The Taiwan New Dollar just posted its sharpest two-day rally against the US dollar—ever.

This wasn’t just any rally. It was a vertical move—TWD/USD spiked over 10% in two sessions, tagging a near three-year high in the process.

It caught the entire FX complex leaning the wrong way. It was statistically off the charts. 

This wasn’t a six-sigma move. Or even ten. We're talking fifteen sigma. That’s what quants call an “impossible” outcome. A market move so extreme that it breaks the model. 

A 10% move might not turn heads in a tape where spec. growth stocks like HIMS or PLTR can move that and more intraday—but for a currency pair? It’s seismic. Especially when the pair has been dozing in a multi-year falling wedge. 

That pattern? It just resolved higher. The breakout came right at the apex of the wedge—when no one was paying attention.

With this kind of volatility comes a forced unwind. Exporters, insurers, speculators—everyone caught leaning the wrong way gets squeezed out the door. Fast.

So what’s behind it—but more...

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. New position in TLT.
2. No adjustments are needed today.
3. Closed XLV at Profit Target.
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!

Berkshire Hathaway $BRK.B just delivered a double miss, falling short on revenue and earnings. 

But the real bombshell came later: Warren Buffett is stepping down as CEO at the end of 2025.

The result? Berkshire just logged its worst earnings reaction since 2011.

This isn’t just another miss. This is the market reacting to the end of an era. 

The Oracle of Omaha has been Berkshire's steady hand for decades, and while succession plans have been public for years, the official word hits differently. 

The stock sold off hard and fast.

This isn’t about numbers anymore. It’s about confidence.

When a fortress stock like Berkshire gets punished like this, it signals something deeper: investors are nervous...

Buffett stepping back into the shadows feels like a metaphor for this entire tape.

If Berkshire’s not safe, what is?

So what else did we learn from yesterday's earnings reactions? Let’s dive into the details.

*Click the image to enlarge it

Henry Schein $HSIC had the best...

Here are the most significant insider buys we’re tracking right now — starting with a major bet in Biotech and ending with a familiar name in Big Tech.

📌 Mimedx Group $MDXG – CEO Joseph H. Capper stepped in to buy 200,000 shares, equivalent to $1.27 million.

When the person steering the ship is buying with that kind of size, it usually means they believe in what’s ahead — or they know something we don’t.

📌 Hillman Solutions $HLMN – CFO Robert Kraft dropped nearly $1 million into his own stock.

If the finance chief is bullish, we take notice. It’s often one of the most telling insider signals out there.

Here’s The Hot Corner, with data from May 5, 2025:

Click the table to enlarge it.

📌 Algoma Steel $ASTL – Maple Rock Capital just upped its stake from 5.85% to 7.2%,...

Today's number is... 358

Gold has been in an uptrend for the past 358 trading days, marking the 8th-longest trend since the 1970s.

Here’s the chart:

Let's break down what the chart shows:

The black line in the upper panel indicates the price of gold. The blue line represents the 50-day moving average, while the red line shows the 200-day moving average of gold.

The black bars in the bottom panel indicate days when the 50-day average is greater than the 200-day average.

The Takeaway: To clarify, I identify a strong uptrend when the 50-day moving average is above the 200-day moving average. Currently, gold is experiencing one of the longest uptrends in the past 60 years, ranking as the eighth longest overall so far. At this point, there are no signs of this trend slowing down, as it continues to move upward and to the right on the chart. Therefore, it's difficult to be pessimistic about gold at this time.

However, Right now the 50-day moving average is 12.4% above the 200-day moving average. The last time the trend...

If there’s one word to describe the Trump administration over the past month, it’s “backfire.”

Just this past week, we’ve seen Australia ($EWA) and Canada ($EWC) rally following their respective elections—both countries opting for left-of-center governments in a clear rebuke of Trump-style politics. Their conservative leaders, caught mimicking Trump’s aggressive rhetoric amid a looming global trade war, were swiftly voted out.

Meanwhile, in a move that further underscores the unintended consequences, China ($FXI) has been quietly outperforming the United States ($SPY), even as tensions rise.

Talk about a backfire.

Since 2024, $FXI has been steadily trending higher relative to $SPY, and there’s no sign of that trend reversing anytime soon.

Strip away the politics, and the rotation out of U.S. equities starts to make perfect sense.

Valuations may not matter—until they suddenly do. U.S. stocks are commanding a premium that investors seem increasingly unwilling to pay in this environment. On the other hand, China offers both attractive valuations and strong momentum—a high-conviction setup...

Sign up for my free note here.

The relentless bid for international equities continues to stand out—and it’s getting harder to ignore.

Outside the U.S., we’re seeing a textbook V-bottom in progress. Stocks around the world are recovering fast and fierce, with many regions snapping back toward new highs.

Just look at the iShares MSCI EAFE ETF $EFA. It erased all its March and April losses in no time. 

After briefly undercutting last year’s lows, EFA shook out the weak hands, trapped the bears, and ripped right back above the upper bounds of the range.

These shakeouts that lead to breakouts are some of the most bullish setups out there. 

The greatest investor the world has ever seen announced his retirement this weekend. 

Warren Buffett delivered the news at the Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholders meeting on Saturday that he’ll be stepping down on January 1, 2026.

Naturally, this was the big story of the day. But all I keep hearing is that the stock is down 5% on the news.

You gotta be kidding me. 

