economics, policy, history, and life. It is Friday, May 8th, 2026. I'm Steve Dutenoffer. I'm Jeff DeGround. I'm Neil Dara And I'm Steve Pavlic. Needle, sorry about your horse last week. Emerging markets, tenth. Not so good.

Well, at least the uh the actual emerging markets are holding up a lot better than uh than the horse. Well that's True. I I have to say I'm you know, I'm no expert in horse racing, though I do enjoy it and I'm not a bad better for what that's worth. I usually can break even. Um sometimes I'll have a asymmetry and and make something. I didn't have anything. I got I got one with Ofer. Opher. And usually I've I've got some place bets that will kinda make up the difference. Nothing.

Well, I mean that that race, if you're not a horse racing fan, go back and watch it because that race with Golden Tempo coming from last down the stretch was unbelievable. That was that was exciting. Shot from back? Did you see that shot from back? Where's this like it was like what? Yeah. It's like that's that it's like watching a pro athlete against, you know, a high school team. It's unbelievable.

Un unbelievable. Uh all right, Neil, payroll Friday. What happened? Um, you know, I mean I th I don't think it really changes anything. I so I would say nothing happens. I mean labor market conditions have probably you could say improved from where they were to start the year. Um whether that means like a ra like a more meaningful acceleration is in front of us, I think remains to be seen. Um But you know, w and when you look at the sort of uh distribution of um of jobs growth

You know, it's pretty clear the data center construction build out is having effects on the distribution of jobs. Um so for example Non-residential construction jobs keep going up. Um they're up, you know, the you know, l in April it was the fastest pace in three months. uh durable goods manufacturing, particularly like metals, like p uh primary fabricated metals manufacturing has been strong. Um the work week in durable goods manufacturing has perked up. Um

But then, you know, on the other hand, there were some industries that aren't doing so hot. You know, so residential construction employment is actually declining. So um you know, if you look at a chart of home building stocks, I'm sure, you know, as Jeff has highlighted, it doesn't look good and uh and you're seeing that reflected in the uh in the labor market uh data. And um, you know, key service industries also look a little sluggish, so

uh information services uh was down so we're seeing some weakness in technology, uh we're seeing weakness in financial activities, we're seeing weakness in accommodation. So, you know, looking forward, um I guess I think the risk is that a lot of the growth in manufacturing might be a a consequence of an inventory rebuild. You know, once that kind of runs its course, what happens? Um and, you know, I would just say that

There are areas in the service sector that are going to get squeezed as households uh cut back their spending. And if they cut back their spending, that'll alter labor market decisions, I think. And I would just say things are f things are fine. I mean there's there's nothing here to suggest that, you know, an imminent slowdown is upon us.

I wouldn't say that there's something here to really suggest uh a big perking up is upon us either. Um I think for the bond market, the bond market might be latching on to the fact that wage growth uh appears to have slowed. Um So we had another month where wage growth uh only rose two tenths of one percent. Um so

you know, for all the the growth in employment, we don't yet see much of a uh inflationary impulse um with respect to wages. Um and so, you know, that's that's encouraging. So I don't think it necessarily you know, puts uh hikes on the table, but it it certainly doesn't put cuts on the table either. Is it a is it a marital fine? Right? You know, when you're like you're with your wife and she's like, It's fine. You're like, oh God, that's not fine. Yeah it'll find you. I think, I mean...

Um you know, I th you know uh there there's a lot of enthusiasm right now for kind of a warming in the jobs market. Um and you know, I mean there's some evidence of that in this report. Um But Yeah, I mean I I wouldn't say that uh you know we're off to the races. I mean I j I would just say uh you know, you could say the best thing you could say is that things aren't getting um it's it's clear that things aren't getting any worse.

Um how much better they're getting I think is is more of a a a debate at this point.

