00:00:00 Speaker A
Stocks ripping higher to close out the week after Fed chair Jerome Powell open the door to a September rate cut at Jackson Hole. Powell saying, quote, the baseline outlook and the shifting balance of risks may warrant adjusting our policy stance. That fueled bets that the Fed could ease as soon as next month. Markets took that as a green light for risk. Meme darling, Open Door that jumped more than 30%, Ethereum spiked 13% outpacing a 4% gain in Bitcoin. And the enthusiasm spilled into some of those crypto linked names as well. Coinbase gained around 7%, Robin Hood up 4%, strategy up 6%. And this marks a sharp rebound after a pretty rough stretch for some of those high volatility plays. City strategist Scott Croner called the market reaction, quote, very positive, highlighting that a striking surge in small caps along with the equal weighted S&P 500 leading the headline index, it's really all incongruent a sign that the rally may be broadening beyond just Big Tech. Still Croner caution that there was some junkiness as unprofitable growth names also surge, but just really an overall risk on rally here amid Powell's dovish tilt. The question, of course now is whether this proves durable. Here's some of the reaction that we heard today following that speech.
00:02:16 Speaker B
I think he laid out the options in front of us by and not commit to anything. This is important. I know the markets think that he's committed, but I think at this point, there's a lot of uncertainty. I know that word's being used a lot, but the signals are mixed.
00:03:02 Speaker C
What Powell was trying to do today was to open the door to a rate cut in September. And what that does is that gives him a little bit insulation because if we get a really bad jobs report next month in early September, he can say, look, I opened the door to a move. Don't worry, we're on it. It's coming.
00:03:53 Speaker D
In a way, maybe he's auditioning for the role of Fed chair. You know, if you look at the text of the speech, he actually completely removed the phrase that has characterized his entire term as Fed share of data dependent. Uh that wasn't in the speech and he's talking more about the balance of risks, looking ahead, and it was actually kind of refreshing to hear that.
00:04:45 Speaker A
Now, there is going to be a fair amount of data that will be released prior to this September decision. As you just heard, there's still some uncertainty related to the inflation side of the Fed's dual mandate. So we'll have to wait and see, but right now, market's clearly interpreting this as a rate cut in September, Josh.
00:05:19 Josh
All right, Alex. Now, thank you.
