Housing Prices See Record Deceleration

MARKET MOVERS

• Home price gains keep slowing down. Home-price growth slowed in August. The fastest pace on record. The latest Case-Shiller data demonstrate how rising mortgage rates are weighing on home-price growth.* The Case-Shiller index tracking home prices nationally in August was 13% higher than the same month last year, down from an annual gain of 15.6% in July.

• Amazon will now let users pay with Venmo at checkout. The feature will begin rolling out in the Amazon app and on amazon.com starting Tuesday, before launching for U.S. users by Black Friday on Nov. 25, Amazon said. The partnership will give Amazon shoppers more options to pay* for their orders. The company currently accepts credit and debit cards, store cards, HSA and FSA accounts, as well as EBT cards.

• GM posts $3.3 billion quarterly profit as shipments to dealerships rise. The quarterly results show that auto profits are resilient* even as the economy weakens, interest rates climb and inflation remains high. Improved availability of semiconductors and other components helped boost sales of its highest margin vehicles in the US, especially large pickups and SUVs. GM also saw higher profits in China.

• Adidas cuts ties with Kanye, absorbing a €250 million hit to profit. The German sports company said it’s cutting ties with Ye, formerly Kanye West, with immediate effect following a rash of offensive behavior from the rapper. By way of comparison, the blow to earnings this year would be equivalent to about a sixth of last year’s net income* from continuing operations.

• Coca-Cola earnings top estimates despite the strong dollar, raises full-year outlook. For its third quarter, Coca-Cola reported earnings of 69 cents per share on revenue of $11.1 billion,* up from the 65 cents a share on $10 billion in revenue the company posted in the same period of last year. Analysts surveyed by FactSet expected earnings of 64 cents a share on revenue of $10.5 billion for the third quarter.
  

WHAT TO WATCH

• Morgan Stanley cuts Tesla price target, warns of ‘unexpected headwinds’ ahead. Unexpected headwinds loom in the fourth quarter and 2023. Analyst Adam Jonas said future estimates need to account for foreign exchange pressures, destruction of demand, and inflated input costs. Jonas expects more volatility ahead for shares given the situation in China* and noted that the bank’s forecasts will increasingly become less reliant on China through 2030.

• Google sales growth is expected to continue to slow. While Google has attempted to become less reliant on advertising in recent years, the tech giant still makes the vast majority of its revenue from ads that appear next to search results and videos surfaced by the company’s algorithms. YouTube relies more heavily on so-called brand advertising than other parts of Google’s business, making it more susceptible to a pullback in spending.*

• The BOJ’s yield curve control policy is "already broken." With the Bank of Japan reaching near-full ownership of those 3 specific bonds, the time is soon approaching where these bonds will stop trading in their entirety & the market will simply cease to exist, says DB's Saravelos.

• Inventory will be constricted for a long time. The Fed hurt the housing market in terms of entry-level housing and buyers being able to buy because the high mortgage rates are an incentive for homeowners not to sell. And with the work-from-home revolution, it's less likely that people will have to move across the country to find a job. All of these dynamics are keeping a lid on inventory for a long time. Source(13:50)

• Elon Musk wants to lay off 75% of Twitter’s staff. Musk has reportedly told investors that he still plans to double revenue in 3 years by firing people and saving that money. This is the week that people expect him to close the deal because the deadline is on Friday. Scott Galloway thinks this is the best strategy for Twitter because he just doesn't see the sense of having 7,000 staff on Twitter given its current service and offerings. Source(15:13)