But you said last week, Neil, that, you know, the economy's running on one engine as you thought about how that, you know, framed out first quarter GDP. Did this report sort of Solidify that? Are we running on one engine? Well, I mean I I think when you look at the when you look at GDP growth, um, you know, leaving the labor market data aside, uh, you know, GDP is very, I think, influenced by um

the the sort of tech capital spending boom. Now it is true that when you look at like GDP accounting, a lot of the tech boom leaks abroad. Um, but I also think that kind of misses the point, right? Like so the idea is that the GDP impact of the tech boom isn't as meaningful because. a lot of the um equipment associated with it is actually imported. So we import a lot of the chips, the intermediate goods, um, you know, with with our tech boom.

And so from a GDP accounting perspective, it's actually not as much of a driver for GDP growth as people think. That being said, I mean to me it's almost besides the point for two reasons. Number one, if we're importing a lot, that means a lot of the growth is leaking abroad, which is in turn juicing financial market conditions in many parts of the world, probably keeping a lid on the dollar.

So there's a financial market effect here that I think is overlooked. Um, and then secondly, um that financial market effect has consequences for uh For GDP growth indirectly, because it juices consumer spending, right? So if you have relatively subdued wage growth,

uh and income growth, but consumer spending is holding up, that means that consumer spending is driven is likely being driven by things not necessarily like about income, probably equity wealth. So I think that channel I think is important when we think about um about the employment outlook. So let's stay on that for a second because, you know, you talked a little bit about, you know, the exposure to the non tech names trading like semis, but I wanna move to Jeff for a second.

Because you know, you've had what, the bubble cluster for semis now, the fourth since nineteen ninety five. I think you had a report out about that this week for clients. Yeah, so the semiconductor index of socks got there. Um that's the first time. It did get there in twenty twenty two, um then we had a thirty percent drawdown. Uh it got there in ninety-six and it got there in wait for it, two thousand, right? Hard to believe. Um and you know, this is a very simple metric. We developed it um

You know, some people call it the degraf danger zone. I'm not taking you know taking it that far, but um it's just a simple rule of thumb, which is if you have an index, you know, which is a diversified index, even if it's just semiconductors, there's a lot of companies within the index. If you double that in price or in value within a two year period of time, it's usually unsustainable. Now it can it can go higher, no doubt about it. In fact, in our note,

uh this week in the survival guide, you know, we um we laid out what bubbles are and what bubbles aren't, right? I mean I'll give you a couple of them. So, you know, what are um what bubbles are? They're they're uh extended price runs that are unsustainable. But They don't ring a bell at the top. You know, it's a yellow flag. Um, it's not necessarily a sell ticket. Um, it really is a signal for sizing as much as anything, not shorting for sure, because there's asymmetry to that.

Um, you know, you want to exit on the tape. You don't want to exit on valuation. In other words, you know say, Well, they're so expensive, I'm just gonna sell'em. That's not the right call. The right call is to actually wait for the deterioration and sell on the way down, not on the way up. Um, but the win is the de risking sequence. That's that's how you win in this game. It's de risking as you're going up, not calling the top, but having this pragmatic approach to it. And so

For us, the reason that we call the bubble or make the bubble call is because you have a very high probability of a V top, right? What does that mean? It means you go up and then you come straight down. You don't have that kind of typical distribution pattern that you get. um with normal uh with with normal top formation. So that's why it's important. Uh but it's as much as anything a mindset of how you have to think about how the markets are likely to behave.

um not a a oh my god this is a top signal. Uh it usually is at some point, but you want to do it on the way down, not on the way up. But it's just that behavior instead of kind of this slow methodical doming top process of distribution. you tend to create these Vs and these peaks and that's what becomes important.

But if everything uh you know is trading like semis, right, and you've got this high correlation, whether it's caterpillar or whatever, if I'm trimming my exposure in semis, what am I putting that money into? Well you wanna you generally wanna just kind of diversify and go to other parts of the market, right? Skim it off, skim it off. I think one of the interesting things is where we did see some momentum is actually, you know, we didn't get twenty day highs in the S P.

But we got twenty day highs in the Russell two thousand. So you actually had a um a stronger underlying internal condition in the small cap index than you did the large cap. So you know what I would look for are things that are just starting to break out.

