1. The S&P 500 has erased all post-election day gains.

2. The equity market is really worried about interest rates.

The rise in yields is making it costlier to borrow, ie “tightening liquidity” in Wall Street parlance.

The average 30-year U.S. mortgage rate rose to 6.9% last week.

3. Stanley Druckenmiller once said: “It’s liquidity that moves the markets.”

4. As uncertainty mounts over surging bond yields and Trump’s rhetoric, contrarian investors are buying Europe.

“European equities tend to benefit from rising rates and a cheaper Euro, given Europe’s status as a value region,” say Bank of America strategists led by Sebastian Raedler, seeing scope for short-term tactical outperformance.

European firms could even enjoy some positive surprises this year: if US tariffs come in lower than expected, if China’s stimulus is bigger and better targeted, and from looser monetary policy than in the US.

The breadth of gains among the region’s stocks has also been improving in the past month, compared to dwindling participation in the US rally. Fewer than 57% of S&P 500 members maintain a rising 200-day average, near the weakest level since December 2023.

The Stoxx 600 is even beating the S&P 500 so far this month.

5. Goldman still bullish on China.

Sentiment has been particularly weak for Chinese stocks, with concern over increased trade tensions under Donald Trump pushing the MSCI China Index into a bear market last week.

However, data showed Chinese exports rose 10.7% in December, and shipments for the whole of last year reached a record of $3.6 trillion.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. strategists said they remain bullish on Chinese stocks despite the ongoing rout, predicting that Chinese benchmarks will rise about 20% by year-end.

6. “SAAS is dead”.

In a recent interview, Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, outlined a bold yet controversial vision for the future of business applications in a world dominated by AI.

According to him, the era of SaaS as we know it is coming to an end, giving way to integrated platforms where AI becomes the central driver.

This transformation is poised to disrupt traditional tools and workflows, paving the way for a new generation of applications. For decades, SaaS applications have been indispensable in powering business operations — CRM, HR, ERP systems, project management tools, and collaborative workspaces have all built their dominance on one fundamental premise: they’re essentially CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) databases with business logic layered on top.

But in the AI era, Nadella envisions that this business logic will migrate to an AI layer, disrupting the role of traditional SaaS apps.

The “intelligence” part of these systems — the workflows, decision-making, and automation — will shift to the AI agents, collapsing the individual value proposition of isolated SaaS tools.

Due to this AI disruption, some software areas will likely be commoditized.

However, software tends to be modestly priced relative to salaries and “labor” is still an expensive way to accomplish any organizational goal. Businesses are trying to avoid throwing people at problems given persistent salary inflation and scarcity of talent in many industries.

Conclusion: the number of winners may narrow, but a smaller number of leaders will continue to drive the SaaS industry forward.

7. “Diamonds are forever” but prices are now at their lowest level this century.

The demand for diamonds has declined as its allure fades in a key consumer market: China.

Falling marriage rates as well as growing popularity for gold and lab-grown gems all drove down Chinese demand for diamonds, said market research firm Daxue Consulting.

Additionally, the case for buying diamonds as an investment has dwindled. Diamonds were seen as an asset and inflation hedge over the last 50 years. But that investment rationale has largely faded as prices plunge.

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