T&Q’s “shutdown shadow” frame from this morning held up. Equities edged higher into the afternoon, led by big tech, while breadth stayed tentative. Traders leaned into the soft-landing story even as the data blackout keeps the Fed guessing.

Hedge trades cooled. Gold eased off record highs as risk appetite poked through, while oil slid on oversupply talk and OPEC+ output chatter. That combo (stocks up a touch, gold and crude softer) fit the day’s “believe, but hedge” vibe.

Bottom line: the tape is drifting higher on faith, not fresh data. With Washington still shut and no clean reads coming, positioning—not prints—drives the next move. Stay nimble; the narrative can turn on a headline.

Forget AI.

President Trump's new law #S.1582 unlocks a new tech that could trigger a $21 trillion financial revolution.

President Trump himself called it a "big innovation"…

And said that it represents "American brilliance at its best."

Click here to see the details because the market for this tech…

Is projected to grow more than THREE times FASTER than AI in the coming years.

While skepticism is rising, this piece argues we’re not in a bubble… at least not yet. In “Five Reasons the AI Boom Isn’t in ‘Dot-Com’ Bubble Territory (Yet),” Alan Gula lays out why this cycle still has structural differences from 1999. He walks through IPO behavior, valuation metrics, concentration limits, growth realism, and investor psychology to show caution is wise, but panic is premature.

Gula’s case centers on how far today’s markets diverge from the dot-com insanity: fewer blow-off IPOs, better revenue traction in leading AI names, and more skepticism baked into valuations. He warns that hype is real, but this boom leans on infrastructure and real earnings, not just speculation.

For traders, this is a lense, not a permission slip. The article suggests you still need hedges, discipline, and a focus on names that can actually deliver… not just ride the narrative. If economists like Hanke and Gordon are right, any misstep in execution or macro could test even this more grounded optimism.

Barry Ritholtz and ETF guru Dave Nadig dig into the tidal wave of new ETF launches,  with nearly 1,000 expected in 2025. But here’s the twist: most aren’t your grandma’s low-cost index funds. They’re complex, expensive strategies wrapped in ETF shells… leveraging options, derivatives, and directional bets disguised as next-gen diversification. 

Nadig warns that the rush to issue new wrappers is less about serving investors and more about revenue. Many of these ETFs carry fees north of 1% and target traders, not long-term allocators. He argues the core low-cost beta funds will still attract real flows, but the standouts (if any) will be those that can scale quickly and survive the churn.

For traders, this is a signal, not a sale. The explosion of wrappers means more edges, more noise, and more landmines. The real play may lie in spotting when novelty becomes norm, understanding which strategies will scale, and treating the rest as speculative toys. As Nadig puts it: “There’ll be more ETFs than there are stocks.”