Edit 2: My post seems to have gotten reported because I apparently i am looking for “ $$ gain”. I am NOT looking for a $$ daddy and anyone who thinks that from this post - I don’t even know what to say. This is not the type of post a $$ baby makes. And I don’t even mention anything involving payment/wanting someone to give me money????
If this is still up then I haven’t found the person for me. And if you messaged me but I never got back to you, there is no harm in trying again!
I thought I would post here and see what is out there again?
Random thoughts: I’m seeking someone who craves, needs, adores, and wants a total power exchange dynamic. Someone who has fulfillment in controlling their partner both inside and outside the bedroom. You are my dominant daddy. You are the first person I go to for advice, wisdom, and just to talk. You don’t mind neediness and clinginess. You are silly and goofy; don’t take all of life too seriously.
I find someone career oriented very attractive. Not ever looking to have kids (but doesn’t hate them either lol). And you love music, food, adventures, and lots of physical touch.
I’m seeking my dominant daddy. I’m naturally submissive with a partner. It’s not an act. It’s not a roleplay. It’s just how I am. I enjoy and need rules, guidance, control, love, affection, and occasional pain. Someone to psychologically dominant me. Someone who craves to be my Daddy. Ideally someone at least 5+ inches because I am addicted to penetration.
Some kinky things I’m into include choking, face fucking, gags, sleep play, CNC, cum play, cuffs, gags, ropes and ties, and much more.
In regards to hard limits, anything considered ‘extreme’ like blood, knives, diapers, scat, vomit, etc etc, I will not participate in.
Location: am from and reside in Toronto, ON. Of course I would love if someone was right here in Toronto as well! But you may be reading this and may be somewhere else. I am open to anyone in Canada. I am happy with a long distance relationship! I am also open to anyone in the U.S in the East Coast (ideally NY/MA/NH/Maine/Pennsylvania/Michigan/Vermont/Connecticut) as these are all easy to travel back and forth to (but let’s talk long term in chat)
A description of myself: I’m 5’9, brown almond eyes that just look black, bbw/plus size, chubby cheeks, tan/olive undertones(?)/honey/bronze skin, 38B breast, full pink lips, nice straight teeth, currently blue glasses, one dimple, and medium/long brown&black wavy curly hair, and….I think that’s all!?
You: please be taller than 5’10, please be 26+, career oriented, loves animals and cats, wants to be a vampire with me under the covers away from the sun, is outgoing, adventurous, talkative, open minded. I cannot father - If you are not somewhat outgoing/extroverted, there is no point in messaging me. I am incredibly introverted and shy and need someone extroverted to guide me and be my person. And lastly, yes, I am plus size, but I’m actively fixing my health and I do love everything with being healthy and whole, so I am looking for someone who is a healthy/into fitness and healthy lifestyle.
Ending: So I I know my post doesn’t exactly contain a lot, I guess…a lot to go off of? So if you are interested, no harm in messaging to see if we are compatible and if you are the one for me.
and I have posted in the past on another account if my post/body description sounds familiar.

I’ve had some decision paralysis about where to move. I (single 36m) currently live in Seattle and I feel it’s time to move on. I’ve tried the social scene in Seattle for 10 years and while I made friends, it just doesn’t feel like home and I’ve been aching for a change. I’d like to move someplace where meeting people/ dating is easier and less outdoor focused.
My new job is fully remote, but requires a lot of travel and so I need to be near a major airport with direct flights. I also have family in NJ/NY metro so would prefer a shorter flight to east coast (so likely no west coast options). I’d like to also live in a townhouse or actual house with actual space(even a small outdoor space works), I’ve always lived in apartments. I also want a safer place to live, Seattle has gotten rough since I came here especially with property crime.
I’ve been leaning towards Frisco/Plano and have been leaning there given proximity to DFW and cost of living is good, plus affordable newly built houses. I’m a bit worried about the dating scene there, especially for mid 30s (but I think that will be a struggle anywhere). I also looked at Denver and MSP but I wonder if they are too “close” to Seattle? Chicago also looked nice, but the safety seems iffy and don’t think I can get a house in city. Any other places I should be considering that could fit?

Received 3 separate emails from gopuff saying “We’ve got your order!” With a time stamp and order number and being delivered to California(I’m on the east coast). I’ve never created a gopuff account or downloaded the app. Checked all my bank and card accounts to make sure no charges were made but still concerned someone used my email to create an account. What can I do to resolve this? Can’t find an easy way to connect to support.

Hi all, I have a UK bank account with Santander and although I’m back in NY the UK account is still active because I was supposed to go back to sort it but got I’ll. No issue, decided instead to use the account to do a wire transfer for a large purchase here. Despite verifying it with their text my account was locked and I had to speak to the bank. Again, no issue except for time difference and long distance calling. My issue is that I got through to securities and the man demanded to know what the money was being used for specifically. It is a bit embarrassing and private(nothing illegal or anything, just… personal). I told him I wasn’t comfortable going into personal information like that but I’m happy to confirm the amount, the company, the address and account in addition to my own. He refused saying that he felt it was too high of an amount to justify my explanation and he’s going to hold up the payment until he’s satisfied as to what it entails. To be clear, this isn’t a loan, it’s my funds. What amount of information can a bank reasonably request in these situations? I understand there’s nothing like HIPPA in banking but do I not have some right to privacy in what I spend my money on? If I wanted to drop 5k on candles the bank can’t tell me I can’t, so what aspect can the demand here?

Fourth and final part at the same time tomorrow.
Series Page - Read 10 weeks ahead on Patreon - Read the story so far on Royal Road
*
Chapter Twelve - The Blacksmith's Boy (Part Three)
Clouds. Black, moving, twisting like rope. His head ached. His blood was hot as flame. Fire flashed in the clouds, and the old stormtower gleamed. The Old Man stared back at him from the gloom, eyes carving at his skin. You could have warned me. He taunted him. Smoke bled around his shoulders, and his skin melted away. Cal tried to look away, but it was too late. The fire was on him, and the sky filled his eyes with black water, smothering his breath.
*
He gasped, pain searing down his spine, and choked on his own breath, spluttering.
‘Get him up.’
‘I’ve got him.’
Lokk’s voice. Cal felt a hand curling underneath one of his arms, lifting his aching jaw off the floorboards. Pain shot down his back again, and he cried out, eyes spinning. Then there was another hand beneath him, and he was lifted groaning away from the floor. They lowered him carefully into a chair, and he fell against it, skin stinging, panting through gritted teeth.
‘What happened to him?’
‘Had a wolf at ‘im, by the looks of it!’
‘Don’t be a fool! No wolves in these woods.’
‘Believe in magic, but not in wolves?’
Cal groaned again.
‘Shut it, all of you!’
Cal blinked again, and the Innkeep’s rosy cheeks coalesced into the air before his eyes, looking down at him worriedly. Lokk was at his shoulder, wide-eyed, his mop of lank hair hanging loosely over his forehead. Someone had put the door to, and it was suddenly very quiet. Cal took a breath.
‘What happened, boy?’ The Innkeep asked him. Beyond his shoul-ders, Cal could see the faces of a half-dozen patrons, blinking back at him with wide eyes. All except Old Godry, who looked mildly irritated. Outside, the storm wailed helplessly against the thatching, and thunder rumbled against the hills, more distant, now. Cal held his breath, craning his ears. But the footsteps were gone. He swallowed.
‘There were…’ He hesitated, glancing towards the door. ‘I… fell.’
‘Down half the Teeth by the looks of it!’ Lokk pointed at his arms. ‘What were you doing out in this?’
Cal blinked, looking down. His arms were crisscrossed with dozens of bloody cuts, and his shirt was hanging off him in strings. He frowned, shrugging, and then winced as fire raced over his skin, and fell back against the chair, gasping.
‘Thought… Thought I had time to get back.’
‘Damned fool.’ Carel told him, appearing beside her father. She had a pail of steaming water under one arm, and a bundle of rags in the oth-er. ‘Got to clean those before they rot.’
‘I’m fi-’
‘That’s enough talking.’ The Innkeep told him. ‘Or I’ll want coin for the cloth.’
Cal thought better of arguing.
‘Saw a fair few mugs go over.’ The Innkeep turned towards the rest of the room, smiling reassuringly. ‘I’ll fetch a new barrel. This one’s on the house.’
A few grumbles of approval from the assembled regulars. They were all watching him. He could feel their eyes on him, prying, poking. Sen-sible boys know better than to go wandering in a storm. They’d always thought the Blacksmith’s stray was cracked. Same as his master. Godry seemed to have let his irritation go at the promise of free ale, but Cal spotted the butcher’s brute of a son, Petr, sneering back at him over the rim of his mug. He lowered his eyes. They thought him mad. Maybe they were right. Behind his eyes, the shadows were still chasing him through endless trees, clawing at his heels. But the door stayed closed, and there was no sound beyond it but the storm. Maybe he was losing his mind.
‘Quite the show, that was.’ Lokk grinned as his father went off to find the barrel. Carel rolled her eyes, pulling up another chair and set-ting about dampening the cloth. ‘Barely seen you in weeks, then you show up all bloody an’ panting like a wolf that’s got in with the chick-ens? You always knew how to make an entrance.’
Cal grunted. He didn’t feel like explaining himself. Wasn’t sure he could, even if he did.
‘Scared off the new folk, too.’ Lokk nodded towards an empty table in the far corner of the room, scattered with discarded mugs.
Cal blinked. ‘What?’
‘Had some of Solen’s new hands in tonight.’ Lokk told him offhand-edly, scratching his chin. ‘Quiet lot. Must have given them quite the fright. Saw themselves out sharpish.’
‘What did… hnngg.’ Cal clamped his teeth together with a groan as Carel pressed one of the rags against his bloody forearm.
‘Stay still.’ She told him, wiping the cloth slowly across his skin. It felt like someone was stripping his flesh with a wood plane. Cal clenched his jaw, forcing himself not to yelp. Lokk lounged idly against the bar beside him, sweeping his loose hair back from his forehead un-tidily.
‘Interrupted Godry, too.’ His friend went on, clearly unperturbed by his suffering. ‘Old goat hates being interrupted.’
Cal grunted again. The little clump of patrons seemed to have lost interest in him, now, turning back to their mugs as the Innkeep moved deftly through the tables, a little cask under his arm. Petr and his father were sitting glowering at no one in particular. Forley and his young wife Priss looked taken aback, and not the least bit shaken, by the un-expected turn of events the evening had taken, but the dour-faced min-ers beside them (whose names Cal did not know) seemed to have paid Cal’s entrance no heed at all. Old Godry was sitting patiently, firelight knotting over his scarred cheeks, waiting for his cue. Soon their mugs were full again, and the foolishness of the Blacksmith’s stray was quite forgotten. The Innkeep set the empty cask down somewhere behind the bar, and went off to find another barrel. Cal gritted his teeth as Carel went on with her work, eyes watering, and watched the villagers blur indifferently by the fire.
‘You weren’t finished, Godry.’ Albin, the butcher began, taking a long swig from his mug. ‘’bout to tell us how the wizard farted out his storm to save the savages.’
Cal saw Forley roll his eyes. ‘You know damned well where we were! Tell us about Arolf!’
Albin scowled, opening his mouth to retort, but Godry regained his composure in time to step in.
‘Aerolf, Forley.’ He corrected patiently.
‘Aerolf, then.’ The young shepherd agreed, rolling his eyes. ‘What happened next?’
‘Well, like I was saying, old King Talor’s already met his end, but them Northmen weren’t done yet. That beast Aerolf most of all.’ Godry began, lowering his voice and eyeing his audience conspiratorially. ‘He had a score to settle, see. This weren’t the kind of man to let a woman run from him, you understand.’
‘Serves him right.’ Albin grumbled. ‘Couldn’t keep her in his bed, even with a sword on her.’
The two miners snorted in agreement, and Petr just kept scowling. Cal flinched as Carel drew her rag over a particularly deep cut. He caught her eye reproachfully, and she smiled slyly.
‘Oops.’
She was very close, he realised, and he could feel the heat of her against his cut-thread skin. Another night, he might even have enjoyed it.
‘So there they was, dead King and all. Could of had the throne for hisself, right then.’ The old miner continued gravely. ‘But he was more animal than man. Mad as a beast, they say, big as a bear, covered head to toe in blood, cut up like an old buck. And this beast had a taste for blood.’
The little circle of villagers leaned a little closer in their seats, eye-ing Godry eagerly. Cal realised he was listening along with them.
‘So off he goes, bloody magic blade in hand.’ Godry held out his hand like a blade, scowling at them over the fire. ‘He finds that place where old King Talor locked up his pretty young daughter. And what’d’you think he does when he finds it?’
‘Kills her.’ Forley whispered.
‘That’s right, boy.’ Godry nodded, dropping his arm. ‘Heard it said he clawed the tower door open with his bare hands. Dragged her out in-to that garden, butchered her right there in the grass, threw her off that big rock of theirs like an old ham. This weren’t a man you run from. If he couldn’t have her, no one could.’
‘How’d they kill him, then?’ Albin asked, frowning.
‘Well, see now. Northmen ain’t the only one with monsters.’ Godry said craftily, raising one patchwork brow. ‘Dekar’s a sharp one. He’d realised what was afoot, by now. Rallied the King’s Men, drove the scum back out of the King’s hall. Weren’t a man amongst them left standing, save the ones in the garden. But for Aerolf and them, he saved his best killer.’
‘The Bloodless.’ Forley murmured.
‘The Bloodless.’ Godry agreed. ‘Biggest woman you’ve ever seen. Big as a wagon, skin like blue snow. They say there’s nought but ice in them veins, and if you cut her, she don’t bleed.’
‘And I’ve got rocks for balls.’ Albin snorted.
‘Might as well, for all the good they do you.’ Godry snapped back at him. ‘But the Bloodless finds the traitor. Right there in that garden, all covered in the Princess’s blood. Cuts Aerolf down, throws him from the walls after her, him and his magic sword. Almost killed that Stonesplitter dog, too, whilst she were at it. Weren’t no easy thing though; gets her head cut open like a peach for its trouble. Should’ve died, right there. Would’ve, if not for those… other types Dekar had took up with.’
‘‘Least the traitor was dead.’
‘Aye, that he was. That Heartspire’s taller than a mountain. Say there weren’t nothing left of him but mulch, once he got to the bottom. Him and the princess both.’
‘Makers have mercy.’ Forley murmured, making the sign of the Nine over his breast. Even Albin took another mouthful of ale.
‘Weren’t no mercy. A beast don’t deserve none.’ Godry said sober-ly, following Forley and drawing a circle over his chest. ‘If he couldn’t ‘ave her, no one could.’
Cal barely heard them. He felt drained, as though the cuts had bled the weight from his bones. He floated just above his chair in a haze, and the roomed blurred and swayed as if through shallow water. Carel went about her work quietly, carefully, and the pain of it washed over him in raw waves, until the pail of water at her feet was stained an ugly pink.
‘Dekar had a plan though!’ Forley whispered excitedly, his rever-ence forgotten. ‘Tell ‘em, Godry!’
‘That he did, Forley.’ Godry smiled, his scarred face contorting gro-tesquely. ‘See, that Dekar’s sharp as a carving knife. Took up Taylor’s magic sword, led the King’s Men himself. But that weren’t all. Had some of his men kept back, from down West. Big men. Hard men. Came on the Northmen camp in the dead of night. Surrounded ‘em.’
‘Weren’t just any men, I hears it.’ Albin grumbled.
‘Here we go!’ Forley snorted.
‘Said it yourself, Godry. Dekar took up with them religious types.’ Albin shot back, frowning indignantly. ‘Everyone knows it.’
‘Religious? Masks don’t keep the Makers.’ Forley spat. ‘Ain’t noth-ing but bandits dressed up like monks.’
Cal blinked.
‘Brothers ain’t got no Gods save the Darkness.’ Priss murmured qui-etly. ‘You say Nine, I say eight.’
‘All the same.’ Albin was saying, folding his arms over his mug. ‘Brothers are useful, and good old Dekar didn’t sniff at them like you do.’
‘That’s enough, Alb.’ Godry interrupted. ‘He’s still our King, even all the way out here.’
Cal opened his mouth, straightening in his seat, but Carel pushed him back down again tutting.
‘Sit still.’
‘But-’
‘Hardly our King anymore, anyways.’ Albin spat. ‘Not like it used to be. Valia’s for the lowlanders.’
‘You sounds like a Northman.’ Forley scowled.
‘Or one of the Elahi.’ Priss added. Albin bristled, and Godry jumped in just in time.
‘Doesn’t matter. All Dekar’s hard men never got to the Northmen camp.’ The grizzled old smelter went on. ‘Seems old Isandur weren’t done yet.
Cal gritted his teeth. His head ached, and his mouth tasted like smoke.
Albin spat at his feet, sneering. ‘Isandur my arse.’
‘Let him be, Alb.’ Forley told him.
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence as the butcher and his son fixed Forley with their most angry of looks. Then Godry cleared his throat noisily, and Petr shoved himself to his feet and stalked off to-wards the bar, snatching up their empty mugs as he went.
‘But Isandur is a crafty one, and no mistake. Showed up just in time, as always. What he wanted from it, no man can say. Them Chosen are scheming sorts, what ones is left. Us mortals couldn’t guess what they’s thinkin’.’ He paused, nodding knowingly. ‘Storm-tamers, they call ‘em. He spoke the words, and the sky opened. Biggest storm you’ve ever seen. Caught Dekar’s men as they came. Scattered ‘em like wheat in a gale.’
Petr aimed a crooked smile at Carel as he passed, and she lowered her eyes. Cal barely noticed. He no longer heard Godry. The room around him seemed very far away. Was he awake? Or was he dream-ing?
‘Northerners took the chance. Fled faster than the wind what chased them. Them that were still on the rock, them what murdered and killed our King?’ Godry went on, shaking his head sadly. ‘Them he called the wind itself for, and carried them away before Dekar could get at them. Aerolf’s brother, among them. King of the North, he goes by now. Couple of other Northmen, too. Stonesplitter cut almost in half by the Bloodless’ blade.’
Albin spat on the floor, and the miners scowled. No right-minded Valian liked this part, magic or not. Cal ground his teeth.
‘That Chosen bastard let the King get his throat slit, then shows up to save his killers.’ Albin cursed.
‘Makers know why. Not been seen since.’ Godry agreed. ‘Back they went, anyway, back to the rest of the savages as they fled like dogs. Storm was so heavy, river banks burst behind them, flooded half the valley.’
Cal’s heart was pounding in his ears, and his skull was ringing. Out-side, the wind whined over the thatching, howling at the broken clouds.
‘Don’t matter how many men Dekar had. Or how many Brothers. Ain’t no one swimming in mail.’
Cal forced his eyes shut. Black Ones. A storm. Falling.
‘Cal?’
He opened his eyes, blinking into the firelight, and found Carel look-ing down at him worriedly.
‘Does it hurt?’ She was asking softly.
‘What… no, I’m fine.’ He told her, blinking again. ‘I need to…’
‘Stay here.’ She told him, lifting up the bloody pail. ‘I need more cloth.’
She turned on her heel and disappeared. Cal’s head spun.
‘… already scared off the new folk with all these tall stories.’ Albin was saying. ‘Storm’s just a storm. Forge boy knows.’
Cal blinked, lurching unsteadily to his feet. Asking questions, the Innkeep had said. His vision blurred unsteadily, and the room stared back at him, wobbling like a top.
‘Cal, you need to sit down.’ Lokk told him, putting a hand on his shoulder.
Cal blinked. His eyes stopped spinning, and the ache in his head had vanished. The wind had moved on overhead, and the air was thick with smoke and heat. The little group of patrons were eyeing him curiously. All save the butcher.
‘Listen to him boy, before you hurt yourself.’ Albin sneered back at him.
‘Come on, Cal. Ignore him.’ Lokk murmured in his ear.
Cal swallowed, meeting the swarthy butcher’s eye for a moment. Then he let himself be steered backward, slumping into his seat like an empty sack.
‘Must have lost more blood than I thought.’ Lokk told him, pulling up a chair beside him and tutting. ‘Want to pick a fight with Albin as well as that storm?’
‘What?’ Cal mumbled, blinking. The butcher had gone back to his drink, and the other villagers had gone with him, grumbling amongst themselves about the practicalities of storm-tamers and treacherous, magical old men. He took a breath. ‘I wasn’t. I-’
‘Sure looked like you were. You know Alb. Just his way. Didn’t mean anything by it.’
‘Lokk, when did the new folk leave?’
‘What? Oh… I told you. Right after you turned up. Spooked ‘em good, you did, all bloody like a fresh ham…’
‘Where did they go?’
‘How should I know? Had my hands full peeling you off the floor. Why d’you care, anyway?’
‘Lokk, I need to…’
‘Oh, no you don’t! You aren’t going anywhere. Need to rest.’ His friend told him, pinning him to his chair by his shoulders. ‘Look like you fell down half the Teeth face first.’
‘I…’ Cal began, lowering his voice. His head was clearing, and the room was no longer spinning like a leaf. Beside the fire, the other pa-trons were still bickering emptily. The storm had passed, and the ache of it was clearing from his battered skull. ‘I didn’t just fall. Something was chasing me.’
‘What are you talking about? You crack your head, too?’
‘Lokk, listen. There were…’
‘Let go!’
They both looked up at the sudden commotion from beside the bar. Carel had just made it out from behind it with a fresh pail of steaming water before Petr had cornered her, bulky shoulders blocking the way forward like a stubborn bullock. He had one meaty hand curled around Carel’s wrist, and she had her eyes fixed on the floor. Cal was on his feet before Lokk could say anything.
‘Let go of her.’
The big youth let go of Carel’s wrist, and the pail fell abruptly back to her side, spilling steaming water across the floor. She looked at it distantly, frowning.
‘Or what, you little shit?’ The butcher’s son grumbled throatily, turning slowly around to facing Cal, glaring down at him with rheumy-eyes. His words had the imprecise edge of drink to them, and his breath smelled of sour ale. ‘Gonna throw yourself down a fucking hill at me?’
‘Just leave her be, Petr.’ Lokk added from Cal’s shoulder.
‘Mind your own business.’ The big youth snorted, still glaring at Cal darkly. ‘Sit down before you hurt yourself, stray.’
He began to turn back to Carel. Lokk put a hand on Cal’s shoulder, and Cal ignored him.
‘Leave her be.’ He said again.
‘Or what?’ Petr snarled back, lurching around again, wiping spittle from the corner of his mouth. ‘Going to bleed on me?’
‘It’s fine, Cal. No harm done.’ Carel said quietly from beside the bar, eyes still on the ground. ‘Sit down, let me finish with your cuts.’
‘You heard her. Be a good little foundling and sit down like she says.’
Cal swallowed. Petr was nearly a head taller than he was, and his arms were thick, corded with miner’s work. But there would be no avoiding it now, and he didn’t have the patience to let it be, that night. The big youth was drunk, and spoiling for a fight. Cal glanced back over his shoulder, but the other patrons were bickering loudly beside the fire, oblivious, or indifferent, or both. The Innkeep was still in the back somewhere, tapping a new barrel. Strike first. Strike hard. Cal shifted his feet slightly, readying himself. His head had cleared, and his pain was far away. The moment of calm was on him. A blink in time. The room faded away, vibrating with stillness. There was only his breath. In, and out. He waited.
‘Nothing to say? Suppose a dead whore can’t teach her cunt son any manners.’
Cal moved quickly, uncoiling like a bowstring. He burst forward off his hind leg, bunching his fist towards Petr’s slab of a jaw. The butch-er’s son had no chance to react. How could he? Cal moved with the ease of a seasoned brawler, hard limbs whipping like clubs. Lokk’s arm slipped from his shoulder. He was already halfway across the distance between them before Petr could even blink.
His boot splashed, skidded, slid. The water. Cal blinked, lost bal-ance, and slid wildly into Petr’s chest. His head thudded into the other boy, and he staggered back, confused, dazed. Petr blinked down at him, cogs turning slowly in his ale-slowed mind. Then a broad grin spread across the big youth’s jaw.
‘Should’ve listened, stray.’

