DC Lite #745

1. Challenger job cuts. More than half of October’s 153k cuts were concentrated in two industries (Tech and Warehousing). ‘Cost-cutting’ and 'Artificial Intelligence' were the primary reasons cited for job cuts, accounting for 33% and 20% of announcements, respectively.

2. Bullish sentiment. 76% of Evercore ISI clients expect the S&P 500's next 10% move will be to the upside, the highest share since at least 2018.

3. AAII Asset Allocation. This cohort's allocation to stocks increased last month to the highest since Jul'24 while their cash allocation dropped to the lowest in 4 years.

4. BTFD. "No surprise ETF investors bought the crap out of the dip (for ants)- the 1D, 1W Top 10 leaderboard is basically a US equity sweep. Note the weekly at +$47b, that's almost $10/day, same with monthly about $8b/day. Unreal. You guys are (wealthy) animals!"

5. Leveraged vs. unleveraged bubbles. "We think that compared with the bubbles of the past, AI looks closer to the benign unleveraged variety ... That said ... With capex funding starting to become more leveraged and increasingly moving 'off balance sheet' ... the systemic fallout from AI could look very different in, say, three or four years’ time."

ICYMI