Closing Bell - Closing Bell: Positioning Your Portfolio Amid Geopolitical Uncertainty 4/8/26

Episode Date: April 8, 2026

“What a relief” are the words of the day for the markets following news of the two-week cease fire. So what does it all mean for the investing road ahead? We discuss with Fundstrat’s Tom Lee and Goldman Sachs’ Meena Flynn. Plus, private credit stocks sat out today’s mega-rally. Sycamore Tree Capital’s Mark Okada gives us his take. And, top technician Jeff DeGraaf tells us if he thinks the bottom is in for the market. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome to closing bell. I'm Scott Wagner live from Postnight here at the New York Stock Exchange. This maker breakout begins with today's relief rally. Let's just get right to the score card here with 60 to go in regulation. There it is. Better than 2% across the board, the ceasefire sending about 70% of stocks hired today. Every sector in the market is green with the exception, of course, of energy, which is red because of that plunge in oil prices, really across the board there. Standouts today include the airlines and cruise companies, casinos, and really anything pegged to the consumer. Take a look at META. Rolled out its first model from its super intelligence team, and that is a super gain for that name. Up better than 6% today.

Amazon and Alphabet are also up nicely for the mega caps and chip equipment names. Nice in the green today. Take a look at that. Lamb Research up 8%. So is ASML. Fly materials KLA, all having. a very strong session. Takes us to our talk of the tape today. How best to position now with this major move to de-escalate the war? Let's first go to the White House, our own Aman Javers, who has the

latest, and I guess we're learning, Amon, that this ceasefire could at times appear to be a bit dicey. Yeah, Scott, a lot of issues still out there to be decided. We heard from White House press secretary Caroline Levitt here at the White House just within the past hour or so, and she confirmed that the United States is sending a delegation under J.D. Vance to go to Pakistan and negotiate face to face with the Iranians, also included in that delegation, Jared Kushner and Steve Whitkoff, who've been in part of the negotiations all the way along. J.D. Vance being there in person kind of elevates the stature of those negotiations. We'll see what they're able to come up with. But one of the key questions in all of this, Scott, is this issue of whether the Iranians post-war

will be able to charge, in effect, tolls for ships going through the Strait of Hormuz. I asked Caroline Levitt that in the press briefing, whether that was an outcome that would be acceptable to the United States or whether that would be a red line for the president. And here's what she said. I think the president was very clear and simplistic in his language last night in his truth social post, where he said that this ceasefire is subject to the free, safe, and immediate reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. That's very plain language and it should be taken at face value. Carrie, go ahead.

Without limitation, including tolls, yes. So you heard her there saying without limitation. All right, we've lost Damon, as you obviously saw there, from some technical issues on the North Lawn of the White House. Bottom line is the markets are taking this for what it is today. A significant relief rally certainly have seen the oil market react positively today in terms of the move lower. Pippa Stevens has more on that for us as well.

Hi, Pippa. Hey, Scott, so we saw just three ships transit the water rate today. That's according to Lloyd's list, which said all had current ore past links to Iran and weren't oil tankers. The firm added that three additional ships are heading to the detour around Lerick Island. Now, vessels aren't rushing to exit, given all the confusion about what exactly is happening in the Strait of Hormuz. Shipper Mersk saying the ceasefire may create transit opportunities, but, quote, it does not yet provide full. maritime certainty, and we need to understand all potential conditions attached. Now, Cruz draw perhaps indication that traders believe the worst might be over, but CIBC,

private Welsh Rebecca Babin attributing some of the move to positioning, especially in Brent, noting that prices pushed through downside option strikes where exposure had built up over the last month. And the bottom line is that at this point, traffic is still 90% below pre-war levels, and it will take weeks, if not months, to clear the backlog. Scott? All right, Pippa, thank you. We'll see what happens with this trade.

Thank you, Pippa Stevens. We did mention big moves and travel names like the airlines today. Phil LeBoe has more on that for us. Hi, Phil. And one of the biggest movers, Scott, Delta Airlines, after beating on the top and the bottom line for the first quarter. But it's really the outlook for the second quarter. That's the strength of the follow-through, if you will, in terms of investors saying, okay, we kind of like what we're seeing here for the second quarter.