Fourth and final part at the same time tomorrow.
Previous Chapter - Read 10 weeks ahead on Patreon - Read the story so far on Royal Road
*
Chapter Twelve - The Blacksmith's Boy (Part Three)
​
Clouds. Black, moving, twisting like rope. His head ached. His blood was hot as flame. Fire flashed in the clouds, and the old stormtower gleamed. The Old Man stared back at him from the gloom, eyes carving at his skin. You could have warned me. He taunted him. Smoke bled around his shoulders, and his skin melted away. Cal tried to look away, but it was too late. The fire was on him, and the sky filled his eyes with black water, smothering his breath.
*
He gasped, pain searing down his spine, and choked on his own breath, spluttering.
‘Get him up.’
‘I’ve got him.’
Lokk’s voice. Cal felt a hand curling underneath one of his arms, lifting his aching jaw off the floorboards. Pain shot down his back again, and he cried out, eyes spinning. Then there was another hand beneath him, and he was lifted groaning away from the floor. They lowered him carefully into a chair, and he fell against it, skin stinging, panting through gritted teeth.
‘What happened to him?’
‘Had a wolf at ‘im, by the looks of it!’
‘Don’t be a fool! No wolves in these woods.’
‘Believe in magic, but not in wolves?’
Cal groaned again.
‘Shut it, all of you!’
Cal blinked again, and the Innkeep’s rosy cheeks coalesced into the air before his eyes, looking down at him worriedly. Lokk was at his shoulder, wide-eyed, his mop of lank hair hanging loosely over his forehead. Someone had put the door to, and it was suddenly very quiet. Cal took a breath.
‘What happened, boy?’ The Innkeep asked him. Beyond his shoulders, Cal could see the faces of a half-dozen patrons, blinking back at him with wide eyes. All except Old Godry, who looked mildly irritated. Outside, the storm wailed helplessly against the thatching, and thunder rumbled against the hills, more distant, now. Cal held his breath, craning his ears. But the footsteps were gone. He swallowed.
‘There were…’ He hesitated, glancing towards the door. ‘I… fell.’
‘Down half the Teeth by the looks of it!’ Lokk pointed at his arms. ‘What were you doing out in this?’
Cal blinked, looking down. His arms were crisscrossed with dozens of bloody cuts, and his shirt was hanging off him in strings. He frowned, shrugging, and then winced as fire raced over his skin, and fell back against the chair, gasping.
‘Thought… Thought I had time to get back.’
‘Damned fool.’ Carel told him, appearing beside her father. She had a pail of steaming water under one arm, and a bundle of rags in the other. ‘Got to clean those before they rot.’
‘I’m fi-’
‘That’s enough talking.’ The Innkeep told him. ‘Or I’ll want coin for the cloth.’
Cal thought better of arguing.
‘Saw a fair few mugs go over.’ The Innkeep turned towards the rest of the room, smiling reassuringly. ‘I’ll fetch a new barrel. This one’s on the house.’
A few grumbles of approval from the assembled regulars. They were all watching him. He could feel their eyes on him, prying, poking. Sensible boys know better than to go wandering in a storm. They’d always thought the Blacksmith’s stray was cracked. Same as his master. Godry seemed to have let his irritation go at the promise of free ale, but Cal spotted the butcher’s brute of a son, Petr, sneering back at him over the rim of his mug. He lowered his eyes. They thought him mad. Maybe they were right. Behind his eyes, the shadows were still chasing him through endless trees, clawing at his heels. But the door stayed closed, and there was no sound beyond it but the storm. Maybe he was losing his mind.
‘Quite the show, that was.’ Lokk grinned as his father went off to find the barrel. Carel rolled her eyes, pulling up another chair and setting about dampening the cloth. ‘Barely seen you in weeks, then you show up all bloody an’ panting like a wolf that’s got in with the chickens? You always knew how to make an entrance.’
Cal grunted. He didn’t feel like explaining himself. Wasn’t sure he could, even if he did.
‘Scared off the new folk, too.’ Lokk nodded towards an empty table in the far corner of the room, scattered with discarded mugs.
Cal blinked. ‘What?’
‘Had some of Solen’s new hands in tonight.’ Lokk told him offhandedly, scratching his chin. ‘Quiet lot. Must have given them quite the fright. Saw themselves out sharpish.’
‘What did… hnngg.’ Cal clamped his teeth together with a groan as Carel pressed one of the rags against his bloody forearm.
‘Stay still.’ She told him, wiping the cloth slowly across his skin. It felt like someone was stripping his flesh with a wood plane. Cal clenched his jaw, forcing himself not to yelp. Lokk lounged idly against the bar beside him, sweeping his loose hair back from his forehead untidily.
‘Interrupted Godry, too.’ His friend went on, clearly unperturbed by his suffering. ‘Old goat hates being interrupted.’
Cal grunted again. The little clump of patrons seemed to have lost interest in him, now, turning back to their mugs as the Innkeep moved deftly through the tables, a little cask under his arm. Petr and his father were sitting glowering at no one in particular. Forley and his young wife Priss looked taken aback, and not the least bit shaken, by the unexpected turn of events the evening had taken, but the dour-faced miners beside them (whose names Cal did not know) seemed to have paid Cal’s entrance no heed at all. Old Godry was sitting patiently, firelight knotting over his scarred cheeks, waiting for his cue. Soon their mugs were full again, and the foolishness of the Blacksmith’s stray was quite forgotten. The Innkeep set the empty cask down somewhere behind the bar, and went off to find another barrel. Cal gritted his teeth as Carel went on with her work, eyes watering, and watched the villagers blur indifferently by the fire.
‘You weren’t finished, Godry.’ Albin, the butcher began, taking a long swig from his mug. ‘’bout to tell us how the wizard farted out his storm to save the savages.’
Cal saw Forley roll his eyes. ‘You know damned well where we were! Tell us about Arolf!’
Albin scowled, opening his mouth to retort, but Godry regained his composure in time to step in.
‘Aerolf, Forley.’ He corrected patiently.
‘Aerolf, then.’ The young shepherd agreed, rolling his eyes. ‘What happened next?’
‘Well, like I was saying, old King Talor’s already met his end, but them Northmen weren’t done yet. That beast Aerolf most of all.’ Godry began, lowering his voice and eyeing his audience conspiratorially. ‘He had a score to settle, see. This weren’t the kind of man to let a woman run from him, you understand.’
‘Serves him right.’ Albin grumbled. ‘Couldn’t keep her in his bed, even with a sword on her.’
The two miners snorted in agreement, and Petr just kept scowling. Cal flinched as Carel drew her rag over a particularly deep cut. He caught her eye reproachfully, and she smiled slyly.
‘Oops.’
She was very close, he realised, and he could feel the heat of her against his cut-thread skin. Another night, he might even have enjoyed it.
‘So there they was, dead King and all. Could of had the throne for hisself, right then.’ The old miner continued gravely. ‘But he was more animal than man. Mad as a beast, they say, big as a bear, covered head to toe in blood, cut up like an old buck. And this beast had a taste for blood.’
The little circle of villagers leaned a little closer in their seats, eyeing Godry eagerly. Cal realised he was listening along with them.
‘So off he goes, bloody magic blade in hand.’ Godry held out his hand like a blade, scowling at them over the fire. ‘He finds that place where old King Talor locked up his pretty young daughter. And what’d’you think he does when he finds it?’
‘Kills her.’ Forley whispered.
‘That’s right, boy.’ Godry nodded, dropping his arm. ‘Heard it said he clawed the tower door open with his bare hands. Dragged her out into that garden, butchered her right there in the grass, threw her off that big rock of theirs like an old ham. This weren’t a man you run from. If he couldn’t have her, no one could.’
‘How’d they kill him, then?’ Albin asked, frowning.
‘Well, see now. Northmen ain’t the only one with monsters.’ Godry said craftily, raising one patchwork brow. ‘Dekar’s a sharp one. He’d realised what was afoot, by now. Rallied the King’s Men, drove the scum back out of the King’s hall. Weren’t a man amongst them left standing, save the ones in the garden. But for Aerolf and them, he saved his best killer.’
‘The Bloodless.’ Forley murmured.
‘The Bloodless.’ Godry agreed. ‘Biggest woman you’ve ever seen. Big as a wagon, skin like blue snow. They say there’s nought but ice in them veins, and if you cut her, she don’t bleed.’
‘And I’ve got rocks for balls.’ Albin snorted.
‘Might as well, for all the good they do you.’ Godry snapped back at him. ‘But the Bloodless finds the traitor. Right there in that garden, all covered in the Princess’s blood. Cuts Aerolf down, throws him from the walls after her, him and his magic sword. Almost killed that Stonesplitter dog, too, whilst she were at it. Weren’t no easy thing though; gets her head cut open like a peach for its trouble. Should’ve died, right there. Would’ve, if not for those… other types Dekar had took up with.’
‘‘Least the traitor was dead.’
‘Aye, that he was. That Heartspire’s taller than a mountain. Say there weren’t nothing left of him but mulch, once he got to the bottom. Him and the princess both.’
‘Makers have mercy.’ Forley murmured, making the sign of the Nine over his breast. Even Albin took another mouthful of ale.
‘Weren’t no mercy. A beast don’t deserve none.’ Godry said soberly, following Forley and drawing a circle over his chest. ‘If he couldn’t ‘ave her, no one could.’
Cal barely heard them. He felt drained, as though the cuts had bled the weight from his bones. He floated just above his chair in a haze, and the roomed blurred and swayed as if through shallow water. Carel went about her work quietly, carefully, and the pain of it washed over him in raw waves, until the pail of water at her feet was stained an ugly pink.
‘Dekar had a plan though!’ Forley whispered excitedly, his reverence forgotten. ‘Tell ‘em, Godry!’
‘That he did, Forley.’ Godry smiled, his scarred face contorting grotesquely. ‘See, that Dekar’s sharp as a carving knife. Took up Taylor’s magic sword, led the King’s Men himself. But that weren’t all. Had some of his men kept back, from down West. Big men. Hard men. Came on the Northmen camp in the dead of night. Surrounded ‘em.’
‘Weren’t just any men, I hears it.’ Albin grumbled.
‘Here we go!’ Forley snorted.
‘Said it yourself, Godry. Dekar took up with them religious types.’ Albin shot back, frowning indignantly. ‘Everyone knows it.’
‘Religious? Masks don’t keep the Makers.’ Forley spat. ‘Ain’t nothing but bandits dressed up like monks.’
Cal blinked.
*‘*Brothers ain’t got no Gods save the Darkness.’ Priss murmured quietly. ‘You say Nine, I say eight.’
‘All the same.’ Albin was saying, folding his arms over his mug. ‘Brothers are useful, and good old Dekar didn’t sniff at them like you do.’
‘That’s enough, Alb.’ Godry interrupted. ‘He’s still our King, even all the way out here.’
Cal opened his mouth, straightening in his seat, but Carel pushed him back down again tutting.
‘Sit still.’
‘But-’
‘Hardly our King anymore, anyways.’ Albin spat. ‘Not like it used to be. Valia’s for the lowlanders.’
‘You sounds like a Northman.’ Forley scowled.
‘Or one of the Elahi.’ Priss added. Albin bristled, and Godry jumped in just in time.
‘Doesn’t matter. All Dekar’s hard men never got to the Northmen camp.’ The grizzled old smelter went on. ‘Seems old Isandur weren’t done yet.
Cal gritted his teeth. His head ached, and his mouth tasted like smoke.
Albin spat at his feet, sneering. ‘Isandur my arse.’
‘Let him be, Alb.’ Forley told him.
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence as the butcher and his son fixed Forley with their most angry of looks. Then Godry cleared his throat noisily, and Petr shoved himself to his feet and stalked off towards the bar, snatching up their empty mugs as he went.
‘But Isandur is a crafty one, and no mistake. Showed up just in time, as always. What he wanted from it, no man can say. Them Chosen are scheming sorts, what ones is left. Us mortals couldn’t guess what they’s thinkin’.’ He paused, nodding knowingly. ‘Storm-tamers, they call ‘em. He spoke the words, and the sky opened. Biggest storm you’ve ever seen. Caught Dekar’s men as they came. Scattered ‘em like wheat in a gale.’
Petr aimed a crooked smile at Carel as he passed, and she lowered her eyes. Cal barely noticed. He no longer heard Godry. The room around him seemed very far away. Was he awake? Or was he dreaming?
‘Northerners took the chance. Fled faster than the wind what chased them. Them that were still on the rock, them what murdered and killed our King?’ Godry went on, shaking his head sadly. ‘Them he called the wind itself for, and carried them away before Dekar could get at them. Aerolf’s brother, among them. King of the North, he goes by now. Couple of other Northmen, too. Stonesplitter cut almost in half by the Bloodless’ blade.’
Albin spat on the floor, and the miners scowled. No right-minded Valian liked this part, magic or not. Cal ground his teeth.
‘That Chosen bastard let the King get his throat slit, then shows up to save his killers.’ Albin cursed.
‘Makers know why. Not been seen since.’ Godry agreed. ‘Back they went, anyway, back to the rest of the savages as they fled like dogs. Storm was so heavy, river banks burst behind them, flooded half the valley.’
Cal’s heart was pounding in his ears, and his skull was ringing. Outside, the wind whined over the thatching, howling at the broken clouds.
‘Don’t matter how many men Dekar had. Or how many Brothers. Ain’t no one swimming in mail.’
Cal forced his eyes shut. Black Ones. A storm. Falling.
‘Cal?’
He opened his eyes, blinking into the firelight, and found Carel looking down at him worriedly.
‘Does it hurt?’ She was asking softly.
‘What… no, I’m fine.’ He told her, blinking again. ‘I need to…’
‘Stay here.’ She told him, lifting up the bloody pail. ‘I need more cloth.’
She turned on her heel and disappeared. Cal’s head spun.
‘… already scared off the new folk with all these tall stories.’ Albin was saying. ‘Storm’s just a storm. Forge boy knows.’
Cal blinked, lurching unsteadily to his feet. Asking questions, the Innkeep had said. His vision blurred unsteadily, and the room stared back at him, wobbling like a top.
‘Cal, you need to sit down.’ Lokk told him, putting a hand on his shoulder.
Cal blinked. His eyes stopped spinning, and the ache in his head had vanished. The wind had moved on overhead, and the air was thick with smoke and heat. The little group of patrons were eyeing him curiously. All save the butcher.
‘Listen to him boy, before you hurt yourself.’ Albin sneered back at him.
‘Come on, Cal. Ignore him.’ Lokk murmured in his ear.
Cal swallowed, meeting the swarthy butcher’s eye for a moment. Then he let himself be steered backward, slumping into his seat like an empty sack.
‘Must have lost more blood than I thought.’ Lokk told him, pulling up a chair beside him and tutting. ‘Want to pick a fight with Albin as well as that storm?’
‘What?’ Cal mumbled, blinking. The butcher had gone back to his drink, and the other villagers had gone with him, grumbling amongst themselves about the practicalities of storm-tamers and treacherous, magical old men. He took a breath. ‘I wasn’t. I-’
‘Sure looked like you were. You know Alb. Just his way. Didn’t mean anything by it.’
‘Lokk, when did the new folk leave?’
‘What? Oh… I told you. Right after you turned up. Spooked ‘em good, you did, all bloody like a fresh ham…’
‘Where did they go?’
‘How should I know? Had my hands full peeling you off the floor. Why d’you care, anyway?’
‘Lokk, I need to…’
‘Oh, no you don’t! You aren’t going anywhere. Need to rest.’ His friend told him, pinning him to his chair by his shoulders. ‘Look like you fell down half the Teeth face first.’
‘I…’ Cal began, lowering his voice. His head was clearing, and the room was no longer spinning like a leaf. Beside the fire, the other patrons were still bickering emptily. The storm had passed, and the ache of it was clearing from his battered skull. ‘I didn’t just fall. Something was chasing me.’
‘What are you talking about? You crack your head, too?’
‘Lokk, listen. There were…’
‘Let go!’
They both looked up at the sudden commotion from beside the bar. Carel had just made it out from behind it with a fresh pail of steaming water before Petr had cornered her, bulky shoulders blocking the way forward like a stubborn bullock. He had one meaty hand curled around Carel’s wrist, and she had her eyes fixed on the floor. Cal was on his feet before Lokk could say anything.
‘Let go of her.’
The big youth let go of Carel’s wrist, and the pail fell abruptly back to her side, spilling steaming water across the floor. She looked at it distantly, frowning.
‘Or what, you little shit?’ The butcher’s son grumbled throatily, turning slowly around to facing Cal, glaring down at him with rheumy-eyes. His words had the imprecise edge of drink to them, and his breath smelled of sour ale. ‘Gonna throw yourself down a fucking hill at me?’
‘Just leave her be, Petr.’ Lokk added from Cal’s shoulder.
‘Mind your own business.’ The big youth snorted, still glaring at Cal darkly. ‘Sit down before you hurt yourself, stray.’
He began to turn back to Carel. Lokk put a hand on Cal’s shoulder, and Cal ignored him.
‘Leave her be.’ He said again.
‘Or what?’ Petr snarled back, lurching around again, wiping spittle from the corner of his mouth. ‘Going to bleed on me?’
‘It’s fine, Cal. No harm done.’ Carel said quietly from beside the bar, eyes still on the ground. ‘Sit down, let me finish with your cuts.’
‘You heard her. Be a good little foundling and sit down like she says.’
Cal swallowed. Petr was nearly a head taller than he was, and his arms were thick, corded with miner’s work. But there would be no avoiding it now, and he didn’t have the patience to let it be, that night. The big youth was drunk, and spoiling for a fight. Cal glanced back over his shoulder, but the other patrons were bickering loudly beside the fire, oblivious, or indifferent, or both. The Innkeep was still in the back somewhere, tapping a new barrel. Strike first. Strike hard. Cal shifted his feet slightly, readying himself. His head had cleared, and his pain was far away. The moment of calm was on him. A blink in time. The room faded away, vibrating with stillness. There was only his breath. In, and out. He waited.
‘Nothing to say? Suppose a dead whore can’t teach her cunt son any manners.’
Cal moved quickly, uncoiling like a bowstring. He burst forward off his hind leg, bunching his fist towards Petr’s slab of a jaw. The butcher’s son had no chance to react. How could he? Cal moved with the ease of a seasoned brawler, hard limbs whipping like clubs. Lokk’s arm slipped from his shoulder. He was already halfway across the distance between them before Petr could even blink.
His boot splashed, skidded, slid. The water. Cal blinked, lost balance, and slid wildly into Petr’s chest. His head thudded into the other boy, and he staggered back, confused, dazed. Petr blinked down at him, cogs turning slowly in his ale-slowed mind. Then a broad grin spread across the big youth’s jaw.
‘Should’ve listened, stray.’

