Bulls, Bears, & The Bell Afternoon Edition 11/5/25

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
OK, let's let's unpack this. We're diving into the market
action from Wednesday, November 5th, 2025.
And it really showed this deep divine, didn't it?
This clash between macro hope and micro reality.
It really did a huge collision. You had this this fleeting
optimism from well, frankly scarce economic data and then
the sort of brutal micro view, skepticism about valuations just

(00:24):
hitting hard. It was.
A classic tug of war. The market spent the day trying
to climb out of Tuesday's big sell off.
Yeah. Trying desperately.
But those gains? Poof, gone right after the bell.
Exactly. And what's fascinating really is
the pressure cooker environment.You've got this historic
government shutdown, right? 36 days now a total data
blackout. The longest ever.
The longest and on the other hand, this pervasive fear,

(00:45):
almost paranoia about an AI bubble.
So every little piece of data gets this extreme reaction.
So our goal today is really to synthesize this how did the
market manage that fragile rebound during the day?
Why did it evaporate overnight? And crucially, how is this, you
know, historic data vacuum changing the game for investors,
especially in high growth? Let's start with the rebound

(01:07):
itself, OK? Yeah, the day session we saw
indices close positive trying torecover from that sharp tech LED
drop on Tuesday. The S&P 500 gained .78%, the Dow
of .62% and NASDAQ LED up over 1%.
Looked like a recovery. It looked like it on the
surface, but, you know, you scratch beneath that surface and
the foundation was shaky, reallyshaky.

(01:28):
This whole upswing, it was almost entirely driven by one
single report, the ADP private employment report.
Yeah, it showed. What was it?
42,000 jobs added in October, which OK beat the forecast
26,000 A nice beat. And this just screams market
desperation, doesn't it? Because the official BLS report,
the quote UN quote gold standardjobs report, it's indefinitely

(01:50):
delayed by the shutdown. So investors had literally
nothing else. They put in massive weight on a
secondary report just because itwas the only macro headline out
there. Precisely.
And we know historically ADP doesn't always line up that well
with the official BLS numbers. It's it's a substitute, sure,
but not a reliable replacement. And even worse, if you looked

(02:11):
inside the ADP report, the details were well concerning.
It was really split. Large companies, they added
74,000 jobs, OK, but small businesses they lost 15,000
jobs. Still feeling the pain?
So that weakness was just ignored by the Bulls.
Pretty much ignored by the headline choicers.
It suggests the rebound was built on, you know, an easily
digestible number, not actual economic strength.

(02:34):
OK. So that split that positive
headline versus the kind of uglydetails that sets up the main
conflict indices rise on this brief macro hope.
Fleeting hope. But the market's real worry, the
dominant concern was still therestretched tech valuations.
The S&P 500's forward PE people were citing it at 23 times
earnings. That's way above the five year
average of 20. Yeah.

(02:54):
Think about that jump 20X to 23X.
That's like a 15% premium you'repaying for future earnings.
Pretty aggressive pricing, especially when the economy is,
like we said, flying blind without official data.
And you saw that tension during the day.
Big tech names, NVIDIA, Alphabet, they bounced back.
Yeah, they led the rebound. But these were the exact same

(03:15):
stocks that got hammered the daybefore.
So the underlying valuation concern, it wasn't fixed, it was
just sort of tabled for a few hours.
OK, help me square this because it feels a bit contradictory.
You have NVIDIA and Alphabet up strongly suggesting faith in AI,
but then companies actually making money from AI or in that
supply chain, they got punished brutally when they reported

(03:36):
earnings. Is that like a rotation within
tech or just market confusion? I wouldn't call it confusion,
more like financial rigor demanding proof.
The stocks that reported during the day showed that fear was
still very much alive. Look at AMD Advanced Micro
Devices. Again, D fell.
Fell 3%, and this was despite reporting record results the
night before. Record results?

(03:57):
Booming AI sales apparently weren't enough to justify that
high valuation. Wow.
Not enough? Nope.
Expectations were just too high.And it wasn't just the chip
makers getting hit, was it? Oh.
Not at all. Look at Pinterest, pins
plummeted, 22% missed on revenue, missed on earnings.
Ouch. And super micro computer SMCI
key hardware name sank 9.5% after missing estimates too.