Strong corporate and leisure demand. The bookings have been solid, according to Ed Bastion, the CEO. But fuel is a cost headwind. how much they will be spending approximately $2 billion more in the second quarter compared to their original plan, which they set up back in January. Capacity as a result, they're going to cut it down to flat year over year was going to be up three and a half percent. Here's Bastion talking with us this morning on Squawk Box.

We're pulling capacity down to accommodate and try to get ahead of some of that potential weakness. But we're not seeing it. The last 30 days, our bookings are of double digits every day for the last 30 days, the strongest period that we've ever seen. We talk about strong demand. Look at the revenue numbers for the first quarter from Delta. Premium products, not just the front of the plane, but all of the premium products, up 14% year over year. Domestic revenue up 8%. Main cabin, there was an inflection.

Used to be negative. This quarter or first quarter, it swung into the positive of 1%. Take a look at the other airline stocks today. And what you're basically seeing is they all are moving higher, primarily on the jet fuel prices coming down, but you also see more optimism that perhaps, perhaps, Scott, the demand will remain strong, given all of the headwinds that are out there. Yeah, big relief rally, no doubt. Phil, thanks. That's Phil Lebo. Now let's bring in Fund Stratt's Head of Research, Tom Lee, also a CNBC contributor, and as you see here with us at Post-Nine. It's good to have you back. Great to see you. Now what for these markets? I think the bottom's in, Scott, because last week was a period where the war was getting worse and oil was going up, but stocks weren't going down. So that's a good precondition. And today now we have the rate of change, that the war is de-escalating. So I think stocks are now in the process to go back to their all-time highs. And I think maybe get to that 7,300 that we're expecting this year.

Wow. So let's just remind and refresh people's memories a bit. You were looking for a strong start to the year. Stocks falling into potentially a bare market. Most of that you pegged to a new Fed chair coming in and some of the issues that might revolve around monetary policy couldn't foresee the outbreak of this war and the conflict, et cetera. Does it matter what caused the bare market for how you project your outlook for the year? Or are you confident that we had this event, an existential event for the market? It reacted negatively and now we're going to rebuild our way back? Yeah, I think things have possibly changed, Scott, because this war pulled forward a lot of repositioning. You know, we know people have gone flat or raised cash, and they were ready to own defensive positioning. And we also had a rolling bear market last year in energy and financials, and this year in Mag 7 and software.

So something like 70% of the S&P has already been through a rolling bear market. So I think the possibility is that the summer lull that could happen won't be as deep because we've already fallen 8%. What's the makeup of the move back towards record highs like you just said you thought we would do? What does the makeup of the market look like in that scenario? I think the leadership has been revealed in the last six weeks because since the war started, the number one performing asset class has been crypto, Ethereum, and then energy stock. Mag 7 software financials. So to me, that's the group that's leading us up. You know, energy went up for obvious reasons. Sure. Isn't it going to go down now for obvious reasons?

Yes. And then the negative correlation to oil was the highest in almost a decade for the Mag 7 Ethereum and software. So I think that as oil flattens or cools or the curve flattens, those names are going to get a bid, and they've gotten already cheap. We know the Mag 7's trading almost at a market multiple. When, you know, we sort of banked on the broadening trade, you know, there was a bent towards value which had outperformed growth. Is that mostly over now? Because even with oil elevated, we're still going to ask ourselves questions about a slowdown

in the economy, right? Yeah. And there's still a shock rippling through the economy. Which we maybe haven't felt quite yet? Correct. Yeah, I think there's an inflation shock still coming. I think that the broadening is taking place. The narrowing is, I think, more investors are going to buy U.S.

because the U.S. has proven its resilience in this wartime period. Plus, the U.S. makes more money in a war. But the broadening is that more U.S. stocks rise. Yeah, but if you're telling me the inflation shock is coming, isn't that going to negatively impact the broadening trade? Yeah. I think it is out there. We just don't know amplitude.

because, you know, it's like a wave. Like, when it hits shore, is it going to be diminished and are people bracing for it? But there should be some inflation shock coming. It sounds like the Fed is already thinking about, you know, still leaning towards cuts, which is good. We'll get some signal. Well, right now they feel like they're leaning towards doing nothing for the foreseeable future. And if they believe what you just said and believe, then you must believe that they're going to remain on hold for potentially even longer. Yeah, and it really depends on if consumers and corporates view this as temporary

or a change in inflation. So the surveys will matter a lot, as will the incoming reports, but the Fed Fund futures show the market's shifting back towards cuts. So the mega caps have had a better go of it, of late. Is that a sign of anything bigger that lies ahead? And will we, with the multiple compression, by the way, right? The stocks have come in a lot. Does that make them even more attractive now because you already had the better earnings growth than most other parts of the market? And now you can couple multiple compression with that? Yeah. I think the Mag 7 bottomed on bad news because they were leading in the middle of war. AI demand will go up because inflation risk means companies want to find productivity.