"Think of this as a chance at revenge," Sweeney said.
​
Revenge.
​
What a moronically quaint idea.
​
This jumped up little shit had come into my home, interrupted my retirement and here he was talking to me about revenge, as if he knew the first thing about what I’d seen, what I’d been through, why I’d quit.
​
Looking into his eyes, I knew he didn’t understand. I knew he couldn’t.
​
I've been hunting vampires for most of my life. I've killed more of them than I can count. But Clementine Di Cesare was no ordinary vampire. Hell, none of the Di Cesares were ordinary vampires, but even among them Clementine was… unique. She was the one all the others quietly feared. The one who was even spoken of with reverence by the Di Cesares masters, those twin Immortals who could not be killed by any weapon of this world. Seeking revenge against her was like seeking revenge against death itself.
​
“Revenge?” I repeated, with a dismissive scoff.
“You’re really going to tell me that after what she put you through, you don’t want revenge?” Sweeney asked.
“If you knew what she did to me, you’d know why I don’t want revenge,” I replied.
“Really? Sorry Franklin, but I don’t buy that. Look, I get it if you’re reluctant to jump back into the fight. I do. You of all people know just how dangerous the Di Cesare’s are. Especially ‘La Morte’.”
​
I looked over at him as he said that name. It rolled off his tongue so irreverently. To him, it was just a name. An alias assigned to some vampire he’s only heard of stories. He didn’t utter it with the respect it deserved, and I almost couldn’t be bothered to correct him. Any words spent on this small minded glory hound were probably wasted.
​
“Yes, I do know.”
“Which is why I need you,” Sweeney said. He almost sounded as if he were pleading with me. “Think of this as an opportunity to set things right… to put that vampire bitch in the ground where she belongs, and save God only knows how many lives in the process!”
I sighed.
He just didn’t get it.
​
“Mark my words, Mr. Sweeney, if you chase after Clementine Di Cesare, you’ll end far more lives than you save. She didn’t get a name like ‘La Morte’ for nothing. She earned it. Purchased it with the blood of the tens of thousands she’s sent screaming into the maw of Hell. She is not something you chase, Sweeney.”
“She’s a vampire,” Sweeney said dismissively. “She’s another enemy to destroy.”
“That’s what George Bundy said,” I replied. “Then not too long after, he died.”
“I’m not George Bundy,” Sweeney said.
“No. You sure as hell ain’t,” I agreed, before looking the kid in the eye.
​
He thought he was an up and comer, climbing the ranks of the Brethren. He probably thought of himself as some sort of badass vampire hunter too, when in reality he could never have so much as dreamed of holding a candle to the likes of Bundy… or hell, any of the men who’d died in Brazil.
“You should watch your tone with me,” Sweeney warned.
“Or you’ll do what?” I asked, “You ain’t going to frighten me with vague threats, boy. I’ve walked through Hell, trying to kill the Devil. What have you done?”
​
Sweeney bit his lip but didn’t respond.
“There’s nothing you can say or do that will intimidate me,” I said, before lighting myself a cigarette. I stared at the road outside of my porch, old memories flooding back to me before looking over at Sweeney again. He sat in his chair beside me like a sulky child. This was the man who wanted to destroy the Di Cesare family? Pathetic.
​
“Exactly how much do you know about the Brazil Job?” I asked.
“I know it was a failure. Clementine Di Cesare killed most of the men the Brethren sent out… all except for you. You were the only one good enough to beat her.”
“Good enough…” I repeated with a huff, “Hardly… whatever picture you’ve got in your head of some glorified battle, throw it away. Trust me, the Brazil Job was anything but glorious. It was a two hour long trek through Hell. And I didn’t beat Di Cesare at the end of it. I survived her. They’re two different things entirely.”
“I’m not sure I understand,” Sweeney said.
“You wouldn’t, would you?” I sighed and took another drag on my cigarette.
​
This kid wasn’t going to leave until I made him understand… so I told him my story. I told him everything even though I knew he’d learn nothing from it.
​
***
​
I’d joined up with the Brethren Knights of St. Fontaine back in the 1980s to hunt monsters. Back then, it seemed like the best use of my skills. I’d done my tours with the army, but even after I got out, I was still looking for an enemy to fight. So naturally, once I found out that vampires were real, I set my sights on them. It seemed like the most sensible thing to do at the time.
​
The Brethren Knights fancied themselves the descendants of the Knights Templar, and they insisted that their God given mission was to protect mankind from the things that lurked in the shadows. I didn’t really have much love for God at the time, but if the Bretheren were the ones fighting the monsters, then I was happy to tolerate the Jesus freaks in their ranks.
​
It was 1988 when we first heard whispers of the Imperium. A supposed cabal of vampires, trying to get them organized. At the time, it’d seemed too crazy to be true. Vampires generally went their own way, in my experience. At most, they might have a partner but other than they they didn’t really socialize with their own kind. But supposedly someone out there had the big fucking balls to keep them in line, and whoever they were, they scared the shit out of the Brethren.
​
They’d started targeting high profile vampires, trying to find someone who was involved in this ‘Imperium’, hoping that maybe they might get someone to talk. And it wasn’t long until they found someone who did.
​
From my understanding, the vampire they captured didn’t seem to know much about who was actually running the show. But they knew who their second in command was… and that was when I first head about the Di Cesare family.
​
The name was familiar to some of the higher ups in the Brethren, and I’d heard some stories. Not sure which were true, but the long and short of it was that the Di Cesare’s and the Brethren shared a bloody history, and didn’t particularly like each other too much.
​
George Bundy explained it to me like this at one point: ‘The Di Cesare’s are an old family. Most of them used to be witches, up until their Matriarch turned them into vampires. Now they’re a whole new kind of nasty. Far as I know, the only time anyone’s actually managed to kill one was about 200 years ago. Anyone who’s tried since has ended up dead, so most folks don’t even bother anymore.’
​
I guess it shouldn’t have been surprising they’d be involved in the Imperium, but the mere mention of their name ruffled some feathers higher up on the chain of command, and eventually they put out a kill order on them. Most of the Di Cesare’s were generally pretty hard to track down, but the top brass had a pretty good line on their matriarch, Bianca Di Cesare. Supposedly, she’d been spotted near the family’s private estate in Brazil and rumor had it that most of her daughters were there too.
​
Normally, the brass wouldn’t have sanctioned any kind of attack on them. The Di Cesare’s were already considered off limits, and attacking them at their private estate was considered damn near impossible. The estate was located in a small mining town outside of Manaus called Refugio de Julia, or just Julia for short. The town was fairly remote, being only accessible from a few backroads and most folks tended to avoid it, claiming they’d had various strange encounters in the area. Their accounts described unsettling pale figures with dark hair and large green eyes working in the mines, although some of the more disturbing stories we heard involved sightings of other creatures in the jungle surrounding the town. Massive spiders with humanoid faces, tending rotting corpses filled with stinging bees, giant howling beasts who tore through the forest, hunting prey, and beautiful women who would appear in the nearby towns, betwitching men into coming away with them only to reveal themselves as monsters who fed on the blood of their victims. Some had even claimed the Di Cesares themselves were such beasts… although those claims weren’t taken quite as seriously.
​
A skeptic might say the stories that surrounded Julia seemed like little more than just local superstition… but the Brethren had been dealing with the supernatural for long enough to recognize when something was probably real, and when it was probably fake and they knew damn well that most of the stories about Julia were probably true. None of them had ever dared set foot in Julia to find out for sure, since doing so would probably be suicide, but the theory was that the Di Cesares had created Julia as something of a refuge for other creatures. Other vampires, werewolves, arachne, karah and all sorts of other hellspawn. They offered them a home and safety in exchange for their labor in the mines. Hell, the name of the town more or less spelled it out.
​
Refugio de Julia
​
Julia’s Haven.
​
Julia had been the name of the only member of the Di Cesare family that the Brethren had ever killed, so I guess it was only fitting they named the town after her.
​
I honestly think using other creatures like them as a workforce was a bit inspired… since it made Julia damn near impenetrable. Reaching their estate at the far side of the town would have been impossible without being noticed by every creature of hell living in that town, and odds are they’d tear anyone apart long before they even reached the gates of the Di Cesare estate. And if one had the bright idea to approach the estate from another angle, they’d be trudging through miles and miles of rainforest to do so, only end up face to face with a massive stone wall that kept the rainforest out.
​
In effect - the Di Cesare estate was a fortress. Getting in would be no easy feat, to say nothing of confronting the vampires within. But with the fear of the Imperium gnawing at the back of their minds, the Brethren had finally set their minds to trying.
​
George Bundy had been the one in charge of planning the operation out.
​
I’d known Bundy before I’d joined up with the Brethren. Hell, Bundy was the whole reason I’d joined the Brethren. He’d been my CO a number of years back, and he’d earned his reputation as a hardass just about ten or twenty times over. Bundy was a gruff looking man with a bushy moustache and intense eyes. During the years I knew him, I don’t believe I ever once saw him so much as crack a smile. He only ever seemed to speak when he felt there was something he needed to say. Otherwise, he was usually dead silent.
​
He was somewhere in his late fifties back in 88. By all rights, he ought to have retired years ago. But he refused.
“I’m a soldier,” He said, when I asked him about it once. “That’s all I am. I don’t know what else to be.”
​
Bundy’s initial plan had been to hit the Di Cesare estate from the air. Come in fast and loud with a couple of helicopters and see how those vampires stood up to some good old American flak. The idea got shot down pretty quickly, so to speak. Apperantly, most if not all of the Di Cesares had cursed their own bodies, causing whatever wound one inflicted on them to appear on whoever it was who had wounded them. Going in guns blazing would have ended in a bloodbath… and not for them. There were also some concerns about drawing attention from Julia. With no conclusive data on just what they had living in that town, there was no guarantee we’d be safe in the air. A few eyewitnesses had described seeing giant nests in some of the trees in the jungle, supposedly consistent with the nests made by harpies.
​
Flying in guns blazing was out. So Bundy went back to the drawing board and what he came back with… well, it was ballsy, but it almost seemed like it just might work. During his reconnisance of the Di Cesare’s estate, he’d noticed a large but shallow tributary flowing into the amazon river that led right through the Di Cesare’s estate. Along the tributary was an abandoned water mill, that connected to the Di Cesare estate.
​
He’d suggested using the water mill to gain entry to the grounds, and from there, move on the Di Cesare’s. That plan had been approved, and Bundy had been allowed to handpick his team for the operation. He’d chosen fifteen men, all of them ex military, most of them having served under him before.
​
He’d told us we would be dividing into three teams of five men each. We would leave Manaus by boat, and land at three different areas near the tributary before making our way to the mill on foot, where we would regroup, before moving on the Di Cesares. The reason for the division was to ensure that if any of our teams ran into trouble upon making ground, the entire operation wouldn’t be compromised.
​
Team 1, led by Bundy himself would depart first and land to the west of the tributary. Team 2, led by a man named Ferdinand Hernandez would make land about fifteen minutes later near the mouth of the tributary and Team 3, to be led by me would land fifteen minutes later to the east.
​
On the day of the operation, I sat in my boat, watching as the other two left. It was twilight when we set out, and I remember that as my team and I carried out our final checks on our equipment, the only thing I felt was a familiar anticipation.
​
I’d hesitate to call it fear. Fear is what came later. Anticipation is the better word. I knew we could be walking into a tough situation… but I trusted Bundy. I trusted he’d run a smooth op. God knew, he’d done it a thousand times before.
​
The team assigned to me wasn’t anything particularly special. They were competent enough, but none of them would’ve been my first choices. Jack McMullen, for instance, who was about the same age as I was at the time. We’d both served under Bundy before, although while I respected Bundy, Jack was wholly devoted to him. I swear, if the man had told him to stuff a live grenade up his ass, Jack would’ve done it without a moments hesitation. I dunno if Jack simply saw him as the father he’d never had or what, but he damn near worshipped Bundy.
​
I can’t quite say the same for the other guys we had with us, though. One of them, some greenhorn by the name of Pearce Wilson struck me as an airheaded pretty boy who’d never actually had his boots on the ground before, while the other one, Scott Barber had left a bad taste in my mouth last time we’d worked together. Barber was capable… but he was violent. This was a kid with a hell of a chip on his shoulder, and it looked a hell of a lot like that Confederate flag patch he wore on his jacket. He wanted an excuse to shoot something, and I don’t think he cared what. Under most circumstances I’m not sure I would’ve fully trusted him with a gun.
​
The last one though, Joseph Feng… him I trusted. Feng was the one I knew the least about, and he didn’t seem much for conversation. But he handled himself competently enough and seemed to know when to sit down and shut up.
​
When Team 2’s boat was far enough away, we got the radio signal to follow. Barber was the one steering the boat, so I gave him the order to cast off and we ventured out into the twilight, unaware of just what was waiting for us out there.
​
***
​
We landed in our designated area fifteen minutes after Team 2 confirmed they’d touched down at theirs. Our landing was fairly uneventful. Feng, Barber, and I secured the boat before we radio’d Bundy to let him know we were in position. After that, it was just a matter of making it to the tributary.
​
As we ventured into the jungle, the world around us was quiet. There was wind, the whisper of the river behind us, and the sounds of animals. But little else. The river fell away behind us as we moved in single file toward the tributary, maintaining radio silence as we did.
​
It was about a half hour before we heard the gunshot.
​
Just one, echoing through the twilight. But it was enough to give us pause.
​
“The fuck was that?” I heard Barber ask. Immediately, the kid was on high alert, with his gun raised as if he were expecting every monster in Julia to come charging at us from all angles.
I just listened, waiting to hear if there was anything else. I half expected my radio to come to life, but it didn’t.
“Team 1, status?” I asked.
The radio crackled with static, but there was no response.
​
I tried it again, but still with no success. The radio was working, that much I was sure of. Something had to be blocking the signal.
“What’s going on?” Feng asked.
“Dunno,” I replied. “Comms are down.”
“Down?” Wilson asked, “So we’re flying blind out here, then?”
“More or less,” I replied.
“What do we do? Do we go back… if the comms are down…”
“Just because something’s jamming our signal doesn’t mean we’re made,” I said. “Relax. We keep moving for now. You keep your eyes wide open, and your head on a swivel. We’ll make it to the tributary and see if we can’t meet up with the other teams.”
I could tell Wilson wasn’t a fan of my answer, but I didn’t much care. We had a job to do, and I aimed to do it.
​
I pressed on without a further word and the others followed. Up ahead, I could hear the sound of running water and picked up the pace. I figured the tributary had to be close… and I was right.
​
I emerged from the brush into the stream, only to pause when I saw what was waiting for us in the water.
​
In the dying sunlight, it was impossible to mistake the bodies sprawled out on the rocks as anything else… and all I needed to do was look at their uniforms to know they were our people.
“Jesus…” I heard Wilson say under his breath. He froze up, lingering by the bank as I cautiously approached one of the bodies.
​
It belonged to a somewhat heavyset man with a thin mustache who I recognized as Hernandez. His eyes were still open, although lifeless and staring in different directions, and there was a clean hole in his forehead where a bullet had ended his life. The gunshot we’d heard earlier had likely been the sound of his death.
​
Looking at the bodies around him, I knew they had to be the rest of Team 2… although it was a little harder pinning down their cause of death. Some sort of bladed weapon, perhaps, judging by the state of them. I realized the odds were that they walked into some sort of ambush.
“What about Bundy and Team 1?” Jack asked, “Any sign of them?”
“No,” I said. “These bodies are all from Team 2… Bundy could still be ahead of us.”
“Then we need to keep going!”
​
