Edward Meir's Week in Review for AMU: Nov. 9, 2025

For the week, all three major US equity indices lost ground. The 3% decline in the NASDAQ marked the sharpest weekly pullback since April. Nevertheless, the index is still up 19% year-to-date. For its part, the Dow lost 1.2% for the week and is now up a little more than 10% year-to-date. The S&P 500 fell by 1.6% and is up 14.4% so far this year.

There was not much change in US Treasury yields this past week. That was rather surprising because, typically, weakness in US equities drives money into the bond market. Instead, both the 10-year and 2-year notes ended virtually unchanged by week’s end, at 4.11% at 3.55%, respectively.

In base metals, copper led the group lower last week. It lost 1.6% and looks shakier on the charts, although not terribly so. Aluminum finished down by 1.25%. But there is no easing in physical premiums, which continue to climb in both the US and Europe (more on that later). Zinc finished pretty much unchanged, and tin was down slightly.

Nickel fell by 1% despite the Indonesian government issuing yet more restrictions on new permitting. In fact, the Indonesians have introduced a variety of measures to limit output for some time now. But nickel continues to flow out, a key reason why prices remain depressed. We suspect that, because Indonesia’s nickel production is concentrated mainly in Chinese hands, it might be difficult for Jakarta to push back too hard. That stands in stark contrast to its more successful efforts to monitor domestically controlled copper and tin production.

Lead was the only winner last week, tacking on about 1.5%. The complex typically is a bit of a contrarian play, moving up when other metals are falling and vice versa.

In the ferrous markets, Chinese iron ore and steel futures lost ground. But we did see a firmer tone in US valuations. US hot-rolled (HR) coil prices are now at nearly four-month highs, while rebar is trading at a 14-month peak – largely because of tariffs and maintenance outages tightening the market.

There were some important developments on the trade front this past week. The Supreme Court started to hear arguments over the legality of President Trump’s tariffs. Judging by the questioning from the justices thus far, there is considerable skepticism about the Trump administration’s legal rationale. Lower courts have ruled that Trump’s use of a 1977 federal law meant for national emergencies is legal overreach and exceeds his authority. The administration argues otherwise, citing power vested in the executive to “regulate” imports.

The Supreme Court probably won’t make any decisions until January. But the case is among the most critical the justices will rule on. Trump described it as the most important in 100 years. He warns a revocation would leave the US “defenseless, leading perhaps even to the ruination of our Nation.” But we do not think the end is nigh. Even if the court rules against the president, his administration could employ other statutes. But these would probably be a more finite duration and would require congressional oversight. Our guess: The court decision will be split. We suspect the Supreme Court will rule some parts of the national security tariffs unconstitutional (like levies on baby strollers), while others will stand. We probably won’t see much change in the steel and/or aluminum tariffs. Why? Because a stronger legal foundation underpins Section 232.

In the precious metal space, December gold futures settled at $4,009 per ounce, up by about $13/ounce on the week. Silver ended the week just about flat. Both platinum and palladium logged weekly losses. The general dollar index finished the week lower after spiking earlier in week.

In the energy markets, Brent futures settled at $63.63 per barrel on Friday. WTI finished at $59.75 a barrel. Both are down between $1.4-$2.00/barrel on the week. Swiss commodities trader Gunvor said on Thursday that it had withdrawn its proposal to buy the foreign assets of Lukoil. The decision came after the US Treasury accussed it of being “the Kremlin’s puppet.” Separately, the US said that it will grant Hungary a one-year exemption from sanctions for buying Russian oil and gas. The decision came after Hungarian PM Viktor Orban pressed his case during a White House meeting with President Trump on Friday.

Finally, natural gas prices have been surprisingly steady this past week despite fairly mild temperatures in large parts of the Northeast. Values ended on Friday at $4.31/barrel, up by about 5 cents on the week. The latest weekly EIA numbers showed gas inventories rising by 33 Bcf. That’s virtually flat from year-ago levels but up by 4.3% from the five-year average.