And U.S. is still a leader in AI. And I think as the world worries about growth, they want to own growth stocks, which is the Mag 7. So the Mag 7's back. Tom's good to talk to you, as always. It's Tom Lee, a fun strat. Speaking of the mega caps, now to that massive move we saw in meta today or we are still seeing. Julia Borson is with us for more on why the stock looks like that today, Julia.

Well, Scott, meta's long-awaited new AI model, Muse Spark, is rolling out across its apps and AI glasses. This is the product of Alex Wang's nine months building meta-superintelligence labs, as well as hundreds of billions of dollars invested. in AI to help address the disappointment of prior meta AI models. Now, instead of launching with a sophisticated model to top rival frontier models, this is a slow release initially focused on uses for METIS apps, with a special mode for shopping, surfacing ideas from creators and content from public posts.

Now, META seems to be trying to lower expectations and address concerns about its AI spending, saying that this is only the start. Now, notably, META is opening the door to a particular. potential new revenue stream, saying they're planning to eventually offer paid access to the model's API, like ChatGPT and Gemini do. Scott? All right. It's a big day for that name. Julia, thank you very much.

That's Julia Forston. Dan Ives covers Meta for Wedbush, among other big names, joins us now. It's nice to have you. Is this a significant inflection point? Well, it's a massive move. I mean, because look, the reality is, Obama fell short, right? And that was the huge disdployment. they need to find success with this initiative.

And it also goes back to the scale AI deal. And look, right now, the stars of the show are anthropic and open AI. Meta needs to make sure within their install base, they have a model that's going to monetize, and it's one that developers want to ultimately go after. That's the key right now for meta. This is a very, very important three to four months to get developers on board. So you don't sound to me as though you're fully sold on whether they can, deliver simply based on what they've brought forward today that has the stock on the move?

Yeah, look, I think this is, it's the first step and it's optimistic. It's the first time you can be optimistic, given what we saw with Lama over the last, you know, six, nine months, been disappointment after disappointment. But there's more wood to chop. They need to be successful. They need to prove it to developers. And ultimately, it comes down to modernization. And I think so far is so good, but it all comes down to, like, in this,

AI arms race, they need a model that's going to monetize, and this has to be it. Who's got the lead now among the mega caps, right? Because the way you answer some of these questions, you're like, everybody seems to be chasing OpenAI or Anthropic. Who's running the fastest to be able to catch them? I think it's Google. I mean, I think they're the one, and it speaks to how that stocks, you know, I think stood out relative to others in terms of what they've done with Gemini. And look, when you think about software AI developers, in the world, you know, a significant piece of them actually work at Google. And you're starting to see with Gemini more and more.

That's the one that I think investors have the most confidence in when it comes to these models. Obviously, meta, you know, it's approved me. You look at Microsoft, we believe they're going to be very successful on the hyperscale side, but where are they on the model side? And Apple, that sort of approved me that we think ultimately starts to come out at WWDC. with right now, you know, if this is a Broadway show front and center, it's anthropic and open AI. And it feels like Microsoft got out of the gate so fast in what is, I guess, a more of a distance race.

And because they sprinted, now I feel like they ran out of gas. And now they're trying to figure out whether they have this next leg in them, or at least investors are certainly questioning whether they're about to get out of the. the race in any large degree. Yeah. And to go down that, I think they're kind of at the rest stop. And investors are trying to figure out, you know, is this a Ferrari or is it, you know, sort of a car in the right lane going 45 miles an hour?

I believe, Scott, like, as we look at first quarter results, they'll prove themselves in Azure capacity will increase. And I think I continue to think Microsoft of all Mag 7 is the most oversold here. relative to the software goes trading expectations. But look, as Tom talked about, too, in this backdrop, this is such an important quarter because there's a lot of confusion. And you're going to have clear winners. But I believe this is going to be for MAG 7.