Jack turned, heading up the stream and Barber was right behind him. Feng paused for a moment, thinking this over before following. Only Wilson remained.
“How do we know we’re not walking into a trap?” He asked.
“We’ll deal with that when we get to it,” I said before moving to follow the others.
“With all due respect, Sarge… that doesn’t sound like the best course of action!” Wilson argued, finally following me. “It sounds just like a good way to get killed!”
“Yeah?” I asked, “I’m gonna tell you an ugly truth, kid. That’s the job. Make your peace with it, and it’ll go a lot easier.”
​
Wilson didn’t like that answer either and trailed off behind me, watching as I continued upstream. For a moment, I half expected him to go back to the boat… but no. I dunno if he found his balls or just didn’t want to get left behind, but he started to follow us again.
​
I kept trying to raise Team 1 on the radio while we walked, although I still had no luck. The light above us slowly faded into darkness as we trudged through the water in silence, guns sitting comfortably in our hands and mosquitos biting at our necks.
​
It wasn’t until we lost Feng that I heard anybody so much as make a sound, and when we lost Feng… it happened almost instantaneously. One minute, he was at the head of the group, walking just ahead of Jack and I. The next, he was gone, only barely having the time to let out a scream as he fell into the river ahead of us.
​
The rest of us paused. Jack seemed to freeze and I pushed past him, calling out for Feng as I did. As punishment for my compassion, I almost went down after him. I only barely stopped myself from stepping on the slippery rocks that had helped send him to his demise.
​
I could see Feng’s body in the water, and I could see the blood pouring out of him. He twitched a few times, but I knew he was dead. The sharpened wooden spikes jutting out of him confirmed as much.
“What the hell…” Jack said under his breath, staring at Feng’s corpse in disbelief. “That’s a fucking spike trap!”
​
Yeah.
​
It was indeed a fucking spike trap.
​
I could see other spikes jutting out of the water ahead of us, just past a small dam of rocks that were just slippery enough to make it difficult to stop yourself from falling. Some of those spikes had other bodies on them… likely members of Team 1. I only counted two, although that still didn’t exactly bode well.
​
“They put a fucking spike trap in the goddamn stream…” Jack said, “Who the hell does that?”
“Somebody who’s expecting us to use the stream,” I replied.
“So they know we’re coming?” Barber asked.
“Clearly…” I replied. “And they’ve got a good idea on what our route is too.”
​
“Yeah, no shit!” Barber snapped. “Christ… let’s get the fuck out of here. There’s probably more fucking traps upstream!”
“Bundy’s orders were clear!” Jack argued.
“Bundy’s probably dead by now!” Barber replied, before looking at me. “Sarge, come on. You have to know this is suicide!”
“Suicide was part of the job description, was it not?” I asked.
“The job is to kill those fucking vampires, not to die in the goddamn process! We need to get out of the stream and into the woods!”
​
“Judging by the fate Team 2 met, I’m not sure the forest is someplace we want to be right now,” I replied.
“Excuse me?” Barber asked, “What the hell are you talking about, Sarge?”
“Five men dead, but only one gunshot. How did the rest die?”
​
Barber didn’t seem to be able to answer that.
“By now… yes. It’s clear we’ve walked into a trap. And yes, I understand that it makes sense to try and leave that trap… but I don’t know if we’ll be safer in the jungle. Something jumped Team 2. Cut them apart, and then shot Hernandez as a warning. They didn’t have to shoot him. They did it so we’d hear.”
“Your point being?” Barber asked.
“I don’t think this is just a trap, Barber. It’s a game. Stop playing, and you might just end up like our friends downstream.”
“A game?” Wilson asked, “Sarge, you can’t be serious!”
​
“From where I’m standing, we have a better chance of surviving in the stream,” I said. “Look, we’re at least halfway to the rendezvous point, and there have to be at least two members of Team 1 left. The safest thing to do right now is to follow them.”
“You’re off your fucking rocker, Sarge,” Barber spat, locking his eyes with mine. For a moment, I thought the boy was going to try and fight me. But no. He was wise enough to stand down.
“If you wanna get yourself killed, go right the fuck ahead. Just leave me out of it! Wilson, come on,” Barber said before trudging over to the edge of the stream. Wilson didn’t even hesitate, just looking back at Jack and I quietly before he disappeared into the forest with Barber.
​
“You’re not gonna stop them?” Jack asked.
“No,” I replied. “God willing, there’s a chance that pigheaded asshole is right… dunno how much of a chance, but a chance.”
“Then how come we’re not following him?” Jack asked.
“There’s also a chance he’s wrong.”
I turned, before making my way around the spike trap.
“Keep a slower pace,” I said. “Watch for traps.”
​
Jack hesitated for a moment, but he followed me without any further questions and we walked in silence for a little longer.
​
We heard nothing from the trees. Nothing that told us about the fate of Barber and Wilson. I wasn’t sure if that was good news or not.
​
In fact, I don’t think we heard a thing until about a half hour later, when we heard the explosion.
​
It came out of almost nowhere, but ahead of us I could see a flash of light and hear the screams of men. On instinct, I found myself picking up the pace and could hear Jack behind me. In the low light, I saw a shape float past me in the stream. It took me a moment to realize that it was a severed human arm.
​
In the water ahead of us, I could see a figure clinging to one of the rocks and trying to pick himself up. I recognized him as George Bundy.
​
Jack was at his side almost immediately, trying to help the old man to his feet.
“Sir! Are you alright?”
Bundy just wheezed, before his legs gave out from under him. I helped Jack drag him to the shore so he could sit and rest for a moment.
“What the hell was that?” I asked, looking back at the stream.
“Grenade trap… I think…” Bundy panted, “Fucking tripwire… Popkov tripped it, I think…”
​
Popkov… odds are he was one of the two mangled corpses lying in the river a few feet away from us. It seemed they’d taken the brunt of the explosion, although Bundy still had some shrapnel in his arm that Jack was tending to.
“Christ… whole fucking ops gone to shit…” Bundy spat. “Team 2 got taken out just about as soon as they landed. Someone killed them and dumped them in the goddamn river. Lost half my boys to the fucking spike trap and half to this…”
​
He looked up at us, before spitting onto the ground.
“Guess you two haven’t done much better.”
“Hard to say,” I replied. “Two of ours took off into the woods, trying to avoid the traps.”
“Then they’re dead,” Bundy replied. “I’ve seen her watching us… always just up ahead, always from a distance… she’s seeing how far we’ll go. How much we’ll take…”
“She?” I asked.
“La Morte. Should’ve figured she’d be the one to greet us.”
“La Morte?” I asked.
​
“It’s Italian. Supposedly, she earned that name around the time the Di Cesares fled Venice. It’s funny, the Brethren like to act like the Di Cesares leaving Venice was some big victory of theirs, since before they did, they finally killed one of them… hard to call it a victory though, considering how many corpses they made before they fled. And most of them came from La Morte…”
Bundy winced in pain as Jack bandaged his arm before he continued talking.
​
“See… when the Di Cesare’s left Venice, one of them stayed behind. Clementine, the Scorpio sister. Guess she was unwilling to leave the fight unfinished… and according to the stories, the death toll she personally amassed in the years after the Di Cesare’s left Venice make the bodies they claimed during the Venetian Massacre a hundred and fifty years prior look like a pittance. The Brethren still occupying the city started to call her La Morte. Death. Cuz wherever she went, death followed in her wake… and it seems we’ve walked right into her open arms, haven’t we, boys?”
​
“You’re sure it’s her?” I asked.
“She’s a Di Cesare… and the shit we’ve seen out here… I don’t see any other Di Cesare setting those traps. It’s her. I’m sure of it. She’s watching us. Seeing how far we’ll go. Seeing if we’ll turn tail…”
“Should we?” Jack asked, and Bundy finally seemed to acknowledge him.
“Excuse me?” He asked.
“Should we? Look, sir… I’d follow you into the mouth of Hell, but right now, we’re down from fifteen men to three. Can’t say I’m optimistic about our chances right now. If this woman is half as bad as you’re saying she is, maybe it’s time we took a step back!”
​
Jack looked at me, hoping I might back him up, but I remained silent.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Bundy asked.
“What I’m hearing here, is that as of right now, the vampire out there could kill us at any time. She hasn’t. Far as I’m concerned, that’s mercy. Maybe we should be taking it while it’s offered.”
Bundy stared at him, before chuckling. I think it was the first time I’d ever seen him laugh.
​
“Just walk away, then?” He asked.
“Walk away, and come back better prepared!” Jack corrected.
“Walk away,” Bundy said again. “We walk away now, and there won’t be a chance to come back better prepared. We get one shot at this. One. Failure is not an option. We go in there and we kill them or we die. End of discussion.”
“And how exactly are we even supposed to kill them?” Jack asked, “That curse they have… bullets aren’t gonna do shit, sir!”
“Yours won’t, mine will…”
Bundy pulled his pistol from his holster. I noticed some sort of pattern crudely engraved on it.
​
“I’ve been doing some research… studied the curse they put on themselves… and I think I’ve found a way to break it. Not sure if it’ll work yet… but we get one chance to test it.”
Jack stared at the gun, then back at Bundy.
“Sir… do you hear yourself?” He asked quietly, “You can’t be serious… right now, even with that gun we don’t stand a chance in he-”
​
The gunshot echoed through the forest and made me jump. Jack’s voice died in his throat as he hit the ground.
​
Bundy stared at him for a moment, before huffing and holstering his pistol again. He draped his coat over his shoulders, before looking over at me.
“No room for failure, Frank,” He said calmly.
I didn’t know what to say to that. I stared down at Jack’s body, my mouth hanging open slightly. When I looked back at Bundy, he was already back in the stream.
​
There was a tense silence between Bundy and I as I followed him along the final stretch of the tributary. He trudged on ahead, covered in sweat and straining with every step, but I could sense the quiet determination he had to see this through. Looking at him, you could’ve told me that George Bundy could wipe out the Di Cesare’s all by himself and I would have believed it in a second.
​
The night around us was full of sound, and each one drew my attention. I watched the forest, expecting to see some sign of La Morte watching us. But I saw nothing, except for what she wanted me to see.
“Mill’s just up ahead,” I heard Bundy say as we pressed on, although I noticed his steps faltering as he seemed to notice something in the trees above us. I stopped behind him, looking up before seeing what he saw, and when I saw it I felt my stomach turn.
​
I’d seen death before.
But what Di Cesare had left out for us… that was something else.
Pearce Wilson and Scott Barber weren’t dead.
But if they could have spoke, I’ve got no doubt they would have begged us to kill them. Wilsons pretty face was covered in blood and his pouty lips were parted as more trickled out of him. His curly blond hair was matted and I could see crimson there. Tree branches portruded from his ribs, while the loops of his entrails dangled out of his opened stomach. And Barber was in just about the same state, only he seemed to at least have the ability to turn his head to look at us.
​
I think he might have tried to speak, but the only sound he seemed to be able to make was a pained whimper.
“Jesus Christ…” I said softly.
“He had nothing to do with this,” Bundy replied. He took one last look at the two dying men hanging from the trees, before moving on.
“We should put them out of their misery, sir,” I said.
​
Bundy paused, before looking back at me.
“Don’t waste the ammo, Frank,” He replied. “They’re already dead.”
“Not yet they’re not!”
“Give them time. They chose to go into the woods. They can live with the consequences… for however long that lasts.”
​
With that, he left them. If I were a more compassionate man, I would have put them out of their misery. But no. Bundy moved on and so did I.
​
He approached the water mill, before examining it. It was an old building, made of stone that had long since been overgrown by moss, and sat right on the wall that separated the Di Cesares estate from the amazon. It hardly looked secure, even if the only entrance hadn’t just been an old wooden door secured with a padlock, finding a way in wouldn’t have been difficult. And it didn’t take much for Bundy to break through that door. All he needed was a couple of well placed kicks and it swung right open.
​
Drawing his gun, Bundy strode inside and I followed him.
“The Di Cesare’s will be in the main house,” He said. “We should find a way in through the back, try and catch them off guard. Main target should be the matriarch, Bianca. Her we should prioritize keeping alive… the rest are expendable.”
​
“Much as you are, I’m sure.” A voice called from deeper in the mill, and both Bundy and I froze.
I noticed movement on the floor above us, and through the shadows, I saw a tall woman watching us. She was dressed all in black, with blond hair tied back in a ponytail and the intense eyes of a soldier.
​
This had to be Clementine Di Cesare.
​
Bundy aimed his pistol at her, although she only barely seemed to notice.
“Only two of you left… I’m not sure the odds are in your favor,” The woman said. Her voice was low, calm and quiet.
“Only one way to find out,” Bundy growled.
“And only one way to walk out of this place alive,” Di Cesare countered. “You can put the gun down, turn and walk away. I won’t stop you. There’s no shame in living.”
​
“All the bodies you’ve left in your wake… that’s rich,” Bundy said.
“I don’t relish what I’ve done. I simply don’t know how to do anything else,” She replied. “Think about this, Bundy. Over my lifetime, there have been countless thousands who have come to kill me. All of them are dead, but I am not. Even if you could kill me… you could not kill my sisters. Not all of them. Not before they came for you.”
“Just you, would be enough…” Bundy said, before pulling the trigger.
​
I knew he’d hit her. I knew the bullet pierced her shoulder. But that woman… she didn’t even flinch. She simply dove out of the way before he could shoot again, taking cover and avoiding his next shot.
“Frank, upstairs!” Bundy snapped, “Flush her out!”
I went, trudging up the old wooden steps with my rifle drawn. Only to see Di Cesare vaulting over the railing and back down to the ground floor as soon as I made it up there.
​
Bundy shot at her again, only to miss for a second time. I saw Di Cesare’s arm move, and heard him cry out in pain. In the low light, I could see a dagger protruding from his shoulder. He stumbled back a step, leaving himself open for only a split second.
​
That second was all it took for Di Cesare to raise her own gun and fire just one shot.
​
George Bundy hit the ground without so much as a final scream. There was just a simple hole in his skull where she had shot him.
​
I felt my heart start to race faster. My eyes settled on Bundy’s gun, and I ran for the railing, vaulting it and dropping to the ground below with a thud. Di Cesare shot at me, and I felt the bullet tear through my leg. I reached out for the fallen gun and grabbed it before turning it on Di Cesare, only to find myself staring down the barrel of her own pistol. My finger rested on the trigger, but I didn’t have the guts to pull it.
​
"Kill me, and you will not see the sun tomorrow." She said, her voice still cold and calm.
“Killing you is part of the job…” I replied, but my finger still couldn’t squeeze the trigger.
“And is it worth your life?” Di Cesare asked. “You fail your mission either way.”
“And die with some goddamn honor…”
“There’s no such thing as honor. There is alive and there is dead. Choose.”
​
I knew what I was supposed to choose.
​
But my hands were shaking, as I stared into the face of death. My finger couldn’t squeeze the trigger.
​
The gun collapsed to the floor and Di Cesare kicked it away from me, before huffing and lowering her gun.
“Do not return,” She said softly. “Or next time, I will unleash a hell upon you that will make you beg for simple traps.”
​
She picked Bundy’s gun up off the ground, and then she was gone. After I finally picked myself up off the ground, I was gone too.
​
As I walked back along the stream… I passed the corpses of the men we’d left behind. Barber and Wilson, Jack, Feng, Hernandez, and his team. The flies were already feasting on them. Animals had already torn at them. And as I looked down at their cold corpses, I knew I had made the right choice.
​
I filed my report with the Brethren. Told them that Di Cesare had wiped us out, and a few months later I quietly retired. I never looked back.
​
***
​
“You walked away from her?” Sweeney asked in disbelief, “You had her dead to rights and you walked away from her?”
“I chose to live,” I replied. “Can’t say I regret the decision either. Because of the choice I made, I met my wife and had my kids. I’ve lived the life I had because I chose not to throw it away on some vampire.”
​
Sweeney just shook his head.
“You could have gotten the first confirmed kill on a Di Cesare in two centuries, and you threw it away you fucking coward! I could execute you for that!” I noticed his hand hovering over the gun on his hip.
“You could.” I replied, before quietly unholstering the pistol I kept at my side. I aimed it at Sweeney’s head.
​
He stared at me like a slack jawed idiot.
“Would you like to give it a try?”
“W-what…?”
“Would you like to give it a try, Mr. Sweeney? Or would you like to see the sun tomorrow?”
He stared down the barrel of my gun, and I already knew what his choice would be.
​
Sweeney took a step back. I saw his hand move away from his holster, and I lowered the gun with a huff.
“Thought so,” I said.
Mr. Sweeney left me without another word.
I knew he would not return.

