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Anna's Markets Recap
Just facts, you think for yourself
Saturday, 5:15 AM
April 25, 2026
Good morning news friend! Here is a quick recap of what happened in the markets this week. 📰🌟
The Gmail app usually clips the bottom quarter of our emails, we recommend you reading our full article online here.
Most people think the market is a random walk. It’s not. It’s a choreographed dance, and you just weren't invited to the rehearsal.
While you were watching TikTok, a key member of the House Financial Services Committee just dropped a "flurry" of 25 consecutive buy orders in a single week. We aren't talking about tiny dividend reinvestments. We’re talking about a systematic, sector-wide accumulation across Aerospace, Financials, and Heavy Industry. When the people who regulate the banks start buying the banks, you don't ask questions. You look for the Alpha.
High-Conviction Signals:
The Power Play: A ranking member of the Ways and Means Committee just fully exited a major consumer discretionary position. They know something about the tax tailwinds (or headwinds) that you don't.
The Semi-Conductor Snipe: A $15k+ bet on the world's most critical chip manufacturer by a member with oversight on Financial Institutions & Monetary Policy.
The Banking Blitz: While the headlines scream about regional bank instability, the "Insiders" are quietly picking up shares of local lenders in Ohio.
Stop being the patsy at the table.
Economic & Market Overview
The S&P 500 closed Friday April 24 at 7,165.08, a new all-time high, finishing the week up 0.55%. The Nasdaq Composite jumped 1.50% to 24,836.60, also a record. The Dow lagged at 49,230.71, off 0.44%. The Russell 2000 set a record close Monday at 2,792.96. Beneath the surface, the tape ran on Iran-driven oil shocks, an AI capex reset, and the worst consumer sentiment reading in survey history.
Markets sold off Monday and Tuesday on stalled Iran peace talks, rallied Wednesday on Trump's indefinite ceasefire extension, wobbled Thursday on IBM and ServiceNow earnings, and surged Friday on Intel's blowout print and DOJ dropping its Powell probe.
The 10-year Treasury yield closed Friday at 4.31%, the 2-year at 3.78%, both pulled higher by oil. The dollar index gained 0.4% to 0.7% to roughly 98.6, its first weekly gain in three weeks on safe-haven flows. The VIX rose 7% to 18.74, signaling hedging demand even as indexes set records.
There was no FOMC meeting; the next decision is April 28-29, with futures pricing a 99.5% probability of a hold at 3.50%-3.75%. The Senate Banking Committee held a confirmation hearing Tuesday for Fed Chair nominee Kevin Warsh, who pledged independence and called for a "different, new inflation framework." Senator Tillis kept his hold pending the DOJ Powell probe. DOJ dropped that probe Friday, removing the major roadblock.
The April flash composite PMI hit 52.0, with manufacturing at 54.0, the highest since May 2022. New orders and output prices rose sharply, but supplier delivery times deteriorated to the worst since August 2022. The print read as stagflation, not reacceleration. Initial jobless claims rose to 214,000. The University of Michigan final April sentiment index landed Friday at 49.8, the lowest in survey history dating to 1952. Year-ahead inflation expectations sat at 4.7%. Pending home sales rose 1.5% month-over-month.
The CBP CAPE refund portal opened Monday, the first phase of refunding $166 billion in IEEPA tariffs struck down by the Supreme Court in February. Geopolitically, the US naval blockade of Iranian ports continued. The Strait of Hormuz remained largely closed for an eighth week. Trump extended a two-week ceasefire indefinitely Wednesday, then Thursday ordered the Navy to "shoot and kill" mine-laying vessels in the Strait. Iran seized two ships there the same day. By Friday, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were headed to Pakistan as Iran's foreign minister arrived in Islamabad, raising breakthrough hopes.
Technology & Growth
Tesla reported Q1 Wednesday after the close. Revenue of $22.39 billion missed $22.64 billion consensus. Adjusted EPS of $0.41 beat $0.37. Deliveries of 358,023 missed by roughly 7,600 vehicles. The headline disappointment came on the call. CFO Vaibhav Taneja raised 2026 capex to above $25 billion, up from $20 billion, against $8.6 billion in 2025. JPMorgan flagged equity-raise risk. Tesla erased robotaxi launch timelines and admitted prior FSD/HW3 capability claims were overstated. Shares opened the after-hours session up 4%, faded to +0.4%, and dropped 3.59% Thursday to $373.60. Friday closed at $373.72, leaving Tesla down 4% to 5% on the week. Positioning was bearish into the print, the result was mixed, and the capex bombshell forced the offside longs out.
