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Warm-Up

- CTP Cup - All systems go! 9 participants!

- ELON gets his $$$

- Kids account challenge

- Patriot games are coming...

Markets

- Not much headwinds - EOY approaching

- Analysts predicting SP500 for 2026 - 7,500 (12% upside)

- More Oracle back and forth

- Gold and Silver

Elon

- Elon Musk's net worth surged to $749 billion late Friday after the Delaware Supreme Court reinstated Tesla stock options worth $139 billion that were voided last year

- He also recently received a $1T pay plan approval

- Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jensen Huang combined

- His fortune exceeds the GDP of nations like the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, and Switzerland.

- He is richer than every country in Africa by GDP

- He is projected by some reports to become the world's first trillionaire by 2027

When did Larry Ellison and Oracle become newsworthy?

- Every day in the news....

- Larry Ellison NOW Personally Guarantees Paramount Bid for Warner Bros.

- The announcement of Mr. Ellison’s personal guarantee is meant to address concerns that the Warner Bros. Discovery’s board had expressed about Paramount’s original offer.

- Helping out sonny-boy?

More Oracle

- Oracle stock slid after a report that Blue Owl Capital won’t back a $10 billion data center for OpenAI. (Michigan)

- Oracle has $248 billion in lease commitments for data centers and cloud capacity commitments over the next 15 to 19 years.

- Oracle later responded to the FT report, saying the project was moving forward and that Blue Owl was not part of equity talks.

EVEN MORE!

- Multiple media outlets, including the Associated Press, reported that ByteDance has reached an agreement with Oracle ORCL, Silver Lake, and Abu-Dhabi-based MGX to set up a joint venture for TikTok’s US operations. Oracle will hold a 15.0% stake in the new entity, while ByteDance will retain a 19.9% stake.

- The important thing her is that TikTok stays as a major tenant of OCI as ORCL needs this cash flow...

- Of all of the items, this may be why ORCL stock has bounced te last few days.

Congressional Ban

- A vote on legislation banning members from owning or trading stocks could get a vote in the new year, according to House leadership and Republican members.

- President Donald Trump has said he supports a congressional ban but has pushed back on versions that include the executive branch.

- Basically this bill would prohibit the ownership of individual stocks by congress

Over to Japan

- Bank of Japan raises benchmark rates to highest in 30 years, lifting 10-year JGB yield past 2%

- Yen still VERY weak - trading at 157/USD - (problematic)

- The BOJ said that real interest rates are expected to remain “significantly negative,” adding that accommodative financial conditions will continue to firmly support economic activity.

- The yen weakened 0.25% against the USD after the decision - therefore still dovish and stimulative

Economic Numbers

- Estimates, partial numbers and best guesses. OH, 2-month averaging as well

- The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the annual headline inflation rate and core CPI rate for last month were 2.7% and 2.6%, respectively, well below expectations.

- Due to government shutdown, BLS to make certain methodological assumptions about the prior month’s inflation levels.

- Those assumptions in the methodology were not clear to economists and were not fully explained in the release.

- Here is a big issue: The price changes in October for the OER (owners equivalent rent) appear to have been “set to zero.”

 Sports Prediction Markets

- Sports is fueling the growth and is forecasted to make up 44% of volume as prediction markets mature.

- According to one expert: the fundamental elements of consumer demand and an array of diverse brands looking to meet that demand are clearly in place

- Sportsbooks are getting a bit nervous....

First Dell, then...

- Billionaire hedge fund manager Ray Dalio of Bridgewater Associates and his wife, Barbara, committed to seed Trump accounts for approximately 300,000 children in Connecticut.

- Following the Dells’ pledge, the funds will be aimed at kids who live in a Connecticut ZIP code where the median income is less than $150,000.

- The Dalio grant will fund $250 per child for approximately 300,000 children in Connecticut. This applies to children who live in a ZIP code where the median income is less than $150,000. About 87% of Connecticut ZIP codes meet that criteria, according to a CNBC analysis of Census Bureau data.

- “Ray has joined what we are calling the 50-state challenge,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a press conference on Wednesday.

- A growing number of companies have announced they would match contributions to Trump accounts for their employees, including BNY and BlackRock.

Patriot Games (Hunger Games?)

- Trump announced: The Washington Monument will be illuminated with festive lights, a triumphal arc will be constructed and the “Patriot Games” will commence. The games are an “unprecedented four-day athletic event featuring the greatest high school athletes: one young man and one young woman from each state and territory.

- Uhhhhhh "And so it was decreed that, each year, the various districts of Panem would offer up, in tribute, one young man and woman to fight to the death in a pageant of honor, courage and sacrifice. (Hunger Games 2012)

- What next - PURGE NIGHT?

Fed Pick

- Now it seems as if it is a 4 person race...

- President Trump says "Nowadays, when there is good news, the market goes down because everybody thinks that interest rates will be immediately lifted"; says "I want my new Fed Chairman to lower interest rates if the market is doing well"; says "Anybody that disagrees with me will never be the Fed Chairman!"

San Fran Blackout

- Alphabet-owned Waymo resumed its robotaxi service in the San Francisco Bay Area Sunday evening after pausing it amid widespread blackouts that had affected their vehicles’ behavior.

- Waymo said it worked with city officials throughout the blackout and had “proactively” initiated a temporary suspension of its service.

- Interesting point there - what happens when grid disruptions for internet with self-driving

Angry Shareholders (For a minute)

- Tricolor CEO Daniel Chu directed a deputy to send him $6.25 million in bonuses in August, weeks before the company filed for bankruptcy, U.S. prosecutors alleged.

- Subprime autofirm that had alleged fraud

- This happens all the time

- Big issue to keep alert to is the news about "Subprime"

WEED

- Trump’s executive order shifts cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III, easing research, banking and tax restrictions and marking the biggest federal cannabis policy change in decades.

- Shares of cannabis conglomerates were down following the announcement, likely from worries of new competition from international companies.

- NOT legalization - NOT for recreational use...

- Banking, Institutional capital .....

OpenAi

- Beggars cup continues

- OpenAI is in initial discussions to raise at least $10 billion from Amazon.com Inc. and use its chips, a potential win for the online retailer’s effort to broaden its AI industry presence and compete with Nvidia Corp.

- The deal under discussion could value OpenAI north of $500 billion and see it adopt Amazon’s Trainium chip, a person with knowledge of the matter said, asking to remain anonymous to describe private negotiations.

- Talks, however, are at a preliminary stage and terms c