"Think of this as a chance at revenge," Sweeney said.
​
Revenge.
​
What a moronically quaint idea.
​
This jumped up little shit had come into my home, interrupted my retirement and here he was talking to me about revenge, as if he knew the first thing about what I’d seen, what I’d been through, why I’d quit.
​
Looking into his eyes, I knew he didn’t understand. I knew he couldn’t.
​
I've been hunting vampires for most of my life. I've killed more of them than I can count. But Clementine Di Cesare was no ordinary vampire. Hell, none of the Di Cesares were ordinary vampires, but even among them Clementine was… unique. She was the one all the others quietly feared. The one who was even spoken of with reverence by the Di Cesares masters, those twin Immortals who could not be killed by any weapon of this world. Seeking revenge against her was like seeking revenge against death itself.
​
“Revenge?” I repeated, with a dismissive scoff.
“You’re really going to tell me that after what she put you through, you don’t want revenge?” Sweeney asked.
“If you knew what she did to me, you’d know why I don’t want revenge,” I replied.
“Really? Sorry Franklin, but I don’t buy that. Look, I get it if you’re reluctant to jump back into the fight. I do. You of all people know just how dangerous the Di Cesare’s are. Especially ‘La Morte’.”
​
I looked over at him as he said that name. It rolled off his tongue so irreverently. To him, it was just a name. An alias assigned to some vampire he’s only heard of stories. He didn’t utter it with the respect it deserved, and I almost couldn’t be bothered to correct him. Any words spent on this small minded glory hound were probably wasted.
​
“Yes, I do know.”
“Which is why I need you,” Sweeney said. He almost sounded as if he were pleading with me. “Think of this as an opportunity to set things right… to put that vampire bitch in the ground where she belongs, and save God only knows how many lives in the process!”
I sighed.
He just didn’t get it.
​
“Mark my words, Mr. Sweeney, if you chase after Clementine Di Cesare, you’ll end far more lives than you save. She didn’t get a name like ‘La Morte’ for nothing. She earned it. Purchased it with the blood of the tens of thousands she’s sent screaming into the maw of Hell. She is not something you chase, Sweeney.”
“She’s a vampire,” Sweeney said dismissively. “She’s another enemy to destroy.”
“That’s what George Bundy said,” I replied. “Then not too long after, he died.”
“I’m not George Bundy,” Sweeney said.
“No. You sure as hell ain’t,” I agreed, before looking the kid in the eye.
​
He thought he was an up and comer, climbing the ranks of the Brethren. He probably thought of himself as some sort of badass vampire hunter too, when in reality he could never have so much as dreamed of holding a candle to the likes of Bundy… or hell, any of the men who’d died in Brazil.
“You should watch your tone with me,” Sweeney warned.
“Or you’ll do what?” I asked, “You ain’t going to frighten me with vague threats, boy. I’ve walked through Hell, trying to kill the Devil. What have you done?”
​
Sweeney bit his lip but didn’t respond.
“There’s nothing you can say or do that will intimidate me,” I said, before lighting myself a cigarette. I stared at the road outside of my porch, old memories flooding back to me before looking over at Sweeney again. He sat in his chair beside me like a sulky child. This was the man who wanted to destroy the Di Cesare family? Pathetic.
​
“Exactly how much do you know about the Brazil Job?” I asked.
“I know it was a failure. Clementine Di Cesare killed most of the men the Brethren sent out… all except for you. You were the only one good enough to beat her.”
“Good enough…” I repeated with a huff, “Hardly… whatever picture you’ve got in your head of some glorified battle, throw it away. Trust me, the Brazil Job was anything but glorious. It was a two hour long trek through Hell. And I didn’t beat Di Cesare at the end of it. I survived her. They’re two different things entirely.”
“I’m not sure I understand,” Sweeney said.
“You wouldn’t, would you?” I sighed and took another drag on my cigarette.
​
This kid wasn’t going to leave until I made him understand… so I told him my story. I told him everything even though I knew he’d learn nothing from it.
​
***
​
I’d joined up with the Brethren Knights of St. Fontaine back in the 1980s to hunt monsters. Back then, it seemed like the best use of my skills. I’d done my tours with the army, but even after I got out, I was still looking for an enemy to fight. So naturally, once I found out that vampires were real, I set my sights on them. It seemed like the most sensible thing to do at the time.
​
The Brethren Knights fancied themselves the descendants of the Knights Templar, and they insisted that their God given mission was to protect mankind from the things that lurked in the shadows. I didn’t really have much love for God at the time, but if the Bretheren were the ones fighting the monsters, then I was happy to tolerate the Jesus freaks in their ranks.
​
It was 1988 when we first heard whispers of the Imperium. A supposed cabal of vampires, trying to get them organized. At the time, it’d seemed too crazy to be true. Vampires generally went their own way, in my experience. At most, they might have a partner but other than they they didn’t really socialize with their own kind. But supposedly someone out there had the big fucking balls to keep them in line, and whoever they were, they scared the shit out of the Brethren.
​
They’d started targeting high profile vampires, trying to find someone who was involved in this ‘Imperium’, hoping that maybe they might get someone to talk. And it wasn’t long until they found someone who did.
​
From my understanding, the vampire they captured didn’t seem to know much about who was actually running the show. But they knew who their second in command was… and that was when I first head about the Di Cesare family.
​
The name was familiar to some of the higher ups in the Brethren, and I’d heard some stories. Not sure which were true, but the long and short of it was that the Di Cesare’s and the Brethren shared a bloody history, and didn’t particularly like each other too much.
​
George Bundy explained it to me like this at one point: ‘The Di Cesare’s are an old family. Most of them used to be witches, up until their Matriarch turned them into vampires. Now they’re a whole new kind of nasty. Far as I know, the only time anyone’s actually managed to kill one was about 200 years ago. Anyone who’s tried since has ended up dead, so most folks don’t even bother anymore.’
​
I guess it shouldn’t have been surprising they’d be involved in the Imperium, but the mere mention of their name ruffled some feathers higher up on the chain of command, and eventually they put out a kill order on them. Most of the Di Cesare’s were generally pretty hard to track down, but the top brass had a pretty good line on their matriarch, Bianca Di Cesare. Supposedly, she’d been spotted near the family’s private estate in Brazil and rumor had it that most of her daughters were there too.
​
Normally, the brass wouldn’t have sanctioned any kind of attack on them. The Di Cesare’s were already considered off limits, and attacking them at their private estate was considered damn near impossible. The estate was located in a small mining town outside of Manaus called Refugio de Julia, or just Julia for short. The town was fairly remote, being only accessible from a few backroads and most folks tended to avoid it, claiming they’d had various strange encounters in the area. Their accounts described unsettling pale figures with dark hair and large green eyes working in the mines, although some of the more disturbing stories we heard involved sightings of other creatures in the jungle surrounding the town. Massive spiders with humanoid faces, tending rotting corpses filled with stinging bees, giant howling beasts who tore through the forest, hunting prey, and beautiful women who would appear in the nearby towns, betwitching men into coming away with them only to reveal themselves as monsters who fed on the blood of their victims. Some had even claimed the Di Cesares themselves were such beasts… although those claims weren’t taken quite as seriously.
​
A skeptic might say the stories that surrounded Julia seemed like little more than just local superstition… but the Brethren had been dealing with the supernatural for long enough to recognize when something was probably real, and when it was probably fake and they knew damn well that most of the stories about Julia were probably true. None of them had ever dared set foot in Julia to find out for sure, since doing so would probably be suicide, but the theory was that the Di Cesares had created Julia as something of a refuge for other creatures. Other vampires, werewolves, arachne, karah and all sorts of other hellspawn. They offered them a home and safety in exchange for their labor in the mines. Hell, the name of the town more or less spelled it out.
​
Refugio de Julia
​
Julia’s Haven.
​
Julia had been the name of the only member of the Di Cesare family that the Brethren had ever killed, so I guess it was only fitting they named the town after her.
​
I honestly think using other creatures like them as a workforce was a bit inspired… since it made Julia damn near impenetrable. Reaching their estate at the far side of the town would have been impossible without being noticed by every creature of hell living in that town, and odds are they’d tear anyone apart long before they even reached the gates of the Di Cesare estate. And if one had the bright idea to approach the estate from another angle, they’d be trudging through miles and miles of rainforest to do so, only end up face to face with a massive stone wall that kept the rainforest out.
​
In effect - the Di Cesare estate was a fortress. Getting in would be no easy feat, to say nothing of confronting the vampires within. But with the fear of the Imperium gnawing at the back of their minds, the Brethren had finally set their minds to trying.
​
George Bundy had been the one in charge of planning the operation out.
​
I’d known Bundy before I’d joined up with the Brethren. Hell, Bundy was the whole reason I’d joined the Brethren. He’d been my CO a number of years back, and he’d earned his reputation as a hardass just about ten or twenty times over. Bundy was a gruff looking man with a bushy moustache and intense eyes. During the years I knew him, I don’t believe I ever once saw him so much as crack a smile. He only ever seemed to speak when he felt there was something he needed to say. Otherwise, he was usually dead silent.
​
He was somewhere in his late fifties back in 88. By all rights, he ought to have retired years ago. But he refused.
“I’m a soldier,” He said, when I asked him about it once. “That’s all I am. I don’t know what else to be.”
​
Bundy’s initial plan had been to hit the Di Cesare estate from the air. Come in fast and loud with a couple of helicopters and see how those vampires stood up to some good old American flak. The idea got shot down pretty quickly, so to speak. Apperantly, most if not all of the Di Cesares had cursed their own bodies, causing whatever wound one inflicted on them to appear on whoever it was who had wounded them. Going in guns blazing would have ended in a bloodbath… and not for them. There were also some concerns about drawing attention from Julia. With no conclusive data on just what they had living in that town, there was no guarantee we’d be safe in the air. A few eyewitnesses had described seeing giant nests in some of the trees in the jungle, supposedly consistent with the nests made by harpies.
​
Flying in guns blazing was out. So Bundy went back to the drawing board and what he came back with… well, it was ballsy, but it almost seemed like it just might work. During his reconnisance of the Di Cesare’s estate, he’d noticed a large but shallow tributary flowing into the amazon river that led right through the Di Cesare’s estate. Along the tributary was an abandoned water mill, that connected to the Di Cesare estate.
​
He’d suggested using the water mill to gain entry to the grounds, and from there, move on the Di Cesare’s. That plan had been approved, and Bundy had been allowed to handpick his team for the operation. He’d chosen fifteen men, all of them ex military, most of them having served under him before.
​
He’d told us we would be dividing into three teams of five men each. We would leave Manaus by boat, and land at three different areas near the tributary before making our way to the mill on foot, where we would regroup, before moving on the Di Cesares. The reason for the division was to ensure that if any of our teams ran into trouble upon making ground, the entire operation wouldn’t be compromised.
​
Team 1, led by Bundy himself would depart first and land to the west of the tributary. Team 2, led by a man named Ferdinand Hernandez would make land about fifteen minutes later near the mouth of the tributary and Team 3, to be led by me would land fifteen minutes later to the east.
​
On the day of the operation, I sat in my boat, watching as the other two left. It was twilight when we set out, and I remember that as my team and I carried out our final checks on our equipment, the only thing I felt was a familiar anticipation.
​
I’d hesitate to call it fear. Fear is what came later. Anticipation is the better word. I knew we could be walking into a tough situation… but I trusted Bundy. I trusted he’d run a smooth op. God knew, he’d done it a thousand times before.
​
The team assigned to me wasn’t anything particularly special. They were competent enough, but none of them would’ve been my first choices. Jack McMullen, for instance, who was about the same age as I was at the time. We’d both served under Bundy before, although while I respected Bundy, Jack was wholly devoted to him. I swear, if the man had told him to stuff a live grenade up his ass, Jack would’ve done it without a moments hesitation. I dunno if Jack simply saw him as the father he’d never had or what, but he damn near worshipped Bundy.
​
I can’t quite say the same for the other guys we had with us, though. One of them, some greenhorn by the name of Pearce Wilson struck me as an airheaded pretty boy who’d never actually had his boots on the ground before, while the other one, Scott Barber had left a bad taste in my mouth last time we’d worked together. Barber was capable… but he was violent. This was a kid with a hell of a chip on his shoulder, and it looked a hell of a lot like that Confederate flag patch he wore on his jacket. He wanted an excuse to shoot something, and I don’t think he cared what. Under most circumstances I’m not sure I would’ve fully trusted him with a gun.
​
The last one though, Joseph Feng… him I trusted. Feng was the one I knew the least about, and he didn’t seem much for conversation. But he handled himself competently enough and seemed to know when to sit down and shut up.
​
When Team 2’s boat was far enough away, we got the radio signal to follow. Barber was the one steering the boat, so I gave him the order to cast off and we ventured out into the twilight, unaware of just what was waiting for us out there.
​
***
​
We landed in our designated area fifteen minutes after Team 2 confirmed they’d touched down at theirs. Our landing was fairly uneventful. Feng, Barber, and I secured the boat before we radio’d Bundy to let him know we were in position. After that, it was just a matter of making it to the tributary.
​
As we ventured into the jungle, the world around us was quiet. There was wind, the whisper of the river behind us, and the sounds of animals. But little else. The river fell away behind us as we moved in single file toward the tributary, maintaining radio silence as we did.
​
It was about a half hour before we heard the gunshot.
​
Just one, echoing through the twilight. But it was enough to give us pause.
​
“The fuck was that?” I heard Barber ask. Immediately, the kid was on high alert, with his gun raised as if he were expecting every monster in Julia to come charging at us from all angles.
I just listened, waiting to hear if there was anything else. I half expected my radio to come to life, but it didn’t.
“Team 1, status?” I asked.
The radio crackled with static, but there was no response.
​
I tried it again, but still with no success. The radio was working, that much I was sure of. Something had to be blocking the signal.
“What’s going on?” Feng asked.
“Dunno,” I replied. “Comms are down.”
“Down?” Wilson asked, “So we’re flying blind out here, then?”
“More or less,” I replied.
“What do we do? Do we go back… if the comms are down…”
“Just because something’s jamming our signal doesn’t mean we’re made,” I said. “Relax. We keep moving for now. You keep your eyes wide open, and your head on a swivel. We’ll make it to the tributary and see if we can’t meet up with the other teams.”
I could tell Wilson wasn’t a fan of my answer, but I didn’t much care. We had a job to do, and I aimed to do it.
​
I pressed on without a further word and the others followed. Up ahead, I could hear the sound of running water and picked up the pace. I figured the tributary had to be close… and I was right.
​
I emerged from the brush into the stream, only to pause when I saw what was waiting for us in the water.
​
In the dying sunlight, it was impossible to mistake the bodies sprawled out on the rocks as anything else… and all I needed to do was look at their uniforms to know they were our people.
“Jesus…” I heard Wilson say under his breath. He froze up, lingering by the bank as I cautiously approached one of the bodies.
​
It belonged to a somewhat heavyset man with a thin mustache who I recognized as Hernandez. His eyes were still open, although lifeless and staring in different directions, and there was a clean hole in his forehead where a bullet had ended his life. The gunshot we’d heard earlier had likely been the sound of his death.
​
Looking at the bodies around him, I knew they had to be the rest of Team 2… although it was a little harder pinning down their cause of death. Some sort of bladed weapon, perhaps, judging by the state of them. I realized the odds were that they walked into some sort of ambush.
“What about Bundy and Team 1?” Jack asked, “Any sign of them?”
“No,” I said. “These bodies are all from Team 2… Bundy could still be ahead of us.”
“Then we need to keep going!”
​
