Good morning! Today is a big day at the White House—Trump is hosting both Zelensky and Netanyahu as both leaders arrived in the US for Lindsey Graham’s funeral. He is expected to discuss both wars with the respective leaders. We dive deeper into the war topics in the first two market segments.
Staying in global affairs, we also take a look at the US anti-cartel operation market that experienced an unusual spike overnight. After a bit of research, we found the main culprit.
We then preview this week’s Fed decision before ending with an update on the new Claude Opus 5.
Let’s take a look at the markets to make sense of the news!
Brought to you by Stand
Stand is a prediction market aggregator and the advanced trading terminal of choice for professionals. On Stand, traders discover trends, track traders, copy trade, get whale alerts, automate trades, and so much more.
The Midterms Tracker
RED
RED moved to 96.5 following the addition of new constituents to the HOUSE indices.
Senate
SENR is back on the rise, slowly approaching 101 points.
House
After the new additions, HOUSER is pretty much aligned with SENR—let’s see how the index will behave next week.
Main Events Of The Day
#1 The Strait Of Hormuz
Trade Strait of Hormuz Traffic on Stand
The Strait of Hormuz continues to be effectively closed. While there are ongoing discussions between Iran and Oman to open up the waterway, they remain at a preliminary stage. Traders kept the long-term forecast flat. However, the short-term end of August market is down to 13c as we approach the resolution date with no change in sight.
The pause in hostilities between the US and Iran still holds, but Saudi Arabia (mainly Saudi Aramco) is being attacked by the Houthis on a daily basis:
I expected to see oil react strongly to the news and that’s why I’m a prediction markets trader—oil is down several percent since the news broke:
#2 Busy Day at the White House
Staying with global affairs, Netanyahu is visiting Trump today. He is attending Lindsey Graham’s funeral and took the opportunity to earn some political capital domestically.
I told you here that the meeting drama was overblown by the mainstream media—after all they are at war together. I expect them to appear for a nice photo-op and discuss the latest developments in the Iran war.
Zelensky is also visiting Trump today—Lindsey Graham’s funeral attracts plenty of important people. Both leaders, however, will meet separately. While I expect some news out of the Netanyahu meeting, I don’t see high chances of any meaningful progress regarding the Ukraine war.
#3 The Anti-Cartel Market Misfire
Trade US anti-cartel operations on Stand
In the Western Hemisphere, one trader moved the price on the US anti-cartel operation from 3c up to more than 75c for a brief moment.
All based on a single headline: Janero Van DeMario Garrett—a 49-year-old Michigan fugitive allegedly tied to Los Chapitos (Sinaloa Cartel), arrested July 17 in Mazatlán in a joint DEA Detroit / DEA-Mexico / US Marshals Mexico / FBI operation. However, shortly after the news dropped it turned out that the US officials were not directly involved in the arrest.
This a cautionary tale to not fast click too fast.
#4 Will He Hike?
Turning to macro markets, this week we have a FOMC meeting that can result in a rate hike. Kevin Warsh, the new chair, no longer issues forward guidance and is not keen on leaking the decision ahead of time—the former Fed oracle, Nick Timiraos, is as clueless as anyone when it comes to the upcoming meeting.
Traders, on the other hand, give now 26% chance we will see a hike this week. And they see 74% chance of a hike by October. CME FedWatch is even more hawkish, giving over 33% chance of a hike:
Between the Iran war and stubborn inflation, he might not have another choice.
#5 The Two Sides of the New Opus
Trade Claude Opus Performance on Stand
Lastly, we have another update on the Claude Opus 5.
The model continues to top the leaderboard on the main benchmarks. However, people are increasingly frustrated with it (article inside the tweet):
Claude Opus 5 is not intuitive to use and often behaves differently to what Claude users are used to.
As the frontier models get better, they will increasingly fall into a trap—the researchers will do their best to align the model with the benchmarks for marketing purposes, making the very benchmarks a bad tool to measure real-life performance.
What do you think about the new Opus? Let us know in the comments.
Wrap up
That’s all for today!
We will continue to monitor the situation on prediction markets.
Make sure to follow prediction markets live to get fresh information on the conflict. Stay strong and see you tomorrow for another Morning Brief!
Brought to you by Stand
Stand is a prediction market aggregator and the advanced trading terminal of choice for professionals. On Stand, traders discover trends, track traders, copy trade, get whale alerts, automate trades, and so much more.
This is not official investment or life advice. Do your own research. These are only my opinions and I encourage anyone to do their own research before putting any money anywhere.