Nvidia retook a $5 trillion market cap Friday at $208.27, up 4.32%. The catalyst was Intel. Intel reported Q1 revenue of $13.58 billion versus $12.42 billion consensus and EPS of $0.29 versus a penny expected. Intel's Data Center & AI segment grew 22% to $5.1 billion. Intel surged 23.6% Friday to $82.55, its best single day since 1987, lifting AMD 13.9%. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index extended its winning streak to 18 sessions. Intel's beat re-anchored the AI capex bull case that Tesla's guide had threatened.
Google Cloud Next ran April 22-24. Google unveiled eighth-generation TPUs, TPU 8t for training and TPU 8i for inference, with three times the performance of Ironwood. Anthropic committed multiple gigawatts of TPUs starting in 2027. Reports surfaced of a $40 billion Google investment in Anthropic. Salesforce announced an expanded Google Cloud partnership for cross-platform agentic workflows. CRM still dropped 9% Thursday as ServiceNow's 18% earnings collapse reignited AI/SaaS cannibalization fears, closing Friday at $174.
Meta announced 8,000 layoffs Thursday and signed an AWS Graviton CPU deal Friday for hundreds of thousands of chips. Microsoft offered voluntary buyouts to 7% of its US workforce Friday and confirmed itself as an Intel 18A foundry customer. Both stocks rallied with the Nasdaq's Friday surge despite the workforce cuts, reflecting investor relief on AI cost discipline. Apple had no week-specific news.
The "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" (OBBBA) was signed in July.
Most people read the headlines about the $15M estate exemption and moved on.
Big mistake.
While everyone is distracted by the estate tax number, they are missing the immediate, tactical windows that just opened up for 2026.
We call this the "Goldilocks Zone"—a specific 4-year period (2025–2029) where permanent structural changes overlap with temporary incentives.
If you have a net worth over $5M or own a pass-through business, you have 5 levers to pull. Right now.
The 5 Levers of the 2026 Wealth Ladder:
The QBI Lock-In: It’s permanent now. Here is how to restructure your entity to force yourself into the 20% deduction bucket.
SALT Arbitrage: The cap is up to $40k (temporarily). We explain the "Stacking" strategy to maximize this.
Charitable Acceleration: The new 0.5% AGI floor changes everything about when you donate.
The $15M Exemption: It's not just for dying. It’s for "Wealth Freezing" today.
Precision Income Management: RMDs and AGI smoothing tactics that actually work.
We read the legislation so you don't have to. This is your playbook for the next 4 years.
Financial Institutions
Berkshire Hathaway owned the financial-sector storyline. New CEO Greg Abel is unwinding roughly $15 billion in positions previously managed by Todd Combs, who left for JPMorgan late 2025. Abel signaled focus on a tight core of Apple, American Express, Coca-Cola, and Moody's. BRK.B closed Friday at $469.32, roughly flat on the week. The May 2 annual meeting will be Abel's first as CEO; Buffett will attend as Chairman from the floor.
JPMorgan closed Friday near $308.35, down 2% to 3% on the week despite franchise momentum. Strategist Dubravko Lakos-Bujas raised the year-end S&P 500 target Tuesday to 7,600 from 7,200, citing 58% AI capex growth and $775 billion in capex by year-end. JPM hired two senior tech bankers from Bank of America, issued $10 billion in fresh debt Friday, and won a mandate to finance Estée Lauder's potential Puig takeover.
Bank of America closed Friday at $52.47 with bearish options flow all week. BAC declared a $0.28 quarterly dividend and announced redemption of $3 billion in 2027 senior notes. Reuters reported Wednesday that draft regulatory rules could free roughly $320 billion of capital across US banks, a major buyback tailwind for JPM and BAC into the second half. This is the week's most under-discussed catalyst.
Visa reports April 28; shares closed Friday near $308.25, down 11.7% year-to-date versus the S&P 500's 3.3% gain. Consensus calls for fiscal Q2 EPS of $3.09 on revenue of $10.7 billion. Mastercard reports April 30 with consensus EPS of $4.40, up 18%. Both traded with cautious positioning into prints.