Jack turned, heading up the stream and Barber was right behind him. Feng paused for a moment, thinking this over before following. Only Wilson remained.
“How do we know we’re not walking into a trap?” He asked.
“We’ll deal with that when we get to it,” I said before moving to follow the others.
“With all due respect, Sarge… that doesn’t sound like the best course of action!” Wilson argued, finally following me. “It sounds just like a good way to get killed!”
“Yeah?” I asked, “I’m gonna tell you an ugly truth, kid. That’s the job. Make your peace with it, and it’ll go a lot easier.”
​
Wilson didn’t like that answer either and trailed off behind me, watching as I continued upstream. For a moment, I half expected him to go back to the boat… but no. I dunno if he found his balls or just didn’t want to get left behind, but he started to follow us again.
​
I kept trying to raise Team 1 on the radio while we walked, although I still had no luck. The light above us slowly faded into darkness as we trudged through the water in silence, guns sitting comfortably in our hands and mosquitos biting at our necks.
​
It wasn’t until we lost Feng that I heard anybody so much as make a sound, and when we lost Feng… it happened almost instantaneously. One minute, he was at the head of the group, walking just ahead of Jack and I. The next, he was gone, only barely having the time to let out a scream as he fell into the river ahead of us.
​
The rest of us paused. Jack seemed to freeze and I pushed past him, calling out for Feng as I did. As punishment for my compassion, I almost went down after him. I only barely stopped myself from stepping on the slippery rocks that had helped send him to his demise.
​
I could see Feng’s body in the water, and I could see the blood pouring out of him. He twitched a few times, but I knew he was dead. The sharpened wooden spikes jutting out of him confirmed as much.
“What the hell…” Jack said under his breath, staring at Feng’s corpse in disbelief. “That’s a fucking spike trap!”
​
Yeah.
​
It was indeed a fucking spike trap.
​
I could see other spikes jutting out of the water ahead of us, just past a small dam of rocks that were just slippery enough to make it difficult to stop yourself from falling. Some of those spikes had other bodies on them… likely members of Team 1. I only counted two, although that still didn’t exactly bode well.
​
“They put a fucking spike trap in the goddamn stream…” Jack said, “Who the hell does that?”
“Somebody who’s expecting us to use the stream,” I replied.
“So they know we’re coming?” Barber asked.
“Clearly…” I replied. “And they’ve got a good idea on what our route is too.”
​
“Yeah, no shit!” Barber snapped. “Christ… let’s get the fuck out of here. There’s probably more fucking traps upstream!”
“Bundy’s orders were clear!” Jack argued.
“Bundy’s probably dead by now!” Barber replied, before looking at me. “Sarge, come on. You have to know this is suicide!”
“Suicide was part of the job description, was it not?” I asked.
“The job is to kill those fucking vampires, not to die in the goddamn process! We need to get out of the stream and into the woods!”
​
“Judging by the fate Team 2 met, I’m not sure the forest is someplace we want to be right now,” I replied.
“Excuse me?” Barber asked, “What the hell are you talking about, Sarge?”
“Five men dead, but only one gunshot. How did the rest die?”
​
Barber didn’t seem to be able to answer that.
“By now… yes. It’s clear we’ve walked into a trap. And yes, I understand that it makes sense to try and leave that trap… but I don’t know if we’ll be safer in the jungle. Something jumped Team 2. Cut them apart, and then shot Hernandez as a warning. They didn’t have to shoot him. They did it so we’d hear.”
“Your point being?” Barber asked.
“I don’t think this is just a trap, Barber. It’s a game. Stop playing, and you might just end up like our friends downstream.”
“A game?” Wilson asked, “Sarge, you can’t be serious!”
​
“From where I’m standing, we have a better chance of surviving in the stream,” I said. “Look, we’re at least halfway to the rendezvous point, and there have to be at least two members of Team 1 left. The safest thing to do right now is to follow them.”
“You’re off your fucking rocker, Sarge,” Barber spat, locking his eyes with mine. For a moment, I thought the boy was going to try and fight me. But no. He was wise enough to stand down.
“If you wanna get yourself killed, go right the fuck ahead. Just leave me out of it! Wilson, come on,” Barber said before trudging over to the edge of the stream. Wilson didn’t even hesitate, just looking back at Jack and I quietly before he disappeared into the forest with Barber.
​
“You’re not gonna stop them?” Jack asked.
“No,” I replied. “God willing, there’s a chance that pigheaded asshole is right… dunno how much of a chance, but a chance.”
“Then how come we’re not following him?” Jack asked.
“There’s also a chance he’s wrong.”
I turned, before making my way around the spike trap.
“Keep a slower pace,” I said. “Watch for traps.”
​
Jack hesitated for a moment, but he followed me without any further questions and we walked in silence for a little longer.
​
We heard nothing from the trees. Nothing that told us about the fate of Barber and Wilson. I wasn’t sure if that was good news or not.
​
In fact, I don’t think we heard a thing until about a half hour later, when we heard the explosion.
​
It came out of almost nowhere, but ahead of us I could see a flash of light and hear the screams of men. On instinct, I found myself picking up the pace and could hear Jack behind me. In the low light, I saw a shape float past me in the stream. It took me a moment to realize that it was a severed human arm.
​
In the water ahead of us, I could see a figure clinging to one of the rocks and trying to pick himself up. I recognized him as George Bundy.
​
Jack was at his side almost immediately, trying to help the old man to his feet.
“Sir! Are you alright?”
Bundy just wheezed, before his legs gave out from under him. I helped Jack drag him to the shore so he could sit and rest for a moment.
“What the hell was that?” I asked, looking back at the stream.
“Grenade trap… I think…” Bundy panted, “Fucking tripwire… Popkov tripped it, I think…”
​
Popkov… odds are he was one of the two mangled corpses lying in the river a few feet away from us. It seemed they’d taken the brunt of the explosion, although Bundy still had some shrapnel in his arm that Jack was tending to.
“Christ… whole fucking ops gone to shit…” Bundy spat. “Team 2 got taken out just about as soon as they landed. Someone killed them and dumped them in the goddamn river. Lost half my boys to the fucking spike trap and half to this…”
​
He looked up at us, before spitting onto the ground.
“Guess you two haven’t done much better.”
“Hard to say,” I replied. “Two of ours took off into the woods, trying to avoid the traps.”
“Then they’re dead,” Bundy replied. “I’ve seen her watching us… always just up ahead, always from a distance… she’s seeing how far we’ll go. How much we’ll take…”
“She?” I asked.
“La Morte. Should’ve figured she’d be the one to greet us.”
“La Morte?” I asked.
​
“It’s Italian. Supposedly, she earned that name around the time the Di Cesares fled Venice. It’s funny, the Brethren like to act like the Di Cesares leaving Venice was some big victory of theirs, since before they did, they finally killed one of them… hard to call it a victory though, considering how many corpses they made before they fled. And most of them came from La Morte…”
Bundy winced in pain as Jack bandaged his arm before he continued talking.
​
“See… when the Di Cesare’s left Venice, one of them stayed behind. Clementine, the Scorpio sister. Guess she was unwilling to leave the fight unfinished… and according to the stories, the death toll she personally amassed in the years after the Di Cesare’s left Venice make the bodies they claimed during the Venetian Massacre a hundred and fifty years prior look like a pittance. The Brethren still occupying the city started to call her La Morte. Death. Cuz wherever she went, death followed in her wake… and it seems we’ve walked right into her open arms, haven’t we, boys?”
​
“You’re sure it’s her?” I asked.
“She’s a Di Cesare… and the shit we’ve seen out here… I don’t see any other Di Cesare setting those traps. It’s her. I’m sure of it. She’s watching us. Seeing how far we’ll go. Seeing if we’ll turn tail…”
“Should we?” Jack asked, and Bundy finally seemed to acknowledge him.
“Excuse me?” He asked.
“Should we? Look, sir… I’d follow you into the mouth of Hell, but right now, we’re down from fifteen men to three. Can’t say I’m optimistic about our chances right now. If this woman is half as bad as you’re saying she is, maybe it’s time we took a step back!”
​
Jack looked at me, hoping I might back him up, but I remained silent.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Bundy asked.
“What I’m hearing here, is that as of right now, the vampire out there could kill us at any time. She hasn’t. Far as I’m concerned, that’s mercy. Maybe we should be taking it while it’s offered.”
Bundy stared at him, before chuckling. I think it was the first time I’d ever seen him laugh.
​
“Just walk away, then?” He asked.
“Walk away, and come back better prepared!” Jack corrected.
“Walk away,” Bundy said again. “We walk away now, and there won’t be a chance to come back better prepared. We get one shot at this. One. Failure is not an option. We go in there and we kill them or we die. End of discussion.”
“And how exactly are we even supposed to kill them?” Jack asked, “That curse they have… bullets aren’t gonna do shit, sir!”
“Yours won’t, mine will…”
Bundy pulled his pistol from his holster. I noticed some sort of pattern crudely engraved on it.
​
“I’ve been doing some research… studied the curse they put on themselves… and I think I’ve found a way to break it. Not sure if it’ll work yet… but we get one chance to test it.”
Jack stared at the gun, then back at Bundy.
“Sir… do you hear yourself?” He asked quietly, “You can’t be serious… right now, even with that gun we don’t stand a chance in he-”
​
The gunshot echoed through the forest and made me jump. Jack’s voice died in his throat as he hit the ground.
​
Bundy stared at him for a moment, before huffing and holstering his pistol again. He draped his coat over his shoulders, before looking over at me.
“No room for failure, Frank,” He said calmly.
I didn’t know what to say to that. I stared down at Jack’s body, my mouth hanging open slightly. When I looked back at Bundy, he was already back in the stream.
​
There was a tense silence between Bundy and I as I followed him along the final stretch of the tributary. He trudged on ahead, covered in sweat and straining with every step, but I could sense the quiet determination he had to see this through. Looking at him, you could’ve told me that George Bundy could wipe out the Di Cesare’s all by himself and I would have believed it in a second.
​
The night around us was full of sound, and each one drew my attention. I watched the forest, expecting to see some sign of La Morte watching us. But I saw nothing, except for what she wanted me to see.
“Mill’s just up ahead,” I heard Bundy say as we pressed on, although I noticed his steps faltering as he seemed to notice something in the trees above us. I stopped behind him, looking up before seeing what he saw, and when I saw it I felt my stomach turn.
​
I’d seen death before.
But what Di Cesare had left out for us… that was something else.
Pearce Wilson and Scott Barber weren’t dead.
But if they could have spoke, I’ve got no doubt they would have begged us to kill them. Wilsons pretty face was covered in blood and his pouty lips were parted as more trickled out of him. His curly blond hair was matted and I could see crimson there. Tree branches portruded from his ribs, while the loops of his entrails dangled out of his opened stomach. And Barber was in just about the same state, only he seemed to at least have the ability to turn his head to look at us.
​
I think he might have tried to speak, but the only sound he seemed to be able to make was a pained whimper.
“Jesus Christ…” I said softly.
“He had nothing to do with this,” Bundy replied. He took one last look at the two dying men hanging from the trees, before moving on.
“We should put them out of their misery, sir,” I said.
​
Bundy paused, before looking back at me.
“Don’t waste the ammo, Frank,” He replied. “They’re already dead.”
“Not yet they’re not!”
“Give them time. They chose to go into the woods. They can live with the consequences… for however long that lasts.”
​
With that, he left them. If I were a more compassionate man, I would have put them out of their misery. But no. Bundy moved on and so did I.
​
He approached the water mill, before examining it. It was an old building, made of stone that had long since been overgrown by moss, and sat right on the wall that separated the Di Cesares estate from the amazon. It hardly looked secure, even if the only entrance hadn’t just been an old wooden door secured with a padlock, finding a way in wouldn’t have been difficult. And it didn’t take much for Bundy to break through that door. All he needed was a couple of well placed kicks and it swung right open.
​
Drawing his gun, Bundy strode inside and I followed him.
“The Di Cesare’s will be in the main house,” He said. “We should find a way in through the back, try and catch them off guard. Main target should be the matriarch, Bianca. Her we should prioritize keeping alive… the rest are expendable.”
​
“Much as you are, I’m sure.” A voice called from deeper in the mill, and both Bundy and I froze.
I noticed movement on the floor above us, and through the shadows, I saw a tall woman watching us. She was dressed all in black, with blond hair tied back in a ponytail and the intense eyes of a soldier.
​
This had to be Clementine Di Cesare.
​
Bundy aimed his pistol at her, although she only barely seemed to notice.
“Only two of you left… I’m not sure the odds are in your favor,” The woman said. Her voice was low, calm and quiet.
“Only one way to find out,” Bundy growled.
“And only one way to walk out of this place alive,” Di Cesare countered. “You can put the gun down, turn and walk away. I won’t stop you. There’s no shame in living.”
​
“All the bodies you’ve left in your wake… that’s rich,” Bundy said.
“I don’t relish what I’ve done. I simply don’t know how to do anything else,” She replied. “Think about this, Bundy. Over my lifetime, there have been countless thousands who have come to kill me. All of them are dead, but I am not. Even if you could kill me… you could not kill my sisters. Not all of them. Not before they came for you.”
“Just you, would be enough…” Bundy said, before pulling the trigger.
​
I knew he’d hit her. I knew the bullet pierced her shoulder. But that woman… she didn’t even flinch. She simply dove out of the way before he could shoot again, taking cover and avoiding his next shot.
“Frank, upstairs!” Bundy snapped, “Flush her out!”
I went, trudging up the old wooden steps with my rifle drawn. Only to see Di Cesare vaulting over the railing and back down to the ground floor as soon as I made it up there.
​
Bundy shot at her again, only to miss for a second time. I saw Di Cesare’s arm move, and heard him cry out in pain. In the low light, I could see a dagger protruding from his shoulder. He stumbled back a step, leaving himself open for only a split second.
​
That second was all it took for Di Cesare to raise her own gun and fire just one shot.
​
George Bundy hit the ground without so much as a final scream. There was just a simple hole in his skull where she had shot him.
​
I felt my heart start to race faster. My eyes settled on Bundy’s gun, and I ran for the railing, vaulting it and dropping to the ground below with a thud. Di Cesare shot at me, and I felt the bullet tear through my leg. I reached out for the fallen gun and grabbed it before turning it on Di Cesare, only to find myself staring down the barrel of her own pistol. My finger rested on the trigger, but I didn’t have the guts to pull it.
​
"Kill me, and you will not see the sun tomorrow." She said, her voice still cold and calm.
“Killing you is part of the job…” I replied, but my finger still couldn’t squeeze the trigger.
“And is it worth your life?” Di Cesare asked. “You fail your mission either way.”
“And die with some goddamn honor…”
“There’s no such thing as honor. There is alive and there is dead. Choose.”
​
I knew what I was supposed to choose.
​
But my hands were shaking, as I stared into the face of death. My finger couldn’t squeeze the trigger.
​
The gun collapsed to the floor and Di Cesare kicked it away from me, before huffing and lowering her gun.
“Do not return,” She said softly. “Or next time, I will unleash a hell upon you that will make you beg for simple traps.”
​
She picked Bundy’s gun up off the ground, and then she was gone. After I finally picked myself up off the ground, I was gone too.
​
As I walked back along the stream… I passed the corpses of the men we’d left behind. Barber and Wilson, Jack, Feng, Hernandez, and his team. The flies were already feasting on them. Animals had already torn at them. And as I looked down at their cold corpses, I knew I had made the right choice.
​
I filed my report with the Brethren. Told them that Di Cesare had wiped us out, and a few months later I quietly retired. I never looked back.
​
***
​
“You walked away from her?” Sweeney asked in disbelief, “You had her dead to rights and you walked away from her?”
“I chose to live,” I replied. “Can’t say I regret the decision either. Because of the choice I made, I met my wife and had my kids. I’ve lived the life I had because I chose not to throw it away on some vampire.”
​
Sweeney just shook his head.
“You could have gotten the first confirmed kill on a Di Cesare in two centuries, and you threw it away you fucking coward! I could execute you for that!” I noticed his hand hovering over the gun on his hip.
“You could.” I replied, before quietly unholstering the pistol I kept at my side. I aimed it at Sweeney’s head.
​
He stared at me like a slack jawed idiot.
“Would you like to give it a try?”
“W-what…?”
“Would you like to give it a try, Mr. Sweeney? Or would you like to see the sun tomorrow?”
He stared down the barrel of my gun, and I already knew what his choice would be.
​
Sweeney took a step back. I saw his hand move away from his holster, and I lowered the gun with a huff.
“Thought so,” I said.
Mr. Sweeney left me without another word.
I knew he would not return.

