Let the earnings barrage commence.
JPMorgan (JPM) is out with a big earnings beat, and CEO Jamie Dimon is voicing his support for Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell and the very institution President Trump and his team are attacking.
“What I’ve seen the president say [is] he’s not going to try to remove Jay Powell,” Dimon told reporters on a call this morning. “I think the independence of the Fed is absolutely critical, and not just for the current Fed chairman, who I respect, Jay Powell, but the next Fed chairman.”
Wells Fargo (WFC) slashed its profit outlook after a weak second quarter, further cementing its status as a banking laggard.
The Consumer Price Index (CPI) for June came in hotter than May’s report as the first signs of Trump’s tariffs appeared in the economic data. Excluding volatile food and energy prices, consumer prices rose 2.9% year over year compared to a 2.8% increase in May. Results were in line with economists’ forecasts.
Here is everything we touched on during Yahoo Finance’s Opening Bid on Tuesday. Tune in live daily to Opening Bid at 9:30 a.m. ET.
Interesting call out from JPMorgan Chase
On the aforementioned reporter call, I asked Dimon why he thinks “elevated” asset prices are a “significant” risk, as outlined in his prepared remarks.
“Look at it the other way around, Brian — what if they were not elevated?” he said. “I just see, you know, [asset prices] are fairly well priced in the top 10% or 15%, however you measure them. And then credit spreads are also, in my view, a little unnaturally low with all the potential exposures out there. And so the world is kind of pricing in a soft landing. And we’ve been in that soft landing very well.”
Markets pro Lauren Goodwin said on Opening Bid that she agrees with Dimon on asset values.
“It’s not necessarily that asset prices are unfair for the economic backdrop that we have today, but we know that there are risks on the horizon that are likely to impact the economic data and reality moving forward,” she said.
Derivative names from the Nvidia China news
The Nvidia H20 China development could be good news for its manufacturing partner, Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM). Nvidia announced late Monday that it had received approval to start filing licenses to ship H20 chips, used for artificial intelligence development, to China.
TSMC will report earnings on Thursday, hot on the heels of this win. By all indications, TSMC could lift its full-year revenue outlook due to strong AI chip demand.
The wild card here is how bullish TSMC execs will sound for 2026 given trade uncertainty and the AI capital expenditures cycle continuing to mature.
“We believe China sales impact has been in the $4-5 billion range and Nvidia has previously talked about China being a $50 billion market,” Citi analyst Atif Malik wrote in a note. “While US/China has patched up recently post EDA ban removal and a rare earth magnets deal, we believe this reversal could be part of the deal too. We believe investors should take a ‘wait and see’ approach before adding China contribution back to their models.”
How popular is Apple’s stock right now?
Bank of America’s new fund manager survey, released today, noted that in the past three months, global investors have raised their allocation to the tech sector by the largest amount since March 2009. Fund managers increased their allocation from a net 1% Underweight tech in June to a net 14% Overweight, the highest since January 2025.
Yet over the past three months, Apple’s (AAPL) stock has underperformed Google (GOOG), Microsoft (MSFT), Meta (META), and Nvidia (NVDA) by a country mile. Shares are up a measly 3% compared to double-digit percentage gains for those other names, led by a nearly 50% advance in Nvidia.
Podcast: Why the CEO of this giant sovereign wealth fund is bullish on Microsoft
Clearly, Apple is being held back by concerns about its exposure to China during the Trump trade war and stalled AI efforts.
Brian Sozzi is Yahoo Finance’s Executive Editor and a member of Yahoo Finance’s editorial leadership team. Follow Sozzi on X @BrianSozzi, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Tips on stories? Email brian.sozzi@yahoofinance.com.
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