We flagged this morning that the shutdown and missing jobs data would tilt the market toward uncertainty, and that’s exactly how it played out. Stocks chopped higher, not with conviction but with relief, as the ADP number (what will be the proxy for September’s Non Farm Payrolls if it isn’t released Friday) came in weak, and pharma carried the tape. Gold once again flashed its safe-haven appeal at record highs.

The tone was fragile. Equities touched fresh intraday highs before fading, with traders leaning on rate-cut hopes even as the ADP report underscored weakness in private hiring. Oil slid back to $62, the dollar was mixed, and Treasury yields eased as investors weighed policy risk against still-strong momentum.

Bottom line: the rally feels thinner by the day. Pharma headlines provided cover, but without hard data and with Washington still dark, positioning remains cautious. Traders are buying what they trust and hedging the rest, letting gold and healthcare do the heavy lifting while the broader market waits for clarity.

We warned this morning that with Washington shut down and the Fed flying blind, markets would trade nervous… and that’s exactly what unfolded. Stocks drifted, traders tiptoed, and gold stole the spotlight again, powering to fresh record highs as investors piled into safety.

The mood stayed uneasy. Equities were mixed through the afternoon, with traders wary of a prolonged shutdown and no jobs data to anchor expectations. Oil steadied after its recent drop, yields softened slightly, and volatility crept higher as proof that calm on the surface hides rising tension underneath.

Bottom line: it’s a “wait and hedge” kind of market. No one’s panicking, but few are buying the dip either. With the data blackout stretching on and the threat of political gridlock spilling over into markets, traders are left trading vibes, not numbers.

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Morningstar argues that we’re living through a quiet revolution: private companies are not just hiding behind the public markets… they’re reshaping them. In this piece, they lay out how these giants are blurring the lines between private and public, from stock-market pressure to capital flow dominance. 

They show how private firms now compete aggressively with public ones, often compressing margins, taking over whole sectors (especially in tech and biotech), and drawing in capital that used to feed public equity. Because many stay private longer, invest behind closed doors, and raise huge rounds, they distort valuation benchmarks and choke IPO pipelines. For traders, that shift means the “public market discount” might become risk, not opportunity.

If the public markets are drained of their best growth engines, the indexes might look lofty but feel hollow. The greatest trades may no longer come from public stock selection, but from spotting which private-to-public plays will break free, which sectors are being hollowed out, and where the next liquidity event will land. This is less a thesis than a warning: the markets you used to know are drifting.

In this Goldman Sachs Exchanges episode, host Allison Nathan gathers heavyweight voices — former BLS Commissioner Erica Groshen, economist Arthur Laffer, Harvard’s Alberto Cavallo, and GS’s Joseph Briggs — to poke holes in the reliability of U.S. economic data. They ask the tough questions: how much political influence seeps into key series, how consistent are revisions, and how blind can markets afford to be? 

They dig into case studies: data anomalies, lag structures, reweighting practices, and the thorny issue of hidden assumptions in headline metrics. The point isn’t to trash data entirely, but to remind us it’s imperfect, malleable, and often backward-looking. Markets built on faith in numbers should also weigh how fragile that faith is.

For traders, this is essential listening. If today’s PCE, CPI, or jobs print is noisy or manipulated, your positioning could misfire… especially in macro trades. Recognizing when data is warped gives you an edge: you’ll know when to fade prints, lean on alternative indicators, or trade around expected revisions. In a world addicted to numbers, skepticism might be your best hedge.