It's going to be a proven movement. I continue to believe tech will see all-time highs this year. Okay. Lastly, Apple, the news yesterday of the delay in a foldable phone that really hit the stock unusually hard if that, in fact, was the major catalyst. How significant is that? Look, it's significant in terms of, obviously, you want to see the foldable. You want to see that come through later this year. But I think that the reason it's sold off, it's just, right now, you know, it's snake-bitten. Investors are just so frustrated about continued delays.

You need to see Siri AI. You don't want to see delays when it comes on the hardware side, which speaks to all the buildup in the WWD's. see. And right now it's a glass half empty stock, but I believe that will be the opportunity as they monetize AI, but this now is time for them to step up. And I think Cook knows it. And I think everyone else in Cupertino knows it as well. All right. We'll talk to you soon. Dan Ives. Thank you very much for White Bush. What a relief. They are the words of the day for these markets. No doubt about that following news of that two-week ceasefire. For more on what it all means for the investing road ahead. We're joined now by Mina Flynn of Goldman Sachs. She's global co-head

of private wealth management and one Goldman Sachs. It's good to have you back. Thanks, Scott. So of the prior two guests declared that the market bottomed and that tech's going to reach new highs. Let's take one before two. Do you believe that we had the bottom in the market and now we can build on what we're seeing today?

I don't know that we can either call the bottom or the top, but I will say that we are relatively constructive on the SMP from here into year end is our base case. I think the more important thing is we are pretty methodical as it relates to investing for our clients. And so what we've seen here to date with our clients is that they haven't really de-risk, nor are they rushing today to add a lot of risk. And so we're constantly rebalancing. And given the amount of uncertainty that we have right now, we still have a lot of uncertainty. We're taking a longer-term approach to investing public market capital. So that's instead of six to 12 months, that's 12 months.

that's 12 to 18 months. On the alternative side, we're continuing as usual because our clients predominantly invest in drawdown funds, which have a multi-year investment cycle. Are you as constructive as you are because you expect the S&P base case mid-7,000 by year end because you are a big believer in the durability of the earnings story? You know, we're still like 14.5% prediction on that or expectation.

And the fact that the economy still looks pretty good. So you have all that. And as I was saying with Tom Lee, not only have you had the mega-cap multiples come in, but the overall market has two. So that's a lot you have going for you. We do have a lot going for us. But the number one question that we've been getting from our clients here to date is, why hasn't the S&P moved more going into, for example, last night, given the amount of negative news flow? And I think this plays both ways, whether it's to the downside or whether it's to the upside. And from my vantage point, that comes down to the earnings durability. as well as the composition of the index versus GDP. So the index, as we know, is more than 30% technology, but it's only 6% of GDP. So yes, how the economy is doing matters to the index, but at the same juncture, the number one thing is earnings.

And we are anticipating that earnings are going to be roughly 10 to 12%. But to your point, you've got to have multiples re-rate through more confidence, whether that's confidence in the AI investment spend, or whether that's confidence because the geopolitical pressures are coming off. Do you have added confidence that the mega caps are back, for lack of better word, and then because of what you're going to see in earnings season, right, they're going to provide you the best earnings growth within the market? And then plus, again, the compression that we've seen in their own multiples.

Yeah, so I think the MAG 7 looks pretty attractive right now, just if you look at multiples being really at market multiples, despite pretty high growth earnings rate, I think the thing that's really interesting about the SMP 500 is that a third of the earnings are coming from the MAG 7, and 40% of the earnings growth is coming from AI investment. AI investment is a multi-decade, a multi-year investment cycle. And you still believe in that. Like there's no, we're like early, so we're early still in that cycle. We're still early in that cycle, but I will say you don't really know who's going to be disrupted yet, nor do you.

And you also still have concerns in terms of all. of this CAP-X spending by the hypers, is that going to turn into the revenue that the market wants? And that's why the multiples have come down. And I do think that as we go through earnings this cycle, as you see the guidance, potentially see buybacks, that's going to give investors more confidence to have that re-rating. Okay. How are the tone, how's the tone of the conversations you're having with your clients, wealthy clients, about private credit? Are they watching what's happening and saying now I'm a little concerned and maybe I'm rethinking my allocation to alts as a result of that? So our clients have roughly 70% of their clients in risk assets.

On that 70, roughly 25 to 30% is in alternatives. Private credit is a portion of those assets. Our clients are invested and quite frankly looking at this market opportunity to say, I probably want to invest more. In private credit? In private credit. Really? Why is that?