I mean I'll I'll give you an example for me. Uh you know, we talked about Apple. This is not investment advice, um, but we talked about Apple breaking out, you know, kinda quietly. So you've got this breakout in Apple. Nobody really cares. They're just concerned about what's gonna happen to Micron.

Um and to me that's like, all right, let me find things that that have momentum but are just starting to emerge. They're not extended. They're still good charts, but they're not extended uh and they're not at risk, uh uh a high probability risk of some type of V.

Uh let's pivot to uh Iran. So the the funniest thing I heard uh this week was we've moved from the taco trade. So if folks don't know what that is, it's Trump always chickens out. Don't tell me it's a lawful trade. No close. It's the nacho trade. The nacho trade. You wanna hear the funniest thing I just saw? I have to mention I'm sorry, we'll get to Nacho in a second, Steve. This is the funniest thing. For everyone that doesn't have a Bloomberg terminal.

Victoria's Secret a clear winner of GLP ones, Wells Fargo says. Just wanna breaking news. I'll tell you who it's not working for is Lululemon, so they better get it. Yeah. The nacho trade, not a chance, hormose opens. Well, I think right now I would refer to Cena. We see now have a ceasefire in aim only, but you know, I think what the market is responding to is

Trump's sort of uh jaw boning here to suggest that there's a pathway towards peace. And I think everybody's sort of hanging on that at the moment. I think there's reasons to be skeptical. I think the resumption

of military activity we're recording this Friday morning, just last night, uh, is reason to sort of cast doubt on a durability of any deal that does emerge. But, you know, I think if you step back It's probably a good case to be made that it is in both sides' interests to reach some resolution here.

Again where the hope is. Uh to your point, whether it's hope or hype, I think remains to be seen. So to watch over the weekend. Again, recording this Friday morning helped to always do a timestamp. Uh so we're waiting for Iran's response. Are they gonna agree as you know Trump suggested? And if not, is he going to follow through now on his threat to return to kinetic uh activity, which is something that clearly he has a preference to avoid?

but as you sort of boxed himself in. And I think that's important because you look ahead to next week. If we do see a resumption in kinetic ac activity, that may Force him to cancel his trip to China to meet with Xi again. Um I don't think that's the base case right now, but that's definitely something to keep an eye on.

Does that put uh China I mean so what's the chess match with China there, right? Do they do they do something to maybe force that because that gives them the upper hand? How how are they thinking about it? Do you think do you think how do you think they're thinking about it? Well, I think China, like uh they usually do, is trying to maximize their interest, but I think as you're to step back and look at what is really in their interest here.

you know, I think it's important to remember that China does have an economic relationship with Iran. They believe they purchase about ninety percent of their oil. And so there's I think two sides to that. Um, you know, China exports a lot for their economy. And right now

It's very difficult to send those exports to the US. That's been part of the uh signal going back to Trump one is we're not gonna have you use your excess capacity and send it here. So now they've been sending it to the rest of the world. Some question whether or not the rest of the world is sort of

Transhipping it here. Uh but right now the rest of the world's probably hurting more than the US. Uh so it's really difficult for China to allow this sort of uh sustained blockage in the strait, in my opinion. So I think that's where they've been sort of probably telling Iran to sort of wrap it up and try to go ahead and move forward to a resolution here. That's my personal opinion. I don't have any insight as to whether or not that's actually how they view it.

But in terms of next week, there's an important leverage point here and I think that's respect to the sanctions. We've talked a lot about the warfare moving from the kinetic battlefield more recently to this test of economic endurance and you've seen the administration really ratchet up sanctions to pressure Iran.

and they've actually gone after one of the big purchasers of this Iranian oil, these teapot refineries in China. Uh but you had the Chinese government announce basically, don't comply with it.

Uh, don't comply with these sanctions and to do it publicly ahead of this meeting sort of forces Trump's hand. One of the differences between Trump two versus Trump one is Trump one was much more confrontational with China. Trump two seemed to have this desire to de escalate and sort of keep situation resolved, try to keep the economy humming along.

