Latest / Trend Watch / Episode 98: Democrats' Senate Hopes Fade?

Transcript

Episode 98: Democrats' Senate Hopes Fade? · Trend Watch

• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: ready to take a deeper look at where history politics
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: and economics all intersect well then you've come to
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: the right place each week here's where we pull back the headlines and focus on
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: the big trends the stuff that actually shapes our future through the noise we focus
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: on the signal i'm your host neil howe and this is trend watch
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: today is july 9th 2026 and this is trend watch welcome back everybody
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: as usual i have on my fellow analyst christian ford and
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: so christian i understand you're up in uh either up or down maine i'm not sure how
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: to talk about it but uh uh uh tell them tell us about it yeah i'm up in maine
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: for up north on a lake for i'm gonna say the whole month of july up here so
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: tying your own flies and you know doing all
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: that stuff fly fishing doing some sailing definitely beats
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: the uh dc summer you're learning you're learning sailing
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: yes we i got out my mom's old uh sunfish my wife and i were learning
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: to sail well it's about time that's all i gotta say um
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: but you'll be you'll be up uh you'll be up that you know you'll be up doing it in
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: the ocean at any time i can just tell right um how do you like it by
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: the way i like it yeah you know we we went out one day when it was really windy
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: and it was definitely a thrill
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: it is it's exciting it's um and it doesn't have
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: the noise you know it's amazing you go to uh you go to lakes and and places all over
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: the country and increasingly no sailboats are rented no sail
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: but you know what i mean everyone just takes their uh you know their their skidoos
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_01: and and boats and you know everything motorized and fills up full of gasoline
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: and goes
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: and i'll tell you there is a thrill uh particularly
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: when it's windy oh yeah particularly when there are waves anyway i've uh that's been
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: a lifelong passion of mine
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: so i'm glad you enjoy it um i was gonna ask you what you're doing but it's kind
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: of obvious uh you know for me i'm uh i'm just trying to finish
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: a new book that's coming out so i've been doing a lot
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: of uh citations you know checking going over all the chapters and
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: i i tell you what you know chat five and clode makes a lot of hazer i mean you know
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: if you're citing some huge congressional hearing
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: or something you just say what it is
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: and it'll just bam you know this perfectly formatted exact you know citation i mean
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: stuff like that it is um it is it is a labor saver anyway no more of
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: the uh what was it the chicago manual that's what i used in college for my citations
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: well yeah there there is that and you know ultimately if you're if you're writing
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: for a commercial publisher you don't really have to worry about that too much
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: because right there's a professional copy editor who will you know do all that
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: for you um but everything else uh to get everything aligned
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: to make sure you don't have any orphan citations orphan bibliographical entries and
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: checking to make sure everything is formatted exactly the same way throughout
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: the book i mean stuff like this is the stuff that ai is designed
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_01: for right um right making sure everything is logical and works i mean it's
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: the same reason why it's so good at coding right
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: if there's something that's truly requires impeccable organization
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: and logical consistency that's that's where it really excels so anyway um
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: uh let's get into it uh let's start with the economy i know we've uh it's been a
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: while since we had our you know we have the fourth of july weekend and all
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: that it's been a while so um bring us up to date
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: yeah well let's start with the markets the s&p closed up today 0.81 over
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: the last five trading days neil it's actually also only been 0.81 so all
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: the growth coming today as for the global dow not looking
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: as good it closed up today 0.33 but over the last five days is down 0.35 vix is
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: at 15.86 so
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: relatively low from what we've been seeing
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: and 10-year treasury 4.552 percent up 6.2 basis points over
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: the last five days i'm watching that uh i know the last time we were
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: on here i was talking about some signs of uh of uh
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: at least temporary deflation you know with the dollar up uh and rates coming down
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: but it's kind of moved the other way
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: uh particularly today europe and the rest of the world weren't doing well obviously
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_01: because of what's going on in iran and the gulf right we're going to talk about
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: that uh that that always introduces a differential right between us non-us um
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: but i'm i'm looking at that you know i've i've i've been uh kind of straddling
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: the fence right now on whether to go long or short uh bond duration
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: just don't know just sitting there thinking huh i could i could make up
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: a good narrative because either way you know depending on what the fed does what
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: the market does whether the global economy begins to speed up or slow down um
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: but uh definitely the story today and also i think split right because on
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: the one hand
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: the iran war is heating up again well that was negative but on the other hand
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: as you're going to
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_01: talk about a little bit the nato summit went surprisingly well and actually i think
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: might have been responsible for some of the buoyancy of the market right
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: right um so anyway any uh uh indicators any pmis anything okay i have
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: a couple here we have the june ism pmis
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: the final numbers came out manufacturing fell from 54.0 to 55
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: 53.3 but that still marks six months of growth similar story with services that fell from
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: 54.5 to 54.0 but again still long time growth there as for non-farm payrolls this came out last
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: week for june
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: now that's interesting i was unaware that those pmis were
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: so high 54 yeah right well no wonder uh rates are going up right i mean um
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: everything's kind
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: of going flat out maybe uh you know maybe that's what it's saying uh war is over um
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: i i didn't think that the employment number was that was that off i just thought
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: the previous month had been extremely high uh we have said many times on this show
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: that the typical employment number from now on considering
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: that there's really zero um net illegal immigration at this point
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: or probably even slightly net negative right is that
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: the typical employment number is going to be something like 20 or 30 right right so
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: when people came in with 50
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: and they were saying oh my god how low i'm just saying we're on
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: a new scale now right right where the the scale has changed let's get used to
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: the new scale right um anything else anything globally uh nothing major global right
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: now i think i'll have some next week but yeah that's what we're looking at
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_01: why don't we just uh jump right into it i mean i don't look there's nothing much
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: to say about the markets it's blackout period we're all waiting
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: for you know we're all waiting for earning season uh you know starting starting
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: in august um so
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: i just don't think there's a lot to talk about i'm still impressed by even on
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: a really good day a really a series of days actually last three days you know
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_01: the vix gets all the way down to like 15.8 uh that just strikes me as
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: a little high um considering that the the the snp is close to an all-time high right
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: um right i know i i've talked about that before but it just that worries me
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: a little bit just seems like uh some somebody's buying insurance out there there's
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_01: a nervousness um right okay let's uh let's jump into it uh you're the you're
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: the organizer you're the uh you're the you know you know you uh shoot me uh let's go
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: all right well talking about maine let's talk about the senate race neil
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: as everyone know probably knows
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: by now graham platner has dropped his main senate bid after he was accused of rape
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: by a former girlfriend now democrats have two weeks to find a replacement
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: with almost 10 names being thrown around
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: neil you know i have a question of how you think this race has got
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: to go now does this chaos hand susan collins a victory on a silver plate or
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: by dumping an already scandal ridden candidate does that give democrats actually
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: a better chance of defeating collins because they can choose someone who has
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: a clean past