Daily Commentary

MarketMinder’s View: The news that eurozone consumer price index (CPI) inflation accelerated from 2.9% y/y in July to 3.3% last month has many penciling another rate hike at the September 10 ECB meeting. Look, we don’t think you can actually forecast central bankers’ actions based on any incoming data point. They are people and people aren’t a market function. They act on emotion, bias and interpretation that can all defy expectations. However, if the ECB does hike, we think it would be a mistake. This article pays it short shrift, but this was entirely about oil and there is no sign of inflation spilling elsewhere. Per Eurostat data, eurozone CPI excluding energy hit 2.2% y/y—matching July … and June … and down from August 2025’s 2.5%. Services inflation actually cooled to 3.0% y/y from 3.3%. The ECB cannot hike its way to more oil and gas production, and it has no tools that will specifically and solely affect demand for energy products. Hence, we think a hike is unnecessary and wrongheaded. But a hike or two isn’t automatically bearish. And the yield curve (the gap between long rates and short rates and a proxy for lending’s profitability) is sufficiently wide that even such small errors shouldn’t materially impair lending and economic activity.

MarketMinder’s View: This is a very silly debate. Look, we get the historical tendency to use letters like L, V or W to depict economic growth’s trajectory during and shortly after recessions. Those make at least some sense from the perspective that they reflect how a graph of GDP or markets (or some other econometric) may look during and after the downturn (although we would note here that L-shaped recoveries have never occurred in a broad, diverse market or economy). But no, this is building on the recent, nonsensical “K-shaped” economy narrative that argues the wealthy are enjoying booming growth while everyone else slumps. Data never supported that (and don’t in the scant evidence provided here), as both high-, middle- and low-income households have seen consumption rise, just at different rates. Now Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and others (reminder: we favor no politician nor any political party) want to say that is over and the economy is a C-shape, where low-income households are on the rise and high earners are cooling. Others say it is an E-shape, where spending is stratified. That seems most accurate but really isn’t telling you anything new. There have always been gaps in economic experience by income group or wealth category, and they will never fully converge. Some people, sadly, will always struggle and live paycheck-to-paycheck. We don’t think you need a letter to paint this picture. Lastly, none of this (or the included discussion of consumer sentiment) tells you anything useful about the current economic expansion or bull market. Wealth inequality trends aren’t cyclical indicators. They are sociology. Stocks don’t do sociology, so this shouldn’t factor into your investment decisions.

MarketMinder’s View: This article mentions a few individual public and private companies, so please keep in mind MarketMinder doesn’t make individual security recommendations. Look, we have long counseled that trying to hit homeruns with IPOs and in illiquid private assets is an error of both process and mindset. This article sort marries the two. Several of the big companies that either have gone public or are reportedly set to soon have sold private shares to various entities. This has led, predictably, some funds to form and offer investors pre-IPO access to companies like SpaceX and others. But, as a separate report covered earlier, one such fund didn’t actually hold the shares when SpaceX debuted, so the access it touted didn’t exist, disappointing some investors. The SEC is now reportedly looking into the matter, although its enforcement powers may be limited given the light regulation of private investments. All in all, this story is a helpful warning to investors considering buying into funds offering pre-IPO or private asset exposure: Do you really know what you own? If so, how?