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President Trump Holds "Make America Wealthy Again Event" In White House Rose Garden
(Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
Eggs, obviously

Tariffs might be starting to show in America’s inflation rate — but where are prices rising the most?

Coffee. Content. Child care. What’s up (and down) as US inflation hits 2.7%?

Hyunsoo Rim

According to new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, consumer prices rose 2.7% year over year in June — slightly above forecast and the fastest pace since February — with some suggesting that President Trump’s sweeping tariffs may finally be filtering through to nudge up prices on a range of goods.

But beyond the monthly ups and downs, where has inflation hit hardest — and where have prices actually fallen — in the last 12 months?

Where are prices rising chart
Sherwood News

The bad news: Food at home is up 2.4% from last year, the fastest rate in nearly two years. Among the biggest contributors are eggs (up 27%) amid avian flu disruptions, while your morning coffee (up 13.4%) and evening steak (up 10.6%) have also gotten pricier on the back of squeezed supply and tariff jitters.

Electricity bills (up 5.8%) are another sore spot, partly due to AI-hungry data center demand straining outdated infrastructure. Elsewhere, in another sign that tariffs might be taking hold, import-heavy categories like kitchen and living room furniture (up 5.1%) are climbing fast.

The slightly-less-bad news: The cost of dining out is up 3.8% — still high, but easing from last month. Housing costs rose by the same amount, though that’s the slowest rate since November 2021. And tariff-sensitive categories like apparel and toys remain relatively flat from last year… for now.

The good news: While repairing a car has gotten pricier, fueling one hasn’t, with gasoline prices down 8.3% thanks to surging global oil supply. Meanwhile, it could be a good time to get globe-trotting: airfares are down 3.5% from June 2024 and hotel stays have fallen 3.7%, too.

For homebodies, maybe now’s the opportunity to invest in your favorite pastimes? TVs are 10.1% less expensive than they were — though what that means in reality, as we’ve discussed, is likely a little different — while sewing machines and supplies for the craftier-minded have plunged 17.4%. However, that may not last once new tariffs set in.

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Nvidia’s H200 suppliers reportedly pause production after China blocks imports

The saga of Nvidia’s H200s has more confounding twists and turns than a house of mirrors.

On Friday evening, the Financial Times reported that suppliers for Nvidia’s H200 chips have halted production amid reports that Beijing has banned these processors from entering the country. Bloomberg had previously reported that China would begin to allow H200 imports for commercial use “as soon as this quarter.”

Nvidia called upon suppliers to boost output of components for these H200 chips after reportedly receiving more than 2 million orders from Chinese customers while only having roughly 700,000 in inventory.

Chinese policymakers have been keen on boosting their domestic semiconductor industry, with Nvidia’s H20 chips (a nerfed version of the H200) not breaking through into the market in a meaningful way even after export restrictions were lifted last year. Even though the H200 is considerably more powerful than the H20, recent reporting by both the FT and The Information suggests that regulators are similarly intent on limiting access.

That’s creating a more robust black market for Nvidia’s flagship Blackwell chips, per the FT:

One Chinese seller of Nvidia AI servers said many local customers had cancelled orders for the H200. Instead, they have switched to the more advanced B200 and B300, which are banned for export into China by Washington, leading to an active black market for the chips.

The Department of Commerce had recently revised its export review policy to lay the foundation for Nvidia to begin to ship these chips to the world’s second-largest economy, while US President Donald Trump imposed a 25% levy on H200 imports into the US that will not be used domestically (that is, will be brought in then re-exported to China). These announcements also cover AMD’s MI325X chips.

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Luke Kawa

How Claude Code “is the ChatGPT moment repeated” — and why that’s awful news for software stocks

The relentless slide in software stocks continues, with the iShares Expanded Tech Software ETF trading to the downside and lagging the market on Friday.

The growing adoption of Claude Code, and more recently, the launch of Claude Cowork by Anthropic, has been an attention-grabbing moment as to the power of AI agents and how they can be housed and operated solely under one highly integrated user interface.

To say that software stocks have fallen out of favor would be an understatement, as having this much industry-specific market pain is incredibly rare. Based on data going back to 2001, if IGV has fallen at least 5% over the past month, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF is typically also down between 5% to 6% over the same period. Less than 3% of the time does SPY rise at least 1% while software stocks have gotten slammed — 28 instances in total, going back to August 2001 — and three of those are the past three sessions. Their valuation compression has also been intense.

Doug O’Laughlin, president of SemiAnalysis, authored a thought-provoking piece on just how momentous this recent technological progress is, along with his views on how AI agents will displace software and what disrupted companies can do adapt. A couple excerpts:

Assuming it improves, has harnesses, and can continue to scale large context windows and only become marginally more intelligent, I believe this is enough to really take us to the next state of AI. I cannot stress enough that Claude Code is the ChatGPT moment repeated. You must try it to understand.

One day, the successor to Claude Code will make a superhuman interface available to everyone. And if Tokens were TCP/IP, Claude Code is the first genuine website built in the age of AI. And this is going to hurt a large part of the software industry.

I believe that all software must leave information work as soon as possible. I believe that the future role of software will not have much information processing’, i.e., analysis. Claude Code or Agent-Next will be doing the information synthesis, the GUI, and the workflow. That will be ephemeral and generated for the use at hand. Anyone should be able to access the information they want in the format they want and reference the underlying data.