Consumer Staples & Healthcare
UnitedHealth was the week's star. Q1 results Tuesday delivered adjusted EPS of $7.23 versus $6.66 consensus and revenue of $111.72 billion versus $109.7 billion. The medical care ratio was 83.9%, below the 85% feared. UNH raised full-year adjusted EPS guidance to above $18.25 from above $17.75. The company shed less profitable Medicare Advantage members and pushed through premium increases. Shares finished the week up 9.2%, the best Dow performer. Argus, Wells Fargo, Truist, and Jefferies all raised targets. Positioning was beaten-down going in; the clean MCR print forced re-rating.
Eli Lilly had the messiest week. Monday Lilly announced acquiring Kelonia Therapeutics for up to $7 billion. Tuesday CVS declined to participate in CMS's BALANCE Medicare obesity coverage program. Truist quantified a $500 million peak Medicare Part D revenue hit, ballooning to $3.3 billion if all PBMs opt out. Friday IQVIA data showed Lilly's Foundayo at just 3,707 scripts in its first full week, well below Novo's oral Wegovy at 18,410 in its second week. LLY closed Friday near $883.89, down 3% to 5% on the week. The GLP-1 investor story took a real hit.
Procter & Gamble capped Friday with Q3 FY2026 results. Adjusted EPS of $1.59 beat $1.56. Net sales of $21.24 billion beat $20.5 billion. Organic sales grew 3%, with the first positive volume contribution in a year. Margins compressed 80 to 100 basis points on a $150 million Iran-driven energy headwind. P&G guided FY26 EPS "toward the lower end" of 1% to 6%. Shares closed up 3.16% near $149.77, the best day since January 2024 and the first close above the 80-day moving average since mid-March.
AbbVie delivered the week's worst pharma news. Thursday the FDA issued a Complete Response Letter for trenibotulinumtoxinE, citing manufacturing process questions. Friday ABBV pre-announced a $744 million pre-tax IPR&D charge and cut FY2026 adjusted EPS guidance to $13.96-$14.16 from $14.37-$14.57. Piper Sandler cut its target to $294 from $299.
Walmart redesigned its Great Value private label across 10,000 items Monday, the first major refresh in over a decade. Citi estimated WMT is owed roughly $10.2 billion in tariff refunds under the SCOTUS ruling. CFO John David Rainey told investors Walmart "would certainly avail" itself of refunds. Costco faced class-action lawsuits filed by seven plaintiffs alleging "double recovery" if Costco both passed tariff costs to consumers and collects refunds.
Energy & Industrial
WTI June futures closed Friday at $94.40, down 1.51% on the day but up 14% to 17% on the week. Brent settled at $105.33. Wednesday's EIA inventory build of 1.925 million barrels was bearish, but gasoline stocks fell 4.57 million and distillates 3.43 million. The bigger story: the EIA's April STEO projected a 5.1 million barrel-per-day global inventory draw in Q2 from Hormuz disruption.
Gold confounded the geopolitical script. Spot closed Friday near $4,723.60, down 2% to 3% on the week despite the war, roughly 10% below pre-war highs. The mechanics: surging energy lifted inflation expectations, repriced Fed cut probabilities to nearly zero through mid-year, strengthened the dollar to 98.6, and pushed the 10-year yield to 4.31%. Institutional sell orders stacked at the $4,785-$4,790 200-day moving average. A textbook stagflation rotation: long oil and equity beta, short gold and duration.
Exxon Mobil roundtripped. Shares closed Monday at $147.68, traded up to $150.53 Thursday, then fell 2.11% Friday to $147.37 as crude eased, leaving the stock roughly flat on the week. Scotiabank raised its target to $163 from $128 with a Sector Outperform Wednesday. Zacks upgraded to Strong Buy Tuesday. Wolfe Research downgraded to Peer Perform.
Home Depot ground lower all week, closing Friday near $335.89, down 1.26% on the day, leaving the stock 14% to 17% year-to-date below water. HD trades well below its 50-day ($348.82) and 200-day ($361.19) moving averages. Existing home sales hit a nine-month low in March at 3.98 million SAAR. The 30-year mortgage rate sat at 6.37% before drifting higher with the war. NAR cut its 2026 sales forecast.
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Baked with love,
Anna Eisenberg ❤️