(04:20):
This isn't just one sector. It suggests investors are losing
faith and speculative growth across the board.
They want proof now. Margin, perfection, real
profits, not just, you know, a good story.
So the day ends positive on the indices, but it sounds like the
bears were just waiting in the wings.
Where did that anxiety pop up next?
Immediately as soon as the regular session closed after

(04:41):
hours trading futures just turned lower straight away.
Erased all that ADP optimism really.
Yep, NASDAQ 100 futures down .6%by 8:00 PM Eastern.
The market just snapped right back to that core.
Skepticism Proved to me these high valuations are justified.
OK. Let's zoom in on Qualcomm, then
QC on them because that reactionseems to really hammer home the
point. They delivered what everyone

(05:03):
call a gold standard quarter. Absolutely textbook.
A beat and raise beat on EPS, beat on revenue gave bullish
guidance for Q1 better than expected.
Everything you want everything. And the stock still fell 1.7% in
extended trading. Yeah.
And this isn't just normal profit taking.
This is a big signal. It's a classic sell the news

(05:24):
event. It tells you the institutions
that push the stock up before the report use the good news
itself as an opportunity to get out to de risk.
So all the good news was more than priced in already.
More than priced in the market is basically saying thanks for
the good quarter, now give me mymoney back.
It shows the bar for success in tech right now, especially high
valuation tech is just impossibly high.

(05:47):
And this wasn't just Qualcomm, right?
We saw Aplovin APP drop after hours too.
Why is that significant? Well, Aplovin is kind of a
bellwether for mobile ads. Digital monetization.
Seeing at Fall, too, confirms the skepticism isn't just about
AI chips. It's broader.
It's about the whole digital ecosystem that fuels growth.

(06:08):
The selling pressure is widespread, but we should
mention a contrast. Fortinet FTNT cybersecurity
name, they actually did OK, reported a beat.
And importantly, strong Billingsgrowth, 14% that countered this
negative story that had been weighing on cyber stocks,
Billings growth that poised to future contracts, future
revenue. So the market rewarded that.

(06:29):
It seems so. It suggests the market isn't
selling all tech blindly. It's being selective.
It's punishing the frothiest AI names, the semiconductor
darlings, maybe, but rewarding companies outside that hype that
show real financial rigor? Like strong future bookings.
That selectivity just raises thestakes even higher for the next
batch of earnings, doesn't it? Especially after Qualcomm.
Absolutely. You look at ARM Holdings.

(06:50):
ARM trading at what, 84 times forward earnings?
Insane multiple and the options market is pricing in a massive
10.7% move on earnings. Huge implied move.
Or Robin Hood 8 Hood needs to hit a 200% jump in year over
year EPS. It feels like these stocks are
now being measured against that Qualcomm reaction, and the
market's trigger finger is itchy.

(07:10):
Very itchy, the pressure is immense.
And all of this volatility, thisnervousness, it's happening in
this giant shadow. The government shutdown 36 days,
longest in U.S. history. That context is absolutely
critical right now. People talk about the economic
cost, maybe $7 billion lost output, sure.
But for the market, the big issue is the systemic risk.

(07:31):
No data, right? The shutdown means no critical
government data releases. The total reserve is essentially
flying blind. How can they make informed
decisions on interest rates, on inflation, on jobs without the
actual data they. Can't.
So it's not just inconvenient, it's actively messing with
market mechanics. It suppresses volatility by
removing the big macro reports like the jobs number, but then

(07:52):
it forces everyone to overreact to the minor stuff like ADP
because it's all they have. The market becomes myopic tunnel
vision. Well said.
Myopic is the perfect word. And here's a really important
warning for listeners. You'll probably still see
financial news sites listing theofficial BLS jobs report for
Friday, November 7th. Right.

(08:13):
That is wrong. It's incorrect.
The report is delayed because ofthe shutdown.
Don't be misled. The only major macro point this
week that is coming out is the University of Michigan Consumer
Sentiment survey. And given this data vacuum.
That sentiment number is going to get huge attention.
Huge oversized attention. Expect the same kind of leverage
reaction we saw with ADP. OK, so let's try to tie this all

(08:35):
together. What's the synthesis here?
I think the dynamic is crystal clear now.
The market is prioritizing shortterm proof financial rigor over
long term stories without reliable government data,
without that official strong economy narrative to backstop
high valuation. Right, no safety net.
The market is just selling the micro reality of earnings
reports. Any disappointment or even just

(08:56):
meeting expectations like Qualcomm, it gets sold.
Macro hope gets overridden by micro skepticism fast.
The QCM and reaction proved thatdefinitively.
And this earnings driven roller coaster, it's set to continue.
We've got Moderna before the open tomorrow, Microchip
Technology after the close. They're all facing that
incredibly high bar set by Qualcomm.

(09:17):
A beat might just not be good enough anymore.
That's the key take away. The data vacuum has made the
market hyper selective, hyper volatile around individual
earnings. The message from Qualcomm, from
Applevan loud and clear. Good news is being treated as an
exit round. So you've seen how strong
performance of beat and raise even is getting sold almost
immediately, an impossibly high bar for growth stocks.

(09:40):
And we have 0 official data to prove the underlying economy can
even support these kinds of valuations.
Given this intense skepticism, this readiness to sell, what
specific data point, macro or micro, could possibly turn the
sentiment around right now? What could satisfy a market that
seems actively looking for excuses to take profits?
Something for you to think aboutas we all navigate this
unprecedented data blackout.