The Luck of the Fed ☘️

Tale of the Tape

Good evening, y’all, and happy St. Patrick’s Day!! But today, rather than the luck of the Irish, it was the luck of the Fed. ☘️

Fed Chair Jerome Powell took the mic and stocks flipped then ripped to close just off intraday highs. Hear more on tonight’s episode of After Hours. 🌌 🙌

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dashed through 33,000 for the first time ever, and the S&P 500 closed at a new all-time high. $SPX is only 26 points from 4K— will it fly through the figure before the end of the week??

The Nasdaq-100 ETF $QQQ fought back and finished up 0.4%.

Even the cryptos crept higher. ⬆️ Bitcoin bounced 2% while Ethereum inched ahead 1.5%.

Lennar lept 14% following last night’s earnings report. The home builder beat estimates and raised guidance. Read the press release here.

Here’s the monstrous monthly chart:

Facebook was the best of the FAANG gang. $FB flew 1.69%, followed closely by $AMZN +1.42%.

General Motors cruised 5% and closed above $60 for the first time ever. 🚗 💨

Caterpillar and Deere both bounced to new all-time highs. $CAT crawled 3%, $DE dashed 1.5%.

GoPro gained 3% to maintain its exhilarating 7-day streak. 🔥 🔥 The stock is up 68% since March 8th, and its daily message volume on Stocktwits is up more than 100%.

Alsooo… the IRS might delay Tax Day! The deadline could be moved from April 15 to May 17. Here’s the Wall Street Journal with more info.

And here are the closing prints:

S&P 500	3,974	+0.29%
Nasdaq	13,525	+0.40%
Russell 2000	2,336	+0.73%
Dow Jones	33,015	+0.58%

Powell Presents Policies

Today was the second (and final) day of The Federal Reserve Board and Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meetings.

During today’s festivities, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell gave a highly-anticipated speech about upcoming policies.

Here are some highlights from the day:

The Fed expects current rises in inflation to be short-lived
Fed officials project a continuation of near-zero rates until late 2023
GDP is expanding at rate of 6.5%, compared to the previously-seen 4.2%

If those were today’s highlights, then Jerome Powell is the real MVP. Here are two Powell Powerisms™ (we just made this up, but we think it’ll stick):

At the Fed, we will continue to provide the economy the support that it needs for as long as it takes.

And:

Our forward guidance for the federal funds rate, along with our balance sheet guidance will ensure that the stance of monetary policy remains highly accommodative as the recovery progresses.

If you’re interested, read the entire transcript here.

Here’s a 5-minute chart of the S&P 500:

We bet you can’t tell when Powell started speaking… 😅

Coinbase’s Valuation Makes a Lot of Cents

In a revised S-1 filing released today, Coinbase shared that its private shares currently trade at $343.58. That puts the cryptocurrency exchange at a staggering $68B valuation, a 750% increase from its October 2018 valuation. 😮

However, Nasdaq will only use that private valuation as a source of information for a reference price, not as an absolute. Matthew Kennedy, Senior IPO Market Strategist at Renaissance Capital, noted:

Those secondary market shares sales help give a ballpark of where they may be valued in the public market, but we put less weight on them than say, if the company had raised money from new investors at that level.

Coinbase reported $322M in profit last year from revenue that has more than doubled since 2019, totaling $1.1B.

Will you join in on $COIN? What are you base-ing that decision on?? 😉 Place your bets…

Morgan Stanley’s Crypto Funds

Morgan Stanley just announced a fun new perk for its wealthiest clients— access to one of three Bitcoin funds. 💰 🔥

The funds, two of which are run by Galaxy Digital and the other by FS Investments/NYDIG, will be offered to clients with “aggressive risk tolerance.”

In 2017, Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman was one of the first Wall Street leaders to validate Bitcoin, claiming it was “more than just a fad.” Now, the bank will be the first of the big 6 to offer its best customers access to the digital currency.

Here’s Bloomberg with more info.

Disneyland’s OPEN!

Dreams really DO come true at Disney. 🏰 ✨

The reopening of Disneyland has officially BEGUN!! The company’s parks have limited capacity, and face coverings are required. But here’s a schedule of upcoming reopenings:

Guests will have to make a park reservation prior to attending and currently, only California residents can enter Disneyland in accordance with state regulations. Read more about the park’s safety guidelines here.

Earnings Round-Up

Williams-Sonoma reported earning after the close. 👨‍🍳 The world’s largest digital-first, design-led and sustainable home retailer beat earnings estimates and grew revenue 25% YoY. Woohoo!

Here are the numbers:

EPS: $3.95 vs $3.30 est.
Revenue: $2.29B, +24.5% YoY

The company also increased its dividend by 11%, and announced a $1B buyback.

Laura Alber, President and Chief Executive Officer, shared:

Our decisions to increase our quarterly dividend, to approve a new $1 billion share buyback authorization and to eliminate all outstanding funded debt reflect our confidence in the long-term outlook of our company, and our commitment to maximizing returns for our shareholders.

$WSM is trading above $150 after hours. Check out the daily chart: