Volatility Pulse - Mission Accomplished
Gold And Bitcoin Evict The Chip Funds
GLD and IBIT just reclaimed spots in the Top 10 most-traded ETFs, bumping out semiconductor funds that dominated all summer. The debasement trade may be quietly replacing AI mania.
Source: Bloomberg
Bitcoin Just Went From $64K To $77K In A Minute
Bitcoin ETFs pulled in $2 billion last week — their best week since October 2025, when Bitcoin jumped from $64,000 to $77,000 'in a New York minute.' The money is back.
Source: Bloomberg
$120 Billion In Precious Metals — One Day
At the peak of 'Metal Mania' earlier this year, precious metal ETFs traded over $120 billion in a single day. For context, that's more daily volume than the entire German stock market. The current pickup is 'not remotely near' that peak.
Source: Baird Strategas via Bloomberg
Silver: -2.6% This Year, -43% From Its High
SLV is only down -2.6% year-to-date — sounds fine. But it's sitting 43% below its 52-week high. A massive round-trip hiding in a 'flat' year.
Source: Bloomberg
Visa Hits ATH, Consumer 'Completely Dead'
Visa just broke to an all-time high. Supposedly because no one is spending anything and the consumer is toast. The payments network that processes every swipe disagrees.
Source: Bloomberg
Apple's App Store: First Decline In A Decade
US consumer spending on Apple's App Store fell year-over-year in Q2 for the first time in a decade. After 10 straight years of growth, the line went red.
Source: Financial Times via SensorTower
Tech Is 37% Of The Index, 2% Of The Winners
Info Technology is 37.4% of the S&P 500's weight but only 2.4% of names near a 52-week high. Health Care is 9.5% of the weight and 27.1% of the leadership. The biggest sector isn't running this rally.
Source: Bloomberg via @HostileCharts
Corporate Profits At An All-Time High
After-tax corporate profits just hit 12.1% of GDP — the highest share ever recorded going back to 1947. The prior peak was around 11.5%. The earnings expansion since 2020 has gone further than anyone expected.
Source: EPB Research
Profits Up 22.8% — Nobody's Talking About It
US corporate profits with IVA and CCA hit $4,827 billion annualized in Q2 — up +22.84% year-over-year. The kind of earnings acceleration that used to trigger a bull market conversation.
Source: Bloomberg
AI Margins: The App Guys Are Losing
Average operating margins in the AI value chain: Models and applications -59%, Compute and cloud +11%, Energy and grid +24%, Silicon and equipment +41%. The companies building the shovels for the AI gold rush are capturing all the economics.
Source: Apollo
Six 'Local' Waters, One Company
Arrowhead, Ice Mountain, Ozarka, Deer Park, Zephyrhills, and Poland Spring all feel like regional brands. They're one company — sold together in 2021 for $4.3 billion to Primo Brands. The water on your local shelf has a global owner.
Source: Bloomberg
Your Electric Bill Is Up 72% Since 2001
The average retail price of electricity has surged across almost every US state since 2001 — DC up 72%, Maine up 67%, California up 50%, Pennsylvania up 46%. Only North Dakota saw prices fall. The power grid is getting more expensive before it gets bigger.
Source: US EIA via Visual Capitalist
Just Because...
Manhattan For A Nutmeg Island
In the 1667 Treaty of Breda, the Dutch handed over New Amsterdam — now Manhattan — to the English. What they took back was Run, a speck in the Indonesian Banda islands, because Run grew nutmeg and nutmeg was then worth more than gold. The Dutch thought they had won. Manhattan now has a GDP of roughly $800 billion.