I’m canadian and visited upstate New York and also visited Michigan. I can’t tell the difference between how we act and talk. In fact I feel closer to Americans in NY or Michigan than East coast Canadians

Hi y’all, looking for some advice, esp older individuals that may have run into the career vs. relationship issue
My partner and I have been together for 4 years. It’s always had it’s up and downs. We have lived in CO since knowing each other, both choosing to come to a Colorado uni, from the east coast ,for the outdoors. We have lived together for 2 years.
Recently I have been looking at a career change. My job is intolerable and is slowly allowing me to spiral into a deep sense on unfulfillment and resentment for my choices. I break down daily and after work curl up to preserve the last bits of emotional energy I have left.
I don’t have a lot of experience in my desired field so the job market is pretty scarce for me right now. Unfortunately Colorado is not ideal for my job market, as many potential businesses are located in NY/OCA etc. My boyfriend has a great job, that he really enjoys, but is remote.
When I asked if he would be willing to move with me if I got a job in a different state, he only responds with “well I want to be out here for another ski season”. When I ask if that means he’d rather be long distance than discuss options and places he may find interesting and move together, he responds “well I’d prefer for you to live with me, but I guess”. I’m not trying to force him to move with me for a potential job- I’m trying to see if it’s even worth applying to jobs out of state or if this means I loose my boyfriend. I’ve even asked if he’d be willing to sign a 6 month lease instead of 12 so I don’t feel like I have to wait out the lease again to find a job and he refuses to talk about it.
So I’m at this point at 24, debating whether I am expecting too much from a fellow 24 yo to give up his dreams of another Colorado ski season ( I mentioned that both CA and Oregon have reasonable seasons too) for my career or if he’s just being selfish and trying to end the relationship (like when you apply for different colleges but don’t discuss staying together and after moving y’all break up).
Our lease is up in a month and I can’t stay in this job much longer, so now I have to make a decision. Wwyd?