That is because they know that it's predominantly a liquidity issue with some of the evergreen funds. It's not really a credit issue. So if you look at non-accruals, if you look at pick rates, they're in line with historical averages. You could get those default picking up because of AI disruption if the economy slows, but you're looking at 10% yields and your first lien in the capital structure. So you'd have to have a lot of negative things happen. to impair that capital. So our clients are looking to invest new capital into private credit

through these dry-down funds. That's an interesting bit of insight. Thanks for being here again. Thank you. All right. Nina Flynn, Goldman Sachs. Right here at Post 9, we're just getting started. Coming up next, more on those private credit fears. Those stocks are sitting out today's rally. Coming up next, Sycamore Tree Capitals, Marco Cata is with us. He gives his take next. All right. Welcome back. One of the big questions hanging over stocks not related to the war is, really happening in private credit. Marco Cata is co-founder and CEO of Sycamore Tree Capital. He's here with us once again at Post-9. It's good to have you back. Yes, Scott. We don't really talk that much about private credit, you and me. But we're going

today, because investors are worried about what's happening. What do you see? Well, I mean, there's a, I guess today's a better day. I like Taco Tuesday versus World War Wednesday. All right. You and a lot of other people. But yeah, so now we can focus on. on credit. I think there's, like, we came in the year. I told you in January when I was here that the cycle had already started. We'd seen that in pricing across credit. Had started to turn. Yeah, and that, and everyone was saying, no, credit spreads are tight. The market's good. Everything's great. And so everyone was totally bullish. And we said, no, that's not the case. So if you think, if the topic is private credit, there are, there are concerns about two big things.

It's market construction. It's how the market has structured itself and then credit quality. So, you know, I said that we were going to see credit quality deterioration because it already started last year. But let's start with market construction because that's what's on everybody's mind. So if you think about the credit markets, there's four big credit markets. There's high-yield bonds. There's loans. There's the IG market.

and then there's private credit. And they're all sizable. But the difference between the public credit markets and the private credit markets is we've had 30, 40 years to figure it out. We spent all this time restructuring the way markets come in and out. Investors can access the market, how managers can manage risk within the market. We're learning on the fly a little bit here, right?

And this is the first cycle. And we've said this for years, that at some point we would have a cycle in private credit, and they're going to have to learn from the lessons. And so the first thing that's happened, right, is we have all of this sort of liquidity seeking in an asset class that has no liquidity. And so people are trying to get out. And then they're looking at nabs where they say, I don't believe the naves. And you have a classic structure where, you know, should I redeem at NAB if I think the nabs are too high?

Yes, you're a smarter investor if you're doing that. And you're supposed to be doing that. Is the manager in a situation where they can actually manage that properly? Some are, and some are not. And so, you know, I look at the proof in the pudding is the way the markets are structured. So CLOs fund bank loans. CLOs are all locked up capital, long-term capital. And even the retail money we have in high yield and bank loans, it's been fine.

We've had $18 billion of redemptions across high-eal. and bank loans. You haven't written a story about that. There's been no, nobody coming on to talk about that. They've had 13 billion of outflows, and they can't meet five of it, and it's the world's in. Well, because the incredibly dramatic rise in the growth of private credit, and now with the added access of the retail investor, it's more topical. It's more on people's minds because we're talking about having more exposure into alts at a time when people who have gotten more exposure through various platforms and whatever are wondering to themselves, what did my advisor do? Why am I in this stuff that I thought I knew enough about? And now I'm

not so sure. And it sounds to me like you are suggesting you think it could get worse from here. I didn't say systemic because most people who have opined on it don't think so. And you can opine yourself too, but worse is different than systemic. Yeah, it's not systematic, it's problematic. So the problems are twofold. We talk about liquidity. And look, I think, I think I'm not here to talk my book or their book or anybody's book because that's all I hear when people talk about this is everyone's talking to their book.

It's fine. It's horrible. It's whatever. But fundamentally, right, most of private credit got it right. They're in these institutional locked-up funds. You can't get out. The only way you can get out is secondary. and a secondary market is going to explode.