So if Trump decides to enforce the sanctions, he's going to have a much more difficult conversation with you when he gets over there next week. However, if he doesn't enforce a sanction, then you sort of signal to the world that hey, don't worry about this. And they sort of lose their deterrence effect.

So I'm not sure how he's gonna handle that. Uh but I think expectations for next week, looking ahead to to China in that meeting, assuming that it does occur, which I think is probably more likely than not.

is that we're probably gonna see an extension of this trade truce that was reached last year between Trump and G because that's supposed to expire at the end of November. And I think the signal there is to try to inject some sort of predictability, sustainability to try to maybe incentivize some of this investment that might be paralyzed right now, uh given some of the

How much is he thinking about doing things to just kinda take things off the boil going into the midterms? Or do you think he just he's just my agenda's my agenda and be damned the G O P and here we go?

Well, I think from Trump's perspective he's sort of a little unique. Remember when he began this process in twenty fifteen, you know, he was actually reporting against a GOP that was not doing him any favors. So maybe in that respect, you know, he's maybe a little less concerned about what's necessarily best for the party, greater emphasis on what's best for him and his legacy.

Which is why I think to this point he's probably had a longer leash, so to speak, with respect to his time horizon, going back to Steve's earlier sort of taco comment than I think many people anticipated he would. Uh I think if he is being honest with himself and just sort of the history of midterms.

uh sort of recognizing that the house is probably already gone. Uh so at this point sort of to take these measures two point Jeff like a futile effort and jeopardize your legacy goal of trying to be the pres first president in forty seven years to resolve the Iranian situation.

Uh my guess is he's probably coming down more on the the legacy side. Uh that said, you know, he doesn't want to see a complete wipeout and I think uh he is watching the the markets like everybody else and that's why you've seen the getting this jaw boning to to try to uh prevent sort of that economic uh damage there. Cause I think part of that's also in his leverage with Iran. You know, Iran sort of sees this economic and uh market

Declines is sort of a near interest there. So it's a long-winded way of saying it. It's a little bit of both, but I would bear more on the legacy as opposed to the near-term political. And you mentioned the the three B's this morning, but pull on that a little bit. So what are what are those signals that you were talking about?

Well when you talk about, you know, what can we look for next week beyond just this trade truce, you know, uh one of the things that China could purchase or I guess w three areas, sort of the three B's. They tend to buy beef, they tend to buy beans, the soy variety, and they tend to buy Boeing aircraft. So if you're looking at potential winners for the upside from some sort of agreement, uh those are three areas to watch.

Treasury Secretary Besson has suggested China uh or may ask them to buy more oil. I'm a little skeptical that they'll want to do that. I don't know that they want to rely on their biggest ge political It worked out great for Europe, why wouldn't they do it? Wow. Well, you uh Europe has its own issues with respect to its green energy transition and why they may be in the uh energy situation that they are. Uh but I think with the sequencing of the um purchases on the uh

the agriculture products is i interesting because China could help Trump politically. He could per they could go ahead if they decide to increase their purchase here to do it before the midterm to try to help the farmers uh in terms of trying to get his base out there. Or if they don't want to help them, they could wait to after and just sort of comply by the letter of the agreement and just do it in December. Uh so that's something to watch if assuming we do get an announcement.

Speaking of the midterms, uh Steve, we had a the Kelly ruling this week on uh voter redistricting. You don't think that's enough to get the Republicans to keep the house, right? Well I I I think it was last week if I'm not m m mistaken. I I don't uh in the sense, you know, there's been all these numbers around as to how many seats.

Republicans are projected to to gain from this. I mean, it really depends on that number. Are you already counting Texas and Florida? Because they already began the redistricting before Calais? Uh so I guess I'm probably closer to the number of maybe potentially five seats and there's also still the question of what would occur in twenty twenty six.

