The expensive parts of Mag 7 sold off this week NVDA -7.1% TSLA -5.9% MSFT -4.1% META -4.1% GOOG -0.8% AAPL -0.7% AMZN 0.1% AI hype cooled as investors questioned rich valuations and slow payoffs. Fed doubts, weak data, and profit-taking drove a rotation out of big tech into safer ground

I'm a convert for microsuction - I can hear beautifully now just in time for my Bank of England livestream this evening. The lady removing the wax was almost performing an exorcism at one point as it didn't want to budge. Look at that malleus!

'I could smell the onions and the mustard'

"UBS chair warns of ‘looming systemic risk’ from private credit ratings" Poor timing, I shot my private credit video over the weekend 😔 on.ft.com/3LeYgU2

"Research" by Barclays: "Over 40% of people lose money after following finfluencer ‘advice’". The article does suggest getting verification for the good influencers which isn't a bad idea www.ftadviser.com/social-media...

Ooof.

Ronald Reagan’s 1987 radio address on tariffs is trending again. Here’s what he actually said about trade, protectionism, and American leadership. Full transcript: www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/spe...

Failed to dodge the showers

Edinburgh castle failing to render, likely thanks to the AWS outage

Coinbase, Perplexity and Xero down due to AWS outage I thought one of the arguments for cloud computing was to avoid these stability issues?

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This is what you requested... ... not sure the answer is what you expected (if you had read my column and you would have known this)

🚨 The First Brands Collapse: A Private Credit Wake-Up Call US auto parts maker First Brands filed for bankruptcy (Sept 28, 2025) with $10–50B liabilities vs $1–10B assets — and $2.3B in assets vanished. The case has shaken confidence in the $2T private credit market

I've been called out on my abnormal hand movements

Perplexity is pony

@robarmstrong.bsky.social and @darioperkins.bsky.social doing a valuable public service in this morning’s Unhedged newsletter: on.ft.com/4nOovPA

Very interesting article on how the “Liberation Day” tariff shock in April 2025 triggered a rare reversal: the US dollar fell even as market volatility spiked, undermining its usual safe-haven role cepr.org/voxeu/column...

Here we go

B of A: “.. Big large cap outflows: Sales of single stocks in the last two weeks were the 3rd-largest of any 2-week period since ’08, driven by large caps ..” [Subramanian]

The gilt market will be breathing a sigh of relief. Rachel Reeves signals big tax rises in the next Budget, citing wars, higher borrowing costs, Trump tariffs, and a productivity downgrade as game-changers for UK fiscal policy. Iron discipline but tough choices ahead. More: on.ft.com/476sShR

Will this quash the appetite for this brand of economic populism? "US offers financial lifeline to Argentina’s Javier Milei" on.ft.com/3KdLTad

Bought a Sony ZV-E10M2 to improve video quality but... 🍊

British households put a record £103bn into individual savings accounts (Isas) in the latest annual figures for the tax-friendly savings vehicles... 😀 revealing a strong appetite for the certainty of cash 😔 "UK households prefer cash, as they plough record sums into Isas" on.ft.com/4nwikig

Independent

* FED SAYS GOVERNOR MIRAN DISSENTS IN FAVOR OF HALF-POINT CUT

New FOMC projections: Higher GDP Growth Lower Unemployment Higher Inflation Lower Interest Rates

What difference does it make? Changing and not changing membership of the Fed a day before the policy decision is not likely to change the outcome. secure.ubs.com/global/en/we... #EconSky

S&P Index vs Active Europe Mid-Year 2025 just published: Long-term results show nearly all GBP global equity funds lagged—97% underperformed their benchmark over 10 years www.spglobal.com/spdji/en/spi...

A sovereign borrowing at higher rates than one of its companies 😟

Volatility isn't risk - here's a nice example of a high yield fund vs global equity. Both fell by about 30% in 2020 but equity rebounded more strongly. Notice the low volatility of the high yield fund, it's very low at 5% vs 15% for global equity. Lots of people reaching for yield right now 😟

Long duration gilts: old man's crypto 👴📈

Genius

US jobs numbers look very weak with just 22,000 jobs added in August and June revised down to a _loss_ of 13,000 jobs. Is the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics going to get re-fired?

Smells like autumn

Problem - structural decline in buying of gilts by DB pension schemes pushing up yields Solution - make it easier / more attractive for UK retail investors to buy gilts e.g. scrap income tax on coupons as well as capital gain on gilts, launch "Gilts Direct", educate people about gilts

after checking the response both here and in the Bad Place to today's already infamous podcast featuring Liz Truss, these seem appropriate judging by the reaction in both forums. I regret nothing, this was a terrible idea:

brb just sawing off my ears

Yellen not at all pulling her punches in this op-ed for the FT www.ft.com/content/d2ea...

Apropos of nothing, a reminder that German stock markets kept climbing in an almost uninterrupted fashion in the run-up to WW2. Investors are really, really bad at pricing serious institutional and political risks.

A rare earth metals song which ChatGPT thinks fits G&S' Major General's Song metre a la Tom Lehrer

Such a beautiful city

Copenhagen

Incredible chart from Goldman’s desk: “.. construction on data centers is poised to surpass general office construction, having been only 20% as large as offices less than three years ago.”

🚨Chart Crime🚨 Drawing an analogy with the dot com bubble using a compressed time axis and y-scale is dodgy Read more in FT Alphaville "Axes of Evil: an Apollonian S&P Sløkker" on.ft.com/46XMbLI

Interesting idea from Scalable Capital with a "hybrid replication" ETF. They choose synthetic replication in countries where synthetic replication makes sense (US withholding tax) & physical where that makes sense (China stock lending) www.justetf.com/uk/academy/h...

I always wondered how a set of islands off the coast of Malaysia, ridden with swamps and malaria 🪰, can transform into the prosperous country that we see today. Here are the answers!

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Until Aug 26, St James’s Place can charge up to 6% if you exit within 6 years (+4.5% upfront). From Aug 27, the same products will have 0% exit fee & lower advice charges. Selling the old version days before the change? That’s beyond absurd on.ft.com/41qAVnq

Interesting that so many people say there is no UK gender pay gap despite ONS evidence to the contrary. Here are some comments from my latest video "UK Wealth: How Do You Compare?" youtu.be/vfmKC2umXZA