You're going to see a lot of trade happen in secondary LP activity, and that's great. But most of the market, if you're the manager of a private credit book, you don't have to sell. You can sit there and ride this out, and that's the way it's supposed to be. 30% though of that market is what we're talking about here. And so it's meaningful. It's big enough so that people should care. We should be talking about it. So last year, defaults across private credit.

was over 5% last year. Versus, and in public credit, we have issues too. It's 3.4%. So it's not like everybody's like, this isn't roses for everyone, everyone's got issues, but how do you manage those issues? And then the whole thing about software is just, it's just totally wrong.

That what's going on in private credit is not about software yet. I mean, they've got much more software exposure. It's to much smaller companies. They're eight times small. smaller or where our issues are eight times bigger. And we scrubbed our whole book so we don't have credit problems in our book. But it's like those maturities don't happen into 27, 28. And the disruption from AI hasn't started yet. No, but the market is assuming that a large number of

these software companies that have taken loans are going to be displaced to the degree that they're not going to be able to pay them. So the market's trying to get ahead of it. You're right. Use the word yet. Yeah. Yet's the key word. Yeah. But the market. doesn't wait around for the yet. Right. So, look, I think, I think the credit quality question is you sat there and you went into these funds because you were making these great returns. You were making bank loans plus 200, 300 basis points year in, year out, with no vol. Now, I argued two things. You had to turn a leverage, right? And you took more credit risk. If you're a CFO of a company and you're borrowing money and you're going to borrow from the private credit guys or the public credit guys, and this money costs 300 basis points more than this money, are you going to pick this money or this money?

You would rather have the cheaper money, but you end up here because of your credit quality. So I argue that at some point the credit quality would catch up to them. You've exploded the amount of private credit debt in the world from 2020 to today at a 16% cater. It's just, it's grown dramatically. So when you issue that much debt, you have credit quality issues, but it has nothing to do with software yet. And that's coming. And so I say that this cycle will be long. We are in the beginning of it.

It's early. And so I don't, it bothers me that people talk about it. opportunity and they're talking about, you know, it's a great opportunity. All they talk about is opportunity. I'd rather talk about risk. I think in the beginning of cycles, it's all about capital preservation. It's about alpha buy avoidance. It's what you don't own. And so, Scott, if you're in public credit and you can trade and you made a mistake and you can get out of it, good for you. But if you're stuck in private credit, there's no secondary market. You've got to work it out. And that's going to be the reality if I'm right and there's a real credit cycle that's already started.

And, you know, we haven't mentioned all this other stuff going on in the world. I think the big takeaway from the macro, Scott, is that the cost of capital has to rise across all markets. Government markets, currency markets, commodity markets, credit markets, equity markets. the cost of capital just have to be bigger because there's more risk. There's more counterparty risk. If you can't trust what someone's telling you from one day to the next and it comes down to some deadline at 8 o'clock at night, I mean, there's got to be more risk premium in all of this.

So I just think it's early and it's going to lead to more of a credit cycle than that feels like it's priced at. All right. We'll talk more. I'm sure of that. Mark, thanks for being here. Good to see. It's Mark O'Codagh, Singapore. Coming up, top technician, Jeff DeGraph.

He breaks down. the key levels he's watching now with this rally today. We're back right after this. I think the bottom's in, Scott, because last week was a period where the war was getting worse and oil was going up, but stocks weren't going down. So that's a good precondition. And today now we have the rate of change, that the war is de-escalating. So I think stocks are now in the process to go back to their all-time highs. Okay, that was Funstrats Tom Lee moments ago, calling the market bottom. Let's find out if our next guest agreed. with that. He's Jeff DeGraph. He's chairman of and head of technical research at Renaissance Macro. It's

good to have you back. So, I mean, we're back, speaking of, above some critical technical levels on the S&P. Are you a believer in what Tom Lee had to say as a result of that? No, I don't think the levels are going to do it, Scott. I certainly wouldn't use the narrative and rate of change of war. That's just going to lead you down a possibly a primrose path or at least a faulty path, so I'd be careful with that. You know, I think there's two things that we're watching today that I think are important. One are bond yields, which are essentially flat, but more importantly, what's happening to real yields, which are essentially flat. You're going to need real yields to come in for Tom's story to play itself out, and that hasn't really

happened in a meaningful way here. Real yields are basically the nominal yields, minus the inflation premium. And so they're elevated, and they remain so. And I think the refurb. And I think the reflection of that is in gold. Gold is down about, you know, a little over a percent today. And that's suggestive that those real yields are not coming in. So I think it's premature to say that it's all done. I think today's a good day, but we're right at the 50-day moving average, which is descending. It's kind of a natural resistance point. If I look at the breadth today, it's about 80 percent advances. That's an okay day. It's certainly not a game changer in our view. I have gold higher. You just mentioned.