Macro readings and other news from the past week:

• With the US government shutdown continuing, the macro releases we got last week were light. Most important were a pair of rather poor consumer confidence readings. It started off with the reported drop in the Conference Board’s confidence index to 94.6 in October, down from a revised 95.6 in September. Markets were more alarmed by Friday’s preliminary University of Michigan sentiment index. It dropped to 50.3, well below an expected 53.2. There was also a 17% drop in the “current personal finances” reading and a 11% decline in “year-ahead expected business conditions.” That’s perhaps not surprising given the government shutdown and rising layoffs. Consumers’ expectations of short-term inflation ticked higher, from 4.6% last month to 4.7%. But longer-term inflation readings dropped to 3.6% from 3.9%.
• Despite the confidence dip, consumers continue to spend. Case in point: the $13.1 billion credit expansion for September from $3.1 billion in August. We are more interested to see how credit holds up in October because that’s when many of the headlines turned more negative. And with federal employees not getting paid, some could be living on credit cards. That means the consumer credit reading could very well increase yet again.
• The ISM service index for October increased to 52.4 from last month’s 51.0. But the services prices-paid index hit a 3-yr high.
• In labor news, ADP private payrolls came in somewhat higher than expected (at 46,000). But this was more than offset by a Challenger report showing job cuts in October climbing by 153,000, their highest October increase since 2003. In addition, layoff announcements surpassed more than a million in the first 10 months of this year, an increase of 65% compared to the same period last year. And yet, the overall unemployment rate (at least through September), remains historically low at 4.3%.
• Cansheet maker Ball Corporation reported strong demand for its products in Q3. The company’s CEO said that Ball saw beverage can volumes grow by 4.2% as operating earnings increased by 5.1%. “Aluminum packaging continues to outperform other substrates globally, underscoring the resilient and defensive nature of our business,” he said.
• The US Geological Survey added copper, lead, phosphate, and metallurgical coal to its list of minerals deemed critical to the economy. The list also includes a host of minor metals as well as silver and uranium, bringing the total number deemed critical to 60. We are not sure what the advantage is for a commodity to make the list. We have not seen significant upticks in domestic production for those that have been on it for some time.
• US Midwest aluminum premiums traded at about $0.90 last week amid talk that they now could go to $1/pound. European premiums are also being pulled higher on concerns about a decrease in Canadian metal flows into Europe and questions about output coming from the Mozal smelter next year. Century’s Icelandic facility is also expected to see its production outage last 11-12 months instead of the six months originally projected.
• Surprisingly, we still don’t see reports of Canadian aluminum flowing into the US. Certainly, current premiums should cover the existing 50% tariff fairly easily and leave a decent profit margin to boot, but shipments are not happening. However, 30,000 tons of Malaysian-originated LME aluminum metal was shipped to New Orleans.
• Out of China, there are signs that the country’s export juggernaut could be stalling. Trade numbers released last week showed exports suffering their worst downturn since February. Overall exports dropped by 1.1% month-on-month in October, in sharp contrast to the 8.3% advance seen in September. Exports to the US fell by nearly 26% year-on-year (y/y), while those to the EU and South Asia grew by just 0.9% and 11% y/y, respectively.
• Among individual commodities, China’s imports of soybeans, crude oil, and iron ore all rose in October from a year earlier, with soybean purchases hitting a record high. However, most of the soybean intake was from South America, not the US. Copper imports dropped by almost 10% in October, slipping to 438,000 tons from 485,000 tons in the month prior. For the year through October, China imported about 4.46 million tons of copper, down from 4.6 million tons in the first 10 months of 2024. Copper concentrate imports also fell slightly last month, but are still running higher versus last year. Rare earths exports were up by 9% in October, no doubt pleasing the Trump administration as the pressure has been on Beijing to step up these sales. China’s crude oil imports were also up by 8.2% from a year earlier, as refineries operated at their highest utilization rate so far this year. However, China’s natural gas imports declined both on a m/m as well as y/y – by roughly 7% in each case. The big surprise was in the Chinese finished steel export category. These dropped by 6.5% in October to 9.78 million tons. Moreover, October was the first month in which steel exports trailed year-ago levels. Not surprisingly, China’s steel domestic production also declined in October, falling to its lowest level since November 2021.
• Out of Europe, Germany’s services sector recorded its fastest growth in more than two years in October. The final HCOB service PMI rose to 54.6, as firms expressed growing optimism about economic conditions for the next 12 months.
• Japanese manufacturing activity shrank in October at its fastest pace in 19 months.

This week’s US macro readings: Hopefully, the US government shutdown will be over soon so we can start receiving badly needed macro readings. Nothing is scheduled for Monday. On Tuesday, the bond market will be closed in observance of Veterans Day, and so we won’t get anything then either. A series of Fed governors speak on Wednesday, but no reports are due. Thursday brings us weekly initial jobless claims and October CPI. But as of now, neither will be released because of the government shutdown. On Friday, we get October retail sales, producer prices and business inventories. All three, however, are on the chopping block if the shutdown continues.

We wish our readers a pleasant week ahead.