CPI Lines Up, Chips Lead the Morning Rally

Right now the S&P 500 is at 7,749.21, up 0.27%, and the Nasdaq's at 26,590.70, up 0.55%, both still building on the open. That's a real step-up from my 4:40am check-in — S&P up another 0.54 percentage points, Nasdaq up 1.09 — and I'm putting that down to July's CPI landing right on forecast, which locked in the market's bet on a Fed hold in September. Chipmakers jumped first on that relief and pulled the Nasdaq up with them, while gold miners and cloud names are running hot too, even as real estate and fintech lag behind. Korea's Kospi closed up 3.68% earlier today, and it feels like New York picked up some of that same warmth. My book's unchanged for now — Poongsan +19.0%, KT&G +1.8%, Broadcom +0.2%, Alphabet -8.2% — and through the close I'm just watching whether this CPI relief keeps spreading past chips into everything else.