Another Wild Week in Markets — Where Are the Long-Term Opportunities?
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Weekly Outlook
Volkswagen's Cuts and the "Selling Assets to Survive" Question $Ford Motor (F.US)$ $General Motors (GM.US)$
Volkswagen plans to cut one in six jobs and close factories, while also selling core assets. The concern is that the funds raised aren't going toward transformation — they're going toward keeping an inefficient operation alive. VW's struggles are a microcosm of broader European manufacturing decline.
The real question markets are asking: will the proceeds from asset sales actually be reinvested in the future, or will VW simply use the cash to keep the lights on — the way a company does when it's winding down rather than rebuilding? On the other side of the ledger, US manufacturing is closely tied to the Republican base, and Trump's policy direction is creating defence-adjacent transformation opportunities for traditional American automakers.
Japan's Economic Nationalism Creep — Investors Fear Reform Reversal $ProShares UltraShort Yen (YCS.US)$
The Japanese government is moving to restrict overseas capital acquisitions and is considering raising the threshold for shareholder activism. Foreign investors are worried Japan is drifting back toward economic nationalism, with reform momentum beginning to reverse.
If Japan trends toward remilitarisation, economic nationalism will follow — the two are inseparable. Investors are not oblivious. A weakening yen and accelerating capital outflows have already validated these concerns.
OpenAI has proposed offering the US government a 5% stake in exchange for political support and financial backing. Other AI companies may be expected to follow suit.
The AI boom has become a structural pillar of the US economy — one that cannot afford to collapse. AI companies voluntarily binding themselves to government interests creates a form of state-level support mechanism, buying time against a near-term bubble burst. That said, this isn't just about AI hardware — further rotation within the broader AI sector should be expected as this dynamic plays out.
US Data Centre Grid Connection Becomes a Bottleneck $First Trust Nasdaq Clean Edge Smart Grid Infrastructure Index Fund (GRID.US)$ $VanEck Uranium and Nuclear ETF (NLR.US)$
Connecting a data centre to the US grid takes an average of four years, with a complex web of federal and state regulations — and local community opposition on top of that. As GPU supply improves, grid access is becoming the new constraint.
At the same time, the US is moving to ban Chinese inverters. But with grid capacity already stretched to the limit, data centres are being forced to build their own power sources — driving a surge in demand for gas turbines, transformers, and solid-state circuit breakers.
The US power shortage is a structural need, not a cyclical one. Restricting Chinese equipment is effectively a self-imposed constraint. Against a global backdrop of 3–4 year delivery timelines, China's 6–12 month lead times are a scarce resource in their own right. In the near term, however, this is a tailwind for domestic US energy sector companies.
Wall Street's China Business Rebounds on Record Trading Revenue $Bank of America (BAC.US)$ $Citigroup (C.US)$
Goldman Sachs $Goldman Sachs (GS.US)$ , Morgan Stanley $Morgan Stanley (MS.US)$ and other major Wall Street banks saw record profits from their China securities operations last year, driven by a recovery in trading and brokerage activity. As global investors return to Chinese markets and volumes pick up, Wall Street's China franchises are once again a growth story.
The major US banks kick off the new earnings season next week — this structural tailwind should show up in their results.
The US Department of Defense plans to purchase 16,000 tonnes of lithium carbonate as a strategic reserve over five years, at a contract value of approximately $300 million. The near-term price impact on lithium is likely limited — but the signal is significant. The US is moving from rhetoric to action on critical mineral stockpiling, and this will have real implications for the battery industry.
Next Week: Dates to Watch
July 14 — US CPI
July 14–15 — Warsh testifies before the Senate and House
July 15 — China GDP
July 15 — US PPI
July 14 — Major US banks kick off the new earnings season
$Invesco QQQ Trust (QQQ.US)$ $ProShares UltraPro QQQ ETF (TQQQ.US)$ $S&P 500 Index (.SPX.US)$ $Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI.US)$ $ProShares UltraShort Gold (GLL.US)$ $DB GOLD DOUBLE LONG EXCH TRADED NOTES (DGP.US)$$US Treasury Bond ETFs (LIST22866.US)$ $USD (USDindex.FX)$ $T-Rex 2x Inverse Tesla Daily Target ETF (TSLZ.US)$ $ProShares UltraPro Short QQQ ETF (SQQQ.US)$ $ProShares UltraPro QQQ ETF (TQQQ.US)$ $2x Long VIX Futures ETF (UVIX.US)$ $ProShares UltraPro Short S&P500 ETF (SPXU.US)$ $ProShares UltraPro Short Dow30 ETF (SDOW.US)$ $Tesla (TSLA.US)$ $NVIDIA (NVDA.US)$ $SpaceX (SPCX.US)$ $Micron Technology (MU.US)$ $SK hynix (SKHY.US)$
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