April 16th Pre-Market

Good Morning

S&P cleared 7,000 for the first time yesterday and the Nasdaq crossed 24,000. Nice round numbers, and truce talks with Iran keep moving in the right direction. TSM just dropped strong earnings, raised guidance, and the stock is still flat. Feels like this rally is running on fumes up here, but I'd rather lean with the flow than fight it.

Let's dig in…

Today's Big Picture

1. Two-Week Extension In Play 

Washington and Tehran are weighing a two-week extension to the April 22 ceasefire, with a Pakistani mediator now in Tehran. The Pentagon is quietly sending thousands more troops to the region in case talks collapse, and an Iranian official said "big splits remain" on the nuclear file this morning. The S&P has fully round-tripped the war. Brent is still $96 and gold is still $4,825. Stocks believe the deal gets done. The commodities tape does not.

2. New Data Just Killed The Rate Cut Story
Jobless claims came in at 207K, well under the 215K expected. Philly Fed manufacturing jumped to 26.7 versus 12 expected, and the prices paid component inside it hit 59.3.

Translation: the job market is still solid and companies are paying more for inputs again. That combination gives the Fed zero reason to cut, and the market is still priced like cuts are coming. Something has to give.

3. TSMC Beat, Raised, And Faded
 
Full-year revenue growth guidance lifted above 30, Q2 revenue guide of $39 to $40.2 billion came in ahead of the $38.1 billion estimate, and capex is going to the high end of the $56 billion range. CEO Wei called AI demand "extremely robust" and said agentic AI is driving another step-up in compute consumption. Nvidia next month gets a lot more interesting.

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Stock Spotlight (pre-market)

PepsiCo $PEP ( ▼ 0.56% )  
Beat on both lines with adjusted EPS of $1.61 on $19.44 billion in revenue, ahead of $1.55 and $18.94 billion. Staples managers have been underweight the group for months and a clean print forces them to close the gap. Watch Coca-Cola $KO next week to confirm the rotation.

Charles Schwab $SCHW ( ▲ 1.92% )  
Profit up 30 year-over-year, trading revenue up 20, and a record 9.9 million daily trades in February. Regulators just scrapped the $25k pattern-day-trader rule, which structurally expands the active retail base.

Voyager Technologies $VOYG ( ▼ 0.76% )  
Moving premarket after NASA picked them for the seventh private astronaut mission to the ISS. Launch is 2028 so there's no near-term revenue, but the government validation puts them in every space-tech screen today.

PPG Industries $PPG ( ▼ 2.55% )  
Announced a global price hike of up to 20 across its portfolio, citing raw material and energy costs. The real signal isn't PPG. It's that Sherwin-Williams $SHW and RPM International $RPM now have cover to follow.

Allbirds $BIRD ( ▲ 582.33% )  
Fading hard after a near seven-fold move yesterday on an AI pivot announcement. Pure retail squeeze and fade. If you're trading it, you already know the rules.

General Motors $GM ( ▼ 2.11% )  
Ford $F, Oshkosh $OSK, GE Aerospace $GE
All approached by the Pentagon about ramping weapons production. Hegseth wants manufacturing on a "wartime footing" and the $1.5 trillion defense budget request gives this real teeth. Non-traditional defense contractors are about to get repriced.

What to Watch

Musk's Terafab Hits The Equipment Names 
Musk's team contacted Tokyo Electron, Applied Materials $AMAT, and Lam Research $LRCX for custom chips. Tokyo Electron is already moving in Japan.

The Powell Exit Playbook 
Trump threatened to fire Powell from his Board seat after the May 15 Chair term ends. Warsh hearings next week. A dovish replacement gets priced in, the 2-year yield drops, regional banks catch a bid.

Lebanon Ceasefire (The Sleeper)
Israel's cabinet met yesterday on a Hezbollah ceasefire. Trump said the leaders speak today. Oil lower, then dollar lower, then EM gets bid.

- John

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