Good Friday evening to all of you here on StockMarketChat! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!

• March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
• April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-

($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())

(N/A.)

Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead StockMarketChat. :)

Good Friday evening to all of you here on WallStreetStockMarket! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!

• March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
• April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).

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The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.

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Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.

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What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.

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Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.

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May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.

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How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.

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When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.

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There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).

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This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.

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Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.

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Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.

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All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.

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Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.

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Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.

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Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.

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STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

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(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-

($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())

(N/A.)

Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

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DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

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I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead WallStreetStockMarket. :)

Good Friday evening to all of you here on StockMarketForums! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

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S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

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Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

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Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

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Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

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Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

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Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!

• March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
• April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000

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We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.

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But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.

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All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

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Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-

($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())

(N/A.)

Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead StockMarketForums. :)

Good Friday evening to all of you here on EarningsWhispers! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!

• March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
• April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-

($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())

(N/A.)

Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead EarningsWhispers. :)

Good Friday evening to all of you here on StocksMarket! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!

• March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
• April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-

($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())

(N/A.)

Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead StocksMarket. :)

Good Friday evening to all of you here on FinancialMarket! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!

• March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
• April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-

($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())

(N/A.)

Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead FinancialMarket. :)

Good Friday evening to all of you here on stocks! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!

• March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
• April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-

(*T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())

(N/A.)

Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?
I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead stocks. :)

Good Friday evening to all of you here on StockMarketChat! I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and are ready for the new trading week ahead. :)
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning June 5th, 2023.

Dow leaps 700 points on hot jobs report, Nasdaq notches sixth straight winning week: Live updates - (Source)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Friday as traders cheered a strong jobs report and the passage of a debt ceiling bill that averts a U.S. default.
The 30-stock Dow jumped 701.19 points, or 2.12%, to end at 33,762.76 — its best day since January. The S&P 500 climbed 1.45% to close at 4,282.37. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.07% to 13,240.77, reaching its highest level since April 2022 during the session.
With Friday’s gains, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished the holiday-shortened trading week about 1.8% and 2% higher, respectively. The Dow’s Friday advance pushed it into positive territory for the week, finishing up around 2%. The Nasdaq notched its sixth straight week higher, a streak length not seen for the technology-heavy index since 2020.
Nonfarm payrolls grew much more than expected in May, rising 339,000. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a relatively modest 190,000 increase. It marked the 29th straight month of positive job growth.
Recently strong employment data had been pressuring stocks on the notion it would keep the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. But Friday data also showed average hourly earnings rose less than economists expected year over year, while the unemployment rate was higher than anticipated.
Both data points have given investors hope that the Fed could pause its interest rate hike campaign at the policy meeting later this month, according to Terry Sandven, chief equity strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.
“The so-called Goldilocks has entered the house,” Sandven said. “Clearly, on the bullish side, there are signs that inflation is starting to wane, speculation that the Fed is going to move into pause mode, increasing the likelihood of a soft landing.”
Easing concerns around the U.S. debt ceiling also helped sentiment. The Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling late Thursday night, sending the bill to President Joe Biden’s desk. That comes after the House passed the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Wednesday, just days before the June 5 deadline set by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
Lululemon shares popped more than 11% on strong results and a guidance boost, while MongoDB surged 28% on a blowout forecast.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

S&P Sectors for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE S&P SECTORS FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

A Resilient Labor Market = A Resilient Economy

Another month, another employment surprise. Should we be surprised anymore?
Economists expected payrolls to grow by about 187,000 in May. That’s still a solid job growth number, but a stepdown from what we’ve seen this year through April. However, actual payroll growth beat expectations for the 14th straight month.
The economy created 339,000 jobs in May, close to double expectations. Better still, payroll growth in March and April were revised higher by a total of 93,000!

• March payrolls were revised up by 52,000, from 165,000 to 217,000
• April payroll were revised up by 41,000, from 253,000 to 294,000

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

We’ve got two months of payroll data since the Silicon Valley Bank crisis in March, and nothing suggests weakness arising from that banking crisis.
Over the first five months of the year, the economy’s added 1.5 million jobs. That in a nutshell tells you how the economy is doing. For perspective, the average annual payroll growth between 1940 and 2022 was 1.5 million. During the last expansion, 2010-2019, average annual payroll growth was 2.2 million per year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

But what about the unemployment rate?
The unemployment rate did rise from a 50-year low of 3.4% to 3.7%. This does raise some cause for concern but digging through the data suggests it may be noise more than anything else.
It probably helps to understand that the job growth and unemployment rate data come from different sources. The former comes from asking about 120,000+ businesses how many people they hired. The latter comes from asking about 60,000 households about their employment status. No surprise, the latter is noisier.
A big reason for the weak household survey (and rising unemployment rate) is that more than 400,000 people who were self-employed said they were no longer employed. As you can see in the following chart this is very noisy data, but the recent trend seems to be toward lower self-employment. It’s basically reversing the surge we saw in 2021, when self-employment surged. So, what we’re seeing now may simply be normalization of the labor market as more workers move from self-employment to W2 jobs with an employer.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Also, the unemployment rate can be impacted by people leaving the labor force (technically defined as those “not looking for work”) and an aging population. I’ve discussed in prior blogs how we can get around this by looking at the employment-population ratio for prime age workers, i.e. workers aged 25-54 years. This measures the number of people working as a percent of the civilian population. Think of it as the opposite of the unemployment rate, and because we use prime age, you also get around the demographic issue.
The good news is that the prime-age employment-population ratio dropped only a tick, from 80.8% to 80.7%. This still leaves it higher than at any point between 2002 and 2022.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the labor market remains strong and resilient, despite all the recession calls. Perhaps its not as strong as the headline payroll growth number of 339,000 suggests, but any number above 150,000 would be good at this point. And we’re certainly well above that.
In fact, looking at the job growth and employment-population data, this labor market is probably the strongest we’ve seen since the late 1990’s. Our view since the end of last year has been that the economy can avoid a recession this year, and nothing we’ve seen to date suggests we need to reverse that view. Far from it.

June Better in Pre-Election Years

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Since 1971 June has shone brighter on NASDAQ stocks as a rule ranking eighth best with an 0.8% average gain, up 29 of 52 years. This contributes to NASDAQ’s “Best 8 Months” which ends in June. Small caps also fare well in June. Russell 2000 has averaged 0.6% in June since 1979 advancing 63.6% of the time.
June ranks near the bottom on the Dow Jones Industrials just above September since 1950 with an average loss of 0.2%. S&P 500 performs similarly poorly, ranking ninth, but essentially flat (0.02% average gain).
Despite being much stronger S&P 500 pre-election year June ranks fifth best. For the rest it is just sixth best. Average monthly gains in pre-election year June range from DJIA 1.1% to a respectable 2.4% for NASDAQ. Russell 2000 has been the most consistently bullish in pre-election years, up 8 of the last 11 (72.7% of the time).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

The June Swoon?

Stocks did it again, as the S&P 500 gained 0.2% in the month of May, making it now 10 of the past 11 years that stocks finished green in May. Of course, it gained only 0.01% last year and only 0.25% this year, so the recent returns weren’t off the charts by any measure.
Looking specifically at this year, tech added more than 9% in May, thanks to excitement over AI and Nvidia, with communication services and consumer discretionary also in the green, while the other eight sectors were lower.
Specifically, turning to the month of June, stocks historically have hit a bit of trouble here. Since 1950, up 0.03% on average, the fourth worst month of the year. Over the past 20 years, only January and September have been worse and in the past decade, it is again the fourth worst month. The one bit of good news is during a pre-election year is it up 1.5%, the fifth-best month of the year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here’s another chart we’ve shared before, but years that gained big in January (like 2023) tend to see some periods of consolidation in late May/early June, but eventually experience a surge higher into July. Given the flattish overall May, this could be playing out again.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

What if stocks were having a good year heading into June? Since 1950, if the S&P 500 was up more than 8% for the year going into June (like this year), the month of June was up an impressive 1.2% on average versus the average June return of 0.03%, while in a pre-election year the returns jumped to 1.8%. The percent of the time where returns were higher gets better as well, from 54.8% in your average June to nearly 74% if up 8% or more for the year heading into June, to 80% of the time higher if up 8% for the year in a pre-election year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Overall, it has been a very nice run for stocks this year and we remain overweight stocks in the Carson Investment Research House Views. June could potentially cause some volatility, but when all is said and done, we wouldn’t bet against more strength and higher prices in June.

NASDAQ and Russell 2000 Lead June Pre-Election Strength

Over the last 21 years, June has been a rather lackluster month. DJIA, S&P 500 and Russell 1000 have all recorded average losses in the month. Russell 2000 has fared better with a modest average gain. Historically the month has opened respectably, advancing on the first and second trading days.
From there the market then drifted sideways and lower into negative territory just ahead of mid-month. Here the market rallied to create a nice mid-month bulge that quickly evaporated and returned to losses. The brisk, post, mid-month drop is typically followed by a month end rally led by technology and small caps.
Historical performance in pre-election years has been much stronger with all five indexes finishing with average gains. June’s overall pattern in pre-election is similar to the last 21-years pattern with a brief, shallow pullback after a solid start.
In pre-election years the mid-month rally has been much more robust beginning around the sixth trading day and lasting until the fifteenth. Followed by another modest retreat and rally into the end of Q2.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

May and YTD 2023 Asset Class Performance

May 2023 is now behind us, and below is a look at how various asset classes performed during the month using US-listed exchange-traded products as proxies. We also include YTD and YoY total returns.
May was a month of divergence where Tech/AI soared, and the rest of the market fell. Notably, the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) gained 7.88% in May while the Dow Jones Dividend ETF (DVY) fell 7.7%. That's a 15 percentage-point spread!
At the sector level, it was a similar story. While the Tech sector (XLK) rose 8.9%, sectors like Energy (XLE), Consumer Staples (XLP), Materials (XLB), and Utilities (XLU) fell more than 5%. In total, 8 of 11 sectors were in the red for the month.
Outside the US, we saw pullbacks in most areas of the world other than Brazil, India, and Japan. China, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, and the UK all fell more than 5%.
All of the commodity-related ETFs/ETNs were in the red for May, with oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) falling the most at more than 10% each.
Finally, fixed-income ETFs also fell in May as interest rates bounced back. The aggregate bond market ETF (AGG) was down 1.14% in May, leaving it up just 2.6% YTD and down 2.2% year-over-year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Worried Should We Be About Consumer Debt?

A very common question we get these days is whether we’re concerned about the massive increase in consumer debt.
Short answer: No. Well, not yet anyway. But let’s walk through it in 6 charts.
The New York Federal Reserve (NY Fed) releases a quarterly report on household debt and credit, and the latest one that was released last week came with the headline:
“Household Debt Hits $17.05 Trillion in First Quarter.” But let’s look at the details. Household debt increased by $148 billion in Q1. That translates to a 0.9% increase, which is the slowest quarterly increase in two years. Most of the increase in debt was from mortgage originations ($121 billion) – mortgage debt makes up $12 trillion of the total $17 trillion in debt. The rest was auto loan and student loan balances.
Here’s something interesting: credit card balances were flat in Q1, at $986 billion. The fact that overall balances are higher than where they were in 2019 ($927 billion) should not be surprising given we just experienced a lot of inflation. Prices rose at the fastest pace in 40 years, and so you should expect card balances to increase. However, incomes rose as well.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

When you think debt, the key question is whether households are able to service that debt. A good measure of that is to look at debt service costs as a percent of disposable income. As of Q4 2022, that’s at 9.7%, slightly lower than what it was before the pandemic and well below the historical average.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

There’s even better news: disposable income grew 2.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Significantly higher than the 0.9% increase in total household debt, let alone interest costs!
Part of that includes the large boost to social security income due to inflation adjustments in January. Also, tax brackets were adjusted higher, resulting in more money in household wallets.
But even if you exclude these one-off increases, disposable income growth has been strong between February and April, rising at a 5% annualized pace. In fact, employee compensation by itself has risen at a 3.9% annualized pace over the past three months. Meanwhile, inflation is running just about 3% – which means households are seeing real income gains (adjusted for inflation).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

This is why consumers don’t feel the need to borrow to the extent they did before the pandemic. Credit utilization rates measure credit card balances as a percent of available credit. As you can see in the following chart, utilization rates for both credit cards and home equity lines of credit are well below pre-pandemic averages.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Lack of stress showing in delinquency data as well
Another way to look for signs of consumer stress is to look at the debt delinquency data. As of the first quarter, the NY Fed survey showed that the percent of loan balances that were more than 90 days delinquent was stable around 1.5%. That’s down from 1.9% a year ago, and quite a bit below the 3% average in 2019.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Even third-party collections are at record lows, with just over 5% of consumers having collections against them as of the first quarter. This is down from 6% a year ago and below the 2019 average of 9.2%. The average collection amount per person is $1,316, which is lower than the $1,452 average in late 2019. This is surprising because just with inflation you’d have thought the amount would be higher.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

All in all, the data on consumer finances is not showing much cause for concern. So, count us in the “not worried” camp. At least, not yet.

Some Good Inflation News

While the market prices in a much higher likelihood of a rate hike at the June meeting, there was actually some decent news on the inflation front today. Starting with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence report, in this month's update, the inflation expectations component fell to 6.1% from a peak of 7.9% fifteen months ago in March 2022 (first time reading touched 7.9%). Looking at the chart below, this reading was also at 6.1% fifteen months before that first peak. In other words, for all the talk about how inflation has been stickier, the pace of decline in this indicator on the way down has been the same as the pace of increase on the way up.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Another notable report was today's release of the Dallas Fed Manufacturing report. The Prices Paid component of that report showed a decline from 19.5 down to 13.8 which was the lowest reading since July 2020. For the month of May, two of the five components (Empire and Philadelphia) showed modest m/m increases from multi-month lows, and three showed significant declines to multi-month lows. The chart below shows a composite of the Prices Paid component using the z-scores for each of the five individual components going back to 2010. The peak for this component was 19 months ago in November 2021. Unlike the inflation expectations of the Conference Board survey, this reading hasn't declined quite as fast as it increased in the 19 months leading up to the peak, but at -0.2, it is still below its historical average dating back to 2010 and back down to levels it was at right before the COVID shock hit the economy in early 2020.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Home Prices Bounce in Hardest Hit Areas

March data on home prices across the country were released today with updated S&P CoreLogic Case Shiller numbers. Case Shiller home prices had been falling rapidly in many of the twenty cities tracked, but in March we actually saw a pretty big month-over-month bounce in some of the hardest-hit areas like San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Denver, and Phoenix. Some cities still saw declines, however. Las Vegas saw a m/m drop of 0.93%, while Miami fell 0.41%, and Seattle fell 0.28%.
On a year-over-year basis, Miami is still up the most with a gain of 10.86%. As shown in the table below, Miami home prices are up 59.87% from pre-COVID levels in February 2020, and they're only down 2.9% from post-COVID highs. Only Tampa is up more than Miami from pre-COVID levels (+61.04%), but Tampa prices are down more from their post-COVID highs (-4.70%) than Miami (-2.90%).
Four cities are down more than 10% from their post-COVID highs: San Diego (-10.12%), Las Vegas (-10.95%), San Francisco (-16.35%), and Seattle (-16.50%). New York is down the least from post-COVID highs of any city tracked at just -2.9%.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Below we include charts of home price levels across all 20 cities tracked by Case Shiller along with the three composite indices. We've included a vertical red line on each chart to highlight pre-COVID levels. When looking through the charts, you can see this month's small bounce back in most cities after a 6-9 month pullback in prices from peaks seen early last year.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending June 5th, 2023

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 6/2/23

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here is the list of notable tickers reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-

($NIO $GTLB $GME $CIEN $DOCU $SAIC $ASO $SJM $CXM $THO $OLLI $MOMO $CBRL $FERG $TTC $HQY $CPB $PLAY $QMCO $FCEL $LOVE $ABM $CNM $HTOO $TCOM $JOAN $UNFI $SFIX $CHS $GIII $SIG $SMAR $PL $ZFOX $HYZN $VRA $CASY $MTN $SMTC $ALYA $DBI $SCWX $JILL $OESX $BSE $REVG $VBNK $VRNT $RENT $HCP)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!]())

(N/A.)

Here is the full list of companies report earnings for this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 6.5.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Monday 6.5.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 6.6.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 6.7.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 6.8.23 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Friday 6.9.23 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES LINK!)

Friday 6.9.23 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

(NONE.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.)

(T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.) (T.B.A. THIS WEEKEND.).

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?

Join the Official Reddit Stock Market Chat Discord Server HERE!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great new trading week ahead StockMarketChat. :)