JC and I have been joking for years that when this moment comes, you buy the dip. And now that it’s here, we’re doing it.

So, let’s tell the real story of Buffett and Berkshire shares these days.

What all the headlines aren’t telling you is that Buffett literally just went out on top in the most GOAT fashion. Let me explain…

Berkshire closed at fresh all-time highs Friday.

Only a handful of stocks in the S&P 500 could say the same.

The market just suffered a swift and steep drawdown. It's the worst of the entire cycle. A lot of stocks have been absolutely crushed. But not this one. 

Not only that, but BRK also recently made...

We're amidst an epic bull market for precious metals. And while gold and silver get all the headlines, we think Palladium could end up being the sneaky outperformer in this cycle.

We laid out the case in February: Commercial hedgers were loading up at record levels. 

That only happens when Palladium is dirt cheap, which it certainly is right now. The price is still trading more than 70% below the 2022 peak.

Price has done nothing for months. 

But that might be exactly what we want.

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Welcome to The Minor Leaguers.

We've had some great trades come out of this small-cap-focused column since we launched it back in 2020 and started rotating it with our flagship bottom-up scan, Under the Hood.

For the first year or so, we focused only on Russell 2000 stocks with a market cap between $1 and $2B.

That was fun, but we wanted to branch out a bit and allow some new stocks to find their way onto our list.

We expanded our universe to include some mid-caps.

Nowadays, to make the cut for our Minor Leaguers list, a company must have a market cap between $1 and $4B.

And it doesn't have to be a Russell component — it can be any US-listed equity. With participation expanding around the globe, we want all those ADRs in our universe.

The same price and liquidity filters are applied. Then, as always, we sort by proximity to new...

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. No new positions today.
2. Adjustment to XLI position.
3. Closed XLE at Profit Target.
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!

Today's trade is a similar trade to the one I did in Kingsoft Computing last week. It's a bet on a previous highfligher, who had it's legs kicked out from under it during the recent market turmoil, that appears to be setting up to resume its former prominence.

In late April Dad-Shoe brand Skechers reported decent earnings and pulled all guidance.

We talked about it at the time in my video update. To refresh, Skechers had cash, patience and a good management team with a strong track record. They also source 40% of their product from China. As a results SKX management rather candidly said "we don't know" and yanked guidance for the rest of the year.

At the time my question was whether or not the stock could hold its lows:

The stock held, which was bullish but it would seem Skechers thought the certainty of cash in hand from 3G was better than rolling the dice of adjusting the supply chain on the fly. Today Skechers announced an agreement to be bought for $63/ share. A 30% premium over the price on Friday but below where SKX was trading in February.

It's important that A) Skechers was worried enough to take the cash and B) Private Equity was there to offer a bid. Skechers was looking at reporting for the next 9 months having no idea what the numbers would be. After a quarter century of...

Earnings season is heating up as we get into May. We've heard from plenty of consumer facing names so far (Hasbro, McDonald's, Chipotle) but by time honored tradition the earnings season for retail doesn't start until Walmart reports which won't happen until next Thursday.

It makes sense if you think about it. Walmart is the biggest retailer on earth. They set the standard and the context for all the other retailers. If Walmart reports positive comps and says it sees no problem with scarcity next week that raises the bar for Target. Home Depot reports before Lowe's for the same reason. There's no official law forcing the order. It's just what makes sense.

Once the big box stores are done reporting the floodgates open. Foot Locker, Best Buy, Kohl's, Gap, Ulta will all be on the record by the end of the month. While the economists argue over the long term implications of trade policy the retailers will be telling us what's actually happening in the real world.

I find it much more lucrative to focus on what Walmart is saying consumers are doing than what economists think should be happening.

I'm grading the names that matter and giving select earnings...

Two of the world's largest companies—Apple and Amazon—just delivered double beats… and the market couldn’t care less.

Amazon posted better-than-expected revenue and EPS, but finished the day slightly negative, marking its 4th consecutive negative earnings reaction. 

Apple also beat on both fronts… and got slammed for a -3.7% decline. This extends a rough streak of being punished in 6 of its last 8 earnings reports.

These aren’t speculative names. These are market generals. 

If they’re getting sold on good news, that’s a big red flag.

Technically, both charts tell the same story. 

After attempting to break out above key resistance levels, both stocks failed hard, printing failed breakout patterns and rolling back over. 

When leadership names like these can’t catch a bid even on strong results, it speaks volumes about the underlying tone of the tape.

This isn’t just a stock-specific weakness. This is index risk.

When the heaviest weights in the major averages get hit on strength, it’s often a sign that institutions are distributing, not accumulating.

The question now isn’t...

Insiders loaded the cart in the packaging space today—tossing in a few jets, biopharma, and an office REIT for good measure.

📌 Sonoco $SON – CEO Howard Coker and several directors teamed up for a $1.14 million aggregate purchase, a collective vote of confidence as the packaging giant hunts for margin upside.

When top brass move together like this, it usually signals high conviction — and, often, they’re seeing something the rest of the market hasn’t caught onto yet.

📌 FTAI Aviation $FTAI – Chairman and CEO Wes Edens joined forces with COO David Moreno to scoop up a total of $908,000 in FTAI stock.

Here’s The Hot Corner, with data from May 2, 2025:

Click the table to enlarge it.

📌 Brandywine Realty $BDN – CEO Gerard Sweeney stepped in for a $251,000 buy, a meaningful commitment in the embattled office REIT space.