So before Calais I probably had Democrats uh probably gaining net gain of fifteen seats. They're about two fifteen now, so they put'em at two thirty. After I'm probably down closer to two twenty five. Uh if they are sort of around that number, that's important for uh presumably Speaker Jeffries because uh if he has a narrow majority, it's difficult to govern. Just ask Speaker Johnson what that's like. It's very easy to unify uh

very slim caucus majority behind what not to do. It's much harder to get them unified uh as to what to do. Uh so I think that's important. And then the other thing to remember too, if it's a small majority that gives Republicans hopes in twenty twenty eight, maybe more states could apply this Calais ruling to draw more seats. And the real opportunity is potentially twenty thirty. That's when you're gonna have the census.

uh go ahead and if we see these demographic trends that we've seen from a lot of voters leaving what traditionally are Democrat states with high state taxes, California, Illinois in particular, New York as well, migrating towards Southern Republican states with lower taxes, if that trend continues, you're probably gonna see Republicans benefit from that. Uh so that's something to keep in perspective too. But one

reason to caution it makes it hard to actually figure out what the exact number is going to be is if you're going to draw more seats, and that's true for both sides here, they are at the expense of previously safe districts. So you're making them by definition less safe. And so um you're trying to figure out what your offsets are gonna be. It's just very difficult to to assess what that is right now.

Uh Jeff, let's move on to uh the credit markets. Uh credit spreads on the public side have done a little bit better, narrowed a little bit, but there's that private credit situation, which I know you want to talk about. Well yeah, we're we did a report uh about a month ago. I think we released it three weeks ago and and you know, this is a

this is a rolling issue. It's not just uh one and done. But uh, you know, we laid out some very specific benchmarks on, you know, what to watch for as we go, including um some uh, you know, at least on the institutional side, some um, you know, individual names that really jumped out that we had to be careful with. So um, you know, look, uh this week we had Blue Owl OTF, which is the publicly traded uh um tech fund. Um net interest income covers about seventy five percent of their dividend.

You know, so one of the it was a eight out of ten risk for us a month ago. Uh obviously that's in in jeopardy of cutting that dividend here. Um so that would be, you know, one of the the keys is watching these dividend cuts, watching these default rates and th that's another thing that's been moving higher there. So I think that's important. Um we do have actually I think it's happening right now the Goldman Sachs um

Uh business development uh ETF is also or uh uh fund is actually reporting earnings right now. Um last night wasn't great. So we'll see. You know, the good news is a lot of things th these things are trading at steep discounts to NAV, but those NAVs are being impaired, right? So you're kind of chasing this down. The market's figured it out. It's giving you a

30% discount roughly on the uh on the OTF, but that's because they're you know expecting that you're gonna have NAV cuts. So this is playing itself out. We're actually doing a call um this next week on on this for clients. Um but this is kind of playing itself out as we were looking for and you know what we had three scenarios. Uh you know, path one was very optimistic, path three was, you know, kinda systemic and a problem.

uh path two is is now becoming the um the more likely scenario here. And that's kind of your traditional credit crunch, you know, happening in this side of the uh of the uh of the business. The important part, and you know Howard's been handling that side for us in terms of

uh how we think about it in in the in the banking system. This is not two thousand eight. This is not, you know, imperiling bank balance sheets right here. Um but there is some question about the sponsorship and the funding and and all that that's happening. So It's a continuing story, but it's not developing, you know, in a more uh optimistic way. It's actually leaning a little darker um and uh a little uh more probable to that that that path number two than than any of the others.

I know you mentioned that uh you know we have a a call on Wednesday for clients. You'll be joined with Howard Mason on that, a sort of update on the private credit uh webinar, we'll call it. Uh and you have a piece out I think tomorrow to clients too, sort of updating that piece that you did, as you said, three weeks ago. So Yeah, we're and we'll do that, you know, as we go. So we had a lot of reporting this uh this last week with some of these things and so you know we'll just keep

you know, keep assessing those probabilities. I mean, that's what this business is, right? It's just kind of a reassessment of probabilities as the information comes and uh it's leaning more towards that kind of middle path, which is um, you know, not just glossing things over, but probably just gonna have

Uh have some teeth to it. So you know, as I as I've mentioned kinda quippingly, um th this is a different animal than two thousand eight. One hundred percent it's a different animal than two thousand eight. That's not to say this animal doesn't have teeth, right? And that's that's how we're thinking about it.