gold. You said it was lowered, didn't you? I have it higher. Yeah, the spot, the spot rate, but it's not right. It's not moving. The spot rate is from the day before. So it's not, it's not moving as much as what we'd expect. But you're right. On that front, you're there, but it's still not the real yields. Why, just tell me why you would expect it to be moving even more than it is today? Because if real yields are coming in, that means the risks are coming off and other assets aren't that attractive, right? And so, you're, willing to basically buy gold, which is not a yielding or a cash flow asset. And that's one of the reasons why it was doing so well, you know, in the call it the last six months up until about

two months ago. So that's going to be part of that story, we think, and we're just not seeing it. I would say if you're, go ahead. I'm sorry. No, no. My apologies, you go ahead. Well, if you're looking, if you're looking for the brightest spot of the day, when I look at breadth amongst sectors in the market, the best one is financials, which in terms of of up names versus down names is 94%. And that compares to, I'm sure everybody's interested in tech. Tech only has 63% advances here. So, you know, I like the fact that financials are helping to drive it in terms of the breadth and then industrials behind that. So I think, you know, I think there's, there are some interesting things that are developing, certainly more bullish than not.

But for me to jump into the Tom Lee camp of, hey, we're going to go right back to the highs. I think it's premature there collectively from what we're seeing. Yeah, I mean, Mike Santoli was saying earlier, right? We got about 70% upstocks today. You'd really like to see 90-ish percent for some degree of confirmation. I would say 90 changes the game. At 80, it's just another day. I mean, if you ask me to script out a day where it's like, okay, that was good, but it doesn't really change anything, today's a pretty close carbon copy of what I would have jotted down to, you know, to kind of make it feel like it feels better, but not really under the surface. surface isn't much better. Given what's happened recently, we're going to take it for what it is today and go from there.

Fair enough. Yeah. Jeff, I'll talk to you soon. Sounds good. Still ahead. The major average is sharply higher as we head towards the close today. The aforementioned Mike Santoli gives us his view next. All right, we're now in the closing bell market zone.

Mike Santoli and Icapitals, Chenali Bassiger, here to break down these crucial moments of the trading day. Plus, Pippa Stevens is watching the move in metals. And Christina Partsenabolo is tracking the action today. in chips. So, Micah, I'll start with you. It's hard to hate on what we're seeing today, but some of the really tight market watchers are not ready to say all good from here until they see a little bit more. For sure. I mean, look, when the market did what it did for four weeks and broke through previous support levels and you had former leadership groups that kind of weren't

able to perform, what that means is the burden of proof goes up on the balls and on any rally. We're seven percent up already in the S&P from the interday lows a couple of weeks ago. It's not as if we're just kind of bouncing around the worst levels. And so I do think you have to scrutinize the character of any rebound rally to say, does this say there's an urgency

among buyers to get back in, of a sort that's going to last us a while and is going to be able to power this market much I think today is one of those constructive but not decisive type days. The rally, it got to the current level right after the open and it kind of sat there most of the day.

and it was stopping right at a level where you might expect it to. 6,800 was the floor on this market in the S&P for months, and we're just underneath it. So I do think that says, guess what, we have some constructive developments. We have a higher probability of a resolution of the crisis in Iran, but we don't necessarily have an all-clear on that front. We have to wait and see and get confirmation. It's exactly how the market would perform if that was the setup. At risk of being the master of the obvious here, I get it. But you need to see follow-through, I would assume, Mike, as Jeff DeGraph was saying,

not just in this rise in stocks, but in the fall in yields. Yes. Yeah, you want to see everything kind of unwind, whatever you had in terms of those stress moves that we got in the market. Obviously, that was oil. Obviously, it was the VIX. And then Treasury Yields as well. You want to see that relax and see the tension come out of those areas in a way that says some version of normalcy is back and we can trade on that basis. What's coming up in about five minutes?