What I’m trying to say is that the traditional differentiation metrics will change. Faster workflows, better UIs, and smoother integrations will all become worthless, while persistent information, a la an API, will become extremely valuable.

The growing adoption of Claude Code, and more recently, the launch of Claude Cowork by Anthropic, has been an attention-grabbing moment as to the power of AI agents and how they can be housed and operated solely under one highly integrated user interface.

To say that software stocks have fallen out of favor would be an understatement, as having this much industry-specific market pain is incredibly rare. Based on data going back to 2001, if IGV has fallen at least 5% over the past month, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF is typically also down between 5% to 6% over the same period. Less than 3% of the time does SPY rise at least 1% while software stocks have gotten slammed — 28 instances in total, going back to August 2001 — and three of those are the past three sessions. Their valuation compression has also been intense.

Doug O’Laughlin, president of SemiAnalysis, authored a thought-provoking piece on just how momentous this recent technological progress is, along with his views on how AI agents will displace software and what disrupted companies can do adapt. A couple excerpts:

Assuming it improves, has harnesses, and can continue to scale large context windows and only become marginally more intelligent, I believe this is enough to really take us to the next state of AI. I cannot stress enough that Claude Code is the ChatGPT moment repeated. You must try it to understand.

One day, the successor to Claude Code will make a superhuman interface available to everyone. And if Tokens were TCP/IP, Claude Code is the first genuine website built in the age of AI. And this is going to hurt a large part of the software industry.

I believe that all software must leave information work as soon as possible. I believe that the future role of software will not have much information processing’, i.e., analysis. Claude Code or Agent-Next will be doing the information synthesis, the GUI, and the workflow. That will be ephemeral and generated for the use at hand. Anyone should be able to access the information they want in the format they want and reference the underlying data.

What I’m trying to say is that the traditional differentiation metrics will change. Faster workflows, better UIs, and smoother integrations will all become worthless, while persistent information, a la an API, will become extremely valuable.

markets
Luke Kawa

Strategists sound alarm over silver’s rally, recommend options trades for potential violent reversal

Silver’s ridiculous romp higher in 2025 and at the start of this year is showing some signs of fraying around the edges.

And with just how fierce the move higher has been, strategists are warning of the potential for intense downside as some of the key parts of the fundamental and technical theses for silver are starting to look less solid.

Michael Purves, CEO of Tallbacken Capital Advisors, who’s been bullish on the shiny metal, thinks it’s once again time to hedge long exposure.

On Thursday, he recommended selling $95 strike calls on the iShares Silver Trust that expire in February to purchase $75 strike puts.

Purves previously recommended that clients hedge their silver exposure on December 26 (its 2025 peak) before declaring that the coast was once again clear for longs on December 30.

“It might be surprising to know that speculative long silver futures positions are at 20 month lows, or that Open Interest is at five year lows,” he wrote. “Once again, hedging long positions is in order — particularly given the distorted put-call skew which allows [investors] to sell calls to finance long put positions.”

Viresh Kanabar, an investment strategist at Macro Hive, followed this up on Friday by flagging one of several key changes in the market structure for silver. The physical market tightness, cited by bulls as an important driver behind silver’s skyward ascent, is showing signs of reversing.

“1m forwards on physical silver have flipped back to contango,” he wrote. “This lines up with physical ETF outflows and evidence that high prices are weighing on industrial demand.”

Silver contango

“In short, we are not bullish on silver at these levels, instead, see increasing signs of risks skewing to the downside,” Kanabar added.

David Cervantes, founder of Pinebrook Capital Management, told clients on Thursday that he’s taken a short position in silver by owning put options on SLV with three months to expiry, noting that its outperformance of the stock market over the past 100 and 252 days has reached unprecedented levels.

“THIS IS HIGHLY SPECULATIVE AND A SMALL GAMBLE-SIZED WAGER WILL BE MADE OVER WHICH SLEEP WILL NOT BE LOST,” he emphasized.

markets

GE Vernova rises on plan to address data center power needs

GE Vernova rose Friday as the market digested reports of Trump administration plans to effectively push hyperscalers to foot the bill for new power plants to feed the giant grid that’s home to some of country’s most data center-dense districts.

In a note, Jefferies analysts called GE Vernova — the maker of turbines for natural gas-fueled power plants — the “clearest winner” of such a plan.

(The need for additional power plants would mean more sales and/or higher prices for its products.)

Jefferies says plans for additional capacity in the PJM grid — a 13-state swath that includes areas of high data center concentration like northern Virginia and Ohio — is a negative for companies like Vistra, Constellation Energy, and Talen Energy, which had invested heavily in the the PJM grid, likely hoping elevated prices would persist. That seems less likely should plans to boost power supply in the grid actually come to pass.

(The need for additional power plants would mean more sales and/or higher prices for its products.)

Jefferies says plans for additional capacity in the PJM grid — a 13-state swath that includes areas of high data center concentration like northern Virginia and Ohio — is a negative for companies like Vistra, Constellation Energy, and Talen Energy, which had invested heavily in the the PJM grid, likely hoping elevated prices would persist. That seems less likely should plans to boost power supply in the grid actually come to pass.

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