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Monday's Market Open
Oil Rips. Warsh Wants A Hike. MSAGA?
By VHLA ·
Dear Winner,
August finished green, fifth straight monthly gain for the Dow, S&P up 2.6%, Nasdaq up 3.9%, nice… market still shit the bed today after 2 IRGC launchers on Larak Island got sent to the big Strait in the Sky.
Naturally oil fucking ripped on it with Brent >$90, WTI >$85, and me thanking god for stop losses.
As for gas, >$4/ gallon every day in August… most expensive August at the pump on record, midterms are coming soon and Iran knows it.
Worse timing you couldn't script: Warsh spent Friday at Jackson Hole telling the world inflation isn't slowing and financial conditions aren't restrictive.
Translation: its looking like the 70’s are back in style…
Let's get into it.
Author Dox
THE TAPE
Where We're At
As of Monday, Aug 31 • 9:45 PM ET • Close
| INDICIES | LAST | CHG | DAY |
|---|---|---|---|
| S&P 500 | 7,686.14 | -25.45 | -0.33% |
| Nasdaq | 26,370.89 | -31.68 | -0.12% |
| Dow | 53,185.90 | -374.09 | -0.70% |
| TSX | 36,246.93 | -306.99 | -0.84% |
| US TREASURYS | YIELD | CHG | BPS |
| 10Y | 4.75% | +3 bp | +3 |
| 30Y | 5.25% | +5 bp | +5 |
| CRUDE | LAST | CHG | DAY |
| WTI | $85.76 | +$2.36 | +2.83% |
| Brent | $90.49 | +$2.39 | +2.71% |
| METALS | LAST | CHG | DAY |
| Gold | $4,433.56 | -$19.44 | -0.44% |
| Silver | $66.30 | +$0.15 | +0.22% |
| Copper (COMEX) | $6.59 | +$0.03 | +0.49% |
| CROSS-ASSET | LAST | CHG | DAY |
| Bitcoin | $78,516 | +$835 | +1.08% |
| DXY | 99.44 | -0.27 | -0.66% |
Green = up, red = down. US and Iran traded strikes for the first time in a month, a tanker hit mines in Hormuz, oil ripped and the 10Y closed at its highest since January 2025. All three US indices still locked in a green August. BoC decision Wednesday, US jobs report Friday.
News
The Recap
USA - Dow dropped 374 points (-0.7%) to 53,186, S&P slid 0.33% to 7,686, Nasdaq gave back 0.12% to 26,371. Ten of eleven sectors red. Chevron +2.8% was the only real place to hide, Alphabet -2.5% and Amazon -1.7% did the damage.
Middle East - CENTCOM confirmed US forces struck two Iranian rocket launchers on Larak Island, the first acknowledged strike inside Iran since late July. The launchers were reportedly loading mines for Hormuz. Roughly 6–8 million barrels a day still crawl through the Strait against 22–24 million pre-war.
Fed - Warsh went full hawk at Jackson Hole: inflation isn't easing, 2% is still the target, conditions aren't tight. Sept hike odds ~57%. 2-year at 4.34%, 10-year at 4.76% — highest since January 2025.
Venezuela - Trump announced "THE BIGGEST OIL DEAL IN WORLD HISTORY," claiming majority US control of 65 billion barrels of proven Venezuelan reserves at no cost to the taxpayer, with the crude earmarked for the SPR. Details are thin. Hold the applause until somebody publishes a contract.
Canada - TSX fell 328 points to 36,226, a one-week low, still on track for a fifth straight monthly gain with materials up over 25% on the month. Shopify -4.2% to $203.61. Loonie firmed to 72.16 cents. Bank of Canada decides Wednesday and is widely expected to sit at 2.25%.
AI - Nvidia took a $3.5B stake in MediaTek and the stock didn't flinch. Same day, FSB chair Andrew Bailey warned the G20 that frontier AI models, equity-market leverage and AI valuations are a financial stability risk. Noted, Andrew.
Vol - VIX closed Friday at 14.13, its 2026 low, heading into the heaviest data week of the quarter. September is also historically the worst month of the year for stocks. Do with that what you will.
News
THE WEEK AHEAD
Tuesday:
ISM Manufacturing and July JOLTS, both 10:00 AM ET
$NIO, $MDT and $SSL before the bell
$PANW and $DELL after the close
Wednesday:
ADP payrolls 8:15 AM ET, factory orders 10:00, Fed Beige Book
Bank of Canada rate decision, consensus a hold at 2.25%
$BF before the bell
$AVGO after the close, Street around $29.4B revenue — the AI read of the week. $SNOW, $HPE, $NTAP, $FIVE and $PVH alongside
Thursday:
Jobless claims and Challenger layoffs 8:30 AM ET, ISM Services 10:00
$CIEN, $VSCO and $CPB before the bell
$LULU, $DOCU, $ZS, $PATH and $ASAN after
Friday:
August jobs, 8:30 AM ET. Consensus is roughly 53k, after July came in at negative 23,000 and revisions stripped another 103,000 out of May and June
Opinion
Bitcoin’s Bullish on Bessent
Not Appealing to Me
Friday's headline Jobs print matters less than one question: whether 53,000 turns out to be the optimistic case.
Look at the box the Fed is standing in. July payrolls were negative. Revisions pulled 103k more jobs out of the two months before it. Labor market’s already stopped hiring….
Warsh spent his Jackson Hole slot telling you inflation is sticky and money isn't tight enough. Now the market’s handicapping a September hike at odds better than a coin flip.
For those betting dovish, hate to break the news but $4 gas for a month doesn’t look good for CPI and the consumer at large.
Where I sit: watching the 10-year, not the S&P. 4.76% is a nineteen-month high and it got there on oil, not growth. If Friday comes in soft and yields keep climbing anyway, that's the combination that actually hurts - the bid for duration walks out the door at the exact moment the economy needs it.
Set two alerts. 4.80% on the 10-year, and the unemployment rate line at 8:30 Friday.
Stocks down while yields rise is an ugly tape. Stocks down while yields rise on a jobs miss is a whole different animal.
Thank You
That’s all Folks
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Cheers,
