Winter is coming. Just ask your friends up in Buffalo, New York, as they dig themselves out of four feet of snow! But judging by oil futures, one would never know — crude was down 1.75% on the day and ended the week down 10%. Energy is up 65% y/y, so conversations are beginning to rumble in regard to demand concerns, recessionary fears and hence, some cracks in the pavement for crude/energy.

Markets have come really far, really fast, and the risk of late has been for a pause or reversal. (Foreshadowing inserted). The past 2 days have seen a little of that risk coming to life. Hawkish tones could be heard across the land today as markets were unable to find their footing from the opening bell. This was mostly thanks to the various Fed speakers who graced the media wires.

Sports are dumb. Ok, let me backtrack a bit. There are certain moments/experiences for a sports fan that will make the proverbial bucket list. When it comes to American football, visiting the “frozen tundra” of Lambeau field in Green Bay qualifies as one. I was able to tick that box this past weekend and with the opponent being my beloved Dallas Cowboys, the emotions for this moment were further elevated.

Monday markets taking the long way home today, closing lower in the red than where we started this am, despite many efforts to emerge higher mid-session. The shakeout following last Thursday’s rumbling CPI print continues with the question mark of a rally boiling under the surface into year-end as the pressure not to underperform the benchmarks will weigh on all when the clock strikes 12 in the New Year.

Yesterday’s momentum continued into today, with markets finishing up strong once again and closing out the best week since June. The optimism was a shampoo effect from yesterday’s inflation number which showed prices are cooling — but for the record the number is still 7.7%! This morning started with University of Michigan consumer sentiment, which came in at 54.7 below estimates (59.5) with one-year inflation matching estimates at 5.1%.

Ok, all better then? Turns out Charlie Brown can kick the football after all. Never has YOY inflation of 7.7% looked so good. In 6 of the last 7 CPI readings, the annual rate came in ABOVE estimates and so investors were reticent for good reason heading into today. It led to some pessimistic positioning as opposed to CPI’s past. So when the under came in and by a fair amount, the pressure valve exploded. Inflation may be cooling but the market was suddenly red hot.

Knowing that stocks go up after elections, regardless of the party in power, should have kept investors tuned in to earnings and macro data today. But, as we all know markets absolutely despise uncertainty—the “not knowing” causes sentiment to falter. After 3 days rallying and an historic surge in October, markets staged a meaningful pullback, while waiting on just three states to determine whether the US would swing red or blue. But the election wasn’t the only show in town.

What began as churn and chop and drifting higher, turned to something that felt much more like whiplash. Although closing higher on the day, US equities were jolted lower midday as crypto markets faltered in an unsuccessful attempt to hold equities under with them. The tug-of-war was first from the side of US midterm elections anticipation, hopeful equity markets, USD relief, US Treasury yield declines/stabilization, commodity/precious metal rally (ex-crude), China re-open optimism- all contributing to a continued market rally of the past few days.