Uh good stuff. All right, let's move to the um mailbag. Harry, good morning. Hi, hello, good morning everyone. We have a question today from Scott Rosenquist. His question is for Jeff, how would you describe the price action in parts of technology? Specifically semis and any storage related. Thank you. Well, I think we hit on that a little bit, right? So in the in the SOX index, um we got to a pretty unique situation where we doubled that in two years time.

And that also happened just, you know, as a uh as a reflection of that, and it's because of the waiting. It also has happened in Korea that's actually entering bubble territory. Uh Taiwan hadn't at the beginning of the week now I I've been out of the office the last two days. I haven't seen that flag, but it was very close. It was win th within about a thousand points on the index uh of of being in quote unquote bubble territory. That was the

First time for those since the eighties. So that wasn't even something that was really part of the uh of the nineteen ninety um uh uh bubble. So this is, you know, very unique there. But it's it's a reflection that you're getting this kind of price action that's that's just unsustainable. And and look, I get it. In fact we're we've got um we're working on a report now to kind of compare what was going on in two thousand uh and the um

uh in the early nineties some of the headlines. And I can I can assure you that the headlines at the top are not like, oh my God, you know, Intel just lost orders or whatever the case may be. uh th that happens well after the peak in uh in these prices. So um, you know, as as I mentioned before, it's about the signal, it's not about short I'm sorry, uh the signal is not about shorting, it's about sizing.

Uh and I think that's the right the right way to think about it. It's not about valuation. Uh it's about the tape. You wanna keep uh watching the tape and let the tape kinda dictate your decision. And the real the real win here is about the de risking sequence. uh not calling the top. So it is a unique situation. We haven't seen this um in a long, long time. Uh we had some some uh some hints of it back in twenty two.

Um, but uh remember that was when the Fed was, you know, kind of starting to hike rates. And so you were uh you were you're taking that uh negative real rate environment that we had around COVID uh and you're kinda normalizing that and that took some risk out of the out of the equation. This one seems a little different to that. So um you know just keep your wits about you. I think it's important. But uh certainly we're in that environment.

Uh I love the fact that uh Scott in his uh submission says I prefer golf polls Yeah. Scott manifesting. Well done, Scott. We'll get you those golf balls, run back golf balls for you. Well, there you go. Maybe I will by note. Uh Neil, uh what are you watching this week?

Um, well, I mean we have a huge uh data calendar uh on deck um for next week. I mean we have the CPI inflation number. Um Uh we're obviously going to continue to see some upward pressure uh on headline inflation from uh higher gasoline prices. Um we also might see a little bit of upward pressure on core inflation because Of rental inflation. Remember, six months ago, um, this is an April data point. Six months ago, we were in the throes of a government shutdown. The BLS made some

um weird assumptions around uh housing rents uh at the time. Um and given the kind of way the sample worked. Uh that unwinds and will probably result in a uh uptick in uh in core inflation as a result. Um but I think the big one is gonna be retail sales for April. Um now.

Eve, when you look at the jobs number, uh you do see some upward momentum in areas that are, you know, sensitive to uh consumer spending, like uh messenger uh cu courier and messaging services, retail trade. Um We're kind of um seeing uh the tax refund boost, bump up against now the uh gas price headwind.

Right. So we're not gonna get any more of the tax refund boost. We are gonna continue to see the headwinds. So that's one of the uh the tensions I think going forward, and we'll see whether or not retail sales, um, you know, what it does next week. Um remember retail sales are a nominal data point. So uh you know I would Curb your enthusiasm, whatever the number is, when it comes out, because it's probably just a price effect. Uh, you have to kind of look through the details and sort of

Match up the individual components to see what's actually going on in real terms. And I don't think in real terms consumer spending is any great shakes. That's it. Steve? Steve. Uh no, so we already talked about abroad in terms of Iran and China closer to home, Congress comes back. So one thing to watch uh Monday, the Senate's supposed to have a procedural vote for Kevin Walsh.

expectation that they'll have a Tuesday confirmation vote for'em. That's ahead of Friday when Jerome Bow's term as chair expires. Still don't have a clear answer as to how long he plans to remain as a board of governors beyond that. The thing to watch next week is the Senate Banking Committee is going to proceed with a vote, because they're saying they are, with respect to uh this crypto digital market access bill.

uh the the regulatory s bill. And I think that's important because the banking committee uh so or sorry, the banking industry right now opposes a stable coin uh s yield issue. And so I think that's something that's a little more favorite right now to the crypto industry. Can the banking uh industry sort of uh energize opposition to that? If the bill gets delayed, I don't think that's a good sign.