Well, we're going to actually get a lot of these issues. On the tactical front, we are going to have Jonathan Krenski, your friend who's got some pretty strict parameters for what a real breakout might represent and whether we're there or not. He's got some specific numbers on his mind, and we'll tease that ahead to see you guys at 5 o'clock and look forward to 4 o'clock, excuse me, and go through that. Mike, thanks. Pippa, tell me more about medals today. Hey, Scott, so gold is off the best levels of the day, but still up 1% with Commerce Bank, attributing the move to the fall in oil prices leading to easing inflation risks and therefore a downward adjustment in interest rate expectations,

with City adding that the headwinds in March that impacted gold, including higher rates and a strong dollar, now are partially alleviated, and global fragmentation could drive reserve diversification, which does benefit gold. The move is lifting the miners with a GDX up better than 3%. Newmont Barrick and Wheaton all outperforming, and keep an eye on silver and copper, both up more than 3%, perhaps on optimism around a shorter-term, more impact on the global economy. Scott? All right, Pippa, thank you very much for that, to Christina Parts of Nevolos, with more on that chip rip today,

because it is just that. Yeah, the compute leaders like Nvidia and Broadcom are up, but mostly in line with the broader market. The real outperformance, though, is in memory and storage names. Though that's not really unusual given how momentum-driven these names are. For example, Micron, you can see on your screen 7 and a half. sand disk almost 10% higher. A reopening of the Strait of Hormuz really eases pressure across the semi-supply chain from energy cost to helium, which is used in chip production.

Taiwan's semi, though, you can see on your screen is an interesting one. It's up almost 5.5% acting more like a levered bed on the supply chain names than the actual compute leaders. Intel, another big name, up what last I checked about, oh, 11%, I was going to say 10. Extending its run after the company joined Elon Musk's TerraFab project to build AI chips for Tesla, SpaceX, and XAI, although we don't know the details of that deal. Intel on track for its highest close since June 2021.

And Scott, we do have a big week ahead in the chip world, ASML, and Taiwan semis earnings are on deck, which will really set the tone for semi sentiment heading into the rest of the quarter. All right, Christina, thank you, Christina, Parts of Nevelos, the Shunali. It's good to have you back. So we're moving a little bit higher as we get, you know,

ever closer to the end of the trading session. Today, are you a believer? for lack of a better word in how this market's reacting? I think it's going to be a little volatile. It's going to be volatile through earnings season because not all companies will react the same to the price pressures we've seen throughout March. Christina made a good point there about Taiwan semi

because, of course, the helium prices. They've already said that there's no near-term impact as of now. They're keeping an eye on it. But remember, it looks good that we're seeing a relief and energy prices. We still have Brent at 95. This is kind of what I was saying here

that still you have energy prices elevated even if we're seeing a cooling off here. And there could be an impact the longer that goes on. We were living, remember, in a sub-70-80 world. How much do yields hold the key for how this market trades from here, 10-year at 428? Now, I mean, there was a moment during the earlier stages of the war where we're saying to ourselves, like, is 450 going to happen on the tenure because we got close? Yeah. So we're significantly lower, but how close are you watching years? I thought we were at 380 last year. We have to remember that. Being at 420 and being excited that we're not 30 basis points off the highs of this year is not a lot to speak for the

bond market yet. When we look at that long end of the curve, we have to keep an eye on it because we have to expect whether we'll see more fiscal pressure in the second half of the year as we head toward the midterm. So of course we're keeping an eye on it. But of course, as critical as I am about the bond market sometimes, I look at that long end and actually believe it's been somewhat orderly. I don't think that we're going to be. to have a whole lot of upside when we look at the bond market on the long end of the curve here. But I also don't think that we need to get into a tantrum either. You confident that earnings are going to hold in?

I do, but you look at what the first quarter looks like. You look at expectations running in. We all know that they have been riding higher. Right. And rising. And rising. So perhaps some of that is already baked in. I will also point out to even though financial loan growth is expected to grow,

it's supposed to start tapering off after the first quarter of this year. So a lot of investors will be keeping an eye on the banks on how much loan growth can grow from here. And then remember, BDC's report after that. So everything we're seeing in private credit, we expect one more wave of nervousness before we see a flush out of the nervous sentiment we've seen of late because you might see some dividend cuts there. All right, good points. We'll get the banks coming up soon.

Shanali Bassig, thank you very much for walking us right up to the close. Bell is going to ring momentarily, and we do have stocks maybe not quite at the highs of the session, but we have moved a little bit higher now as we hear the bell ring today. Dow, S&P, NASDAQ, all good for at least 2.5%. The Russell almost 3. I'll see you tomorrow, and I'll send it into overtime.