🦢 Black Swan Street Weekly Stock Market Summary (July 24th - July 28th 2023)

Happy Friday!

The new billion dollar bank, interest rates reach the highest level in 22 years, Volkswagen's $700 million EV investment, Lockheed Martin wins defense contract, Mcdonald's new spinoff restaurant.

Let’s get into it ↓

Here’s what we got for you this week:

• Stock Market Summary 🦢

• Rates Reach Highest Level in 22 Years 📈

• The Newest Billion Dollar Bank 🏦

• Other News In The Stock Market 🌎

• Next Week In The Stock Market 🔮

Read time: 5 minutes

Stock Market Summary 🦢

Market Performances This Week:

Earnings From This Past Week:

Rates Reach Highest Level in 22 Years 📈

Okay, I’m sorry. I know you’re sick of the interest rate talk. But it’s important, I promise.

This week, the Federal Reserve hiked (raised) interest rates by 25 bps. This brings the federal funds rate to a target range of 5.25% to 5.5% - aka the highest level in more than 22 years.

Of the central banks in charge of the ten most traded currencies, the United States has hiked interest rates the most:

The Newest Billion Dollar Bank 🏦

Earlier this year, we saw the collapse of three major banks: Silicon Valley Bank, First Republic Bank, and Signature Bank, which accounted for 2.4% of all assets in the banking sector.

So, to say the banking sector has been crazy this year would be a drastic understatement.

Well, it just got crazier.

PacWest is merging with Banc of California. The two banks will combine in an all-stock deal and operate with $36 billion worth of assets. The merger is expected to close in late 2023 or early 2024.

• PacWest (PACW) shares finished the week declining -2.58%

• Banc of California (BANC) shares finished the week gaining 13.22%

Other News In The Stock Market 🌎

• TC Energy sells 40% equity interest in Columbia Gas and Columbia Gulf to GIP in $5.2 billion sale - GNW

• Immatics receives $35 million equity investment from Bristol Myers Squibb - MW

• Public Storage to buy Simply Self Storage for $2.2 billion from Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust (BREIT) - MW

• UBS to pay $387 million in Credit Suisse-tied Achegos fines - BBG

• Sam Altman launches new venture, Worldcoin - FRB

• UPS reaches tentative contract with Teamsters and 340,000 unionized workers, avoids a potentially catastrophic strike - WKYT

• PacWest agrees to combine with Banc of California - YF

• Amazon lowers iRobot deal price 15% to $51.75 per share from $61 per share - RT

• Wells Fargo announces $30 billion share buyback program - CNBC

• Mastercard moves to ban cannabis purchases on its debt cards - RT

• Lockheed Martin gets U.S. defense contract to develop nuclear-powered spacecraft - RT

• L3Harris says deal for Aerojet gets go-ahead from U.S. regulator - RT

• Volkswagen invests $700M in Xpeng and will jointly develop EVs in China with the EV maker - BBG

• Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) grew 3.0% YoY, down from previous 3.8%, and in line with expectations

• Biogen to buy rare disease drugmaker Reata for $6.5 billion - RT

• IMF to loan Argentina as much as $10.8 billion this year - BBG

• AMD plans $400 million expansion in India - MW

• Sequoia Capital slashed sizes of two funds, including crypto fund - WSJ

• U.S. Q2 GDP QoQ: 2.4%, from previous 2.0%, and above 1.8% expectation

Next Week In The Stock Market 🔮

Earnings Calendar Next Week:

What the Swan is watching:

Monday: SoFi

Tuesday: Pfizer, Uber, AMD, Starbucks, Toyota, Caesars Entertainment, BP, HSBC, Electronic Arts, Caterpillar, Merck

Wednesday: CVS, PayPal, Humana, Shopify, Phillips 66, Qualcomm, Occidental Petroleum, DoorDash, MetLife

Thursday: Amazon, Apple, ConocoPhillips, Coinbase, Airbnb, DraftKings, Wayfair, Amgen, Block, Expedia

Friday: Enbridge, Magna International, Corebridge Financial, Global Partners LP

Economic Calendar Next Week:

The Swan’s Picks 🦢

🎬 Barbie vs Oppenheimer… Who Won? In last week’s edition of Black Swan Street, we released a poll to vote who you thought would have the bigger opening weekend, Oppenheimer or Barbie.

The results are in:

66.67% of Black Swan Street readers thought Oppenheimer would have the bigger opening weekend.

Bad news, y’all were wrong.

• Barbie pulled off the biggest debut of the year closing in a $155 million opening weekend

• Oppenheimer, while still impressive, only collected $80.5 million in its opening weekend.

Fun fact: The ‘Barbenheimer’ weekend is set to be the fourth-highest opening weekend haul of all time and the largest since ‘Avengers: Endgame’ hit theatres in 2019.

❌ In case you haven’t heard, Twitter officially rebrands to “X”: Well, Elon Musk, you’ve done it again. Elon Musk made headlines earlier this week as he announced Twitter will be rebranding from “Twitter” to “X”.

👕 Clothing giant, Kering, buys 30% of Valentino: Kering just purchased a 30% stake in Valentino for 1.7 billion euros. Kering is a “multinational corporation specializing in luxury goods,” they own equity in brands like Gucci, Balenciaga, Yves Saint Laurent, Alexander McQueen, and many other well-known clothing brands.

🍔 Mcdonald’s set to debut new spinoff restaurant “CosMc’s”: McDonald’s CEO, Chris Kempczinski, announced on their recent earnings call that McDonald’s is bringing its new spinoff restaurant live in 2024. It’s said to have “all the DNA of McDonald’s, but its own unique personality”- whatever that means.

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The Wrap-Up 🔄

Well, this is the end. But, guess what? We’ll see you next Friday!!

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