Fed Day

Good morning contrarians! Welcome to the Daily Contrarian, our morning look at events likely to move markets. It is Wednesday, Dec. 18. The Bottom Line segment of today’s podcast starts at (2:34), followed by Stocks on the Contrarian Radar©️ featuring Dow Industrials and UNH 0.00%↑ at (8:01) for listeners who want to skip ahead.

State of Play

Stocks dropped a bit yesterday with small caps seeing the worst of it. As we eye our board of indicators for signs of direction at 0700, things are pretty quiet ahead of the Fed interest rate decision:

• Stock index futures are pointing to a higher open, led by small caps. The Russell 2000 is up 0.5% with S&P 500 and Nasdaq futures pointing to gains of 0.2% each;

• Cryptos appear to be taking a bit of a breather after ascending to fresh record highs yesterday. Bitcoin is down 2% to trade around $105,000. It briefly broached $108,000 yesterday;

• Commodities aren’t doing anything. WTI crude oil is unchanged trading at $70/barrel. Copper is unchanged;

• Bonds are quiet ahead of the Fed. The 2-year yields 4.25%. The 10-year yields 4.40%.

Today’s Known Events

It’s Fed Day! The US Federal Reserve concludes its two-day meeting today and is widely expected to cut another 25 basis points off the key policy rate. The decision is out at 1400 to be followed by Jerome Powell’s press conference at 1430.

(‘Jay Powell Ponders His Fate’ by author via Grok AI)

We do have some earnings as well: Birkenstock (BIRK 0.00%↑), General Mills (GIS 0.00%↑), Jabil (JBL 0.00%↑), and Toro Company (TTC 0.00%↑) report before the open at 0930.

Micron (MU 0.00%↑) is the biggest name to report after the close at 1400.