And remember, if the bill doesn't pass this year, I don't think it's going to move next year because it you're likely going to have a Democratic House and or Senate. So I think that's sort of the thing I'm keeping an eye on this week. Uh, you mentioned Powell. Apparently what, Tim Scott weighed in on this, right? And said he should be off the board of governors?

Yeah, I mean a lot of people have said he should resign or or leave when his term uh as as chair ends. Um, you know, it's up to him as to whether or not he chooses to to do that. Again we talk about the two past If he's looking for the resolution path, I think that's a little sooner. If he just wants the Fed IG to say there's no there there and have some agreement with the Trump administration, then I think his path to leaves a little sooner.

If it is more the relevance revenge path, then I think that's a little longer. We're still waiting to see the Supreme Court decision on whether Trump can fire Lisa Cook. uh as a governor, uh if so, um that will influence Powell's decision, presumably whether or not to stay. I know he's saying it won't, but you know, I don't believe him. And uh the other thing to watch too is the midterm election.

Because if again, there's more desire for revenge if you have a Democratic Senate, that would be an opportune time for Powell to leave, because I don't see them confirming uh his replacement. Jeff, what are you watching? Well y you know, I think one of the things that's important is what you're watching is that this is actually not one of those bullshit sets that's like not real. Like look I catch the book, right? This it doesn't it look like a very well curated uh

Backdrop. I'm in at this hotel and it's like got this beautiful swanky We know it's not your actual house because you don't read, so That's not true. He reads too much. picture of that back you should take a picture of that background and have that as your virtual background. Keep it as my virtual. It's a ten out of ten. If you if Room Raider would give you a ten out of ten.

Right. No doubt. Uh a couple of things. One, you know, Neil mentioned CPI, that's gonna be important, but I think one of the things that's important there too is that we're now year over year in terms of the tariff effect, right? So we get to see kind of what that impact is.

China also releases its CPI on Monday, so that's important. We get stockpiles, crude stockpiles of the EIA um on Wednesday. So we'll look at those changes just to get some sense as to what's going on in the in the oil market or the energy market. Um it is option expiration on Friday, so uh we need to keep an eye on that, which we are always attuned to um in uh you know, in terms of uh unnecessary volatility. This isn't a big one, but

certainly we'll be watching it. And then you've got Cisco and AMAT reporting. Um so those will be two I wouldn't say juggernauts, but certainly um two um uh relevant names in you know what we're seeing from the uh you know kind of uh boom here uh in semi and uh communication equipment. And, you know, I'll be watching the Knicks game tonight. Neil, you gonna wear that sweatshirt? Um I haven't stopped, so maybe it's bringing them some good luck. Yeah, go mix.

Go next indeed. That and uh the NCAA men's and women's lacrosse championships getting uh kicked off today and the weekend. So lots of good TV if you want to watch. Um that's it. We'll make it a wrap. We'll be back next week. Uh and until then, I'm Steve Duttenhoffer. I'm Jeff DeGraf. And I'm Steve Papp.

Thanks everybody. Have a great week. Hey, it's Steve. Thanks for listening to the show. Small slice of what we do here at Renmac. So if you liked it and aren't already a client, go to renmac.com and request a free trial. You get access to all the political, all the macro, all the technical, and all the economic work we do here, plus screens, alert lists.

And all the research behind the wall. Work at a financial institution or just an individual, we have the edge you need. So join us here at Renmac. We'd love to have you part of the team. And don't forget to follow us on X, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Thanks for listening to the show.