Mondays in December always feel a little heavier, don’t they? The holiday lights are up, the eggnog is flowing, but Wall Street wakes up with a hangover from whatever happened in November. Today, December 1st, the mood is decidedly grumpy. Tech names are sliding, Bitcoin can’t seem to hold $86,000, and everyone’s waiting to see if the Santa Claus rally is going to show up this year or if we’re getting coal instead.
I’ve been glued to the screens since 5 a.m., coffee in one hand, phone in the other, trying to make sense of the pre-market action. And honestly? The legendary investor who never sleeps (yes, that one) just laid out his ten biggest things to watch today. Some of them made me sit up straight. A couple made me wince. All of them matter if you have money in the market.
A Choppy Start to the Final Month
Let’s not sugarcoat it — November was rough for a lot of the high-flyers. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq are staring at red opens this morning, and the usual suspects (mega-cap tech) are leading the decline. Earnings season is mostly behind us, but a few big Club names are still stepping up to the plate this week. Think CrowdStrike tomorrow night and Salesforce on Wednesday. Those reports could set the tone for the entire cloud complex.
In my experience, the first trading day of December often feels like the market taking a deep breath after the Thanksgiving feast. Sometimes it exhales calmly. Sometimes it coughs up everything it just ate. Today feels more like the second scenario.
Bitcoin’s Scary Slide Below $86,000
Crypto never sleeps, and apparently it doesn’t take holidays either. Bitcoin dropped hard overnight and is now flirting with the mid-80s. That’s a psychological gut punch for anyone who thought $100k by Christmas was locked in.
Here’s the part that actually worries me more than the price itself: one single company — the one that changed its name to basically scream “Bitcoin” — has borrowed billions upon billions to stack coins. If rates stay high or sentiment flips, the margin calls could get ugly fast. We’ve seen domino effects before. 2022 anyone? When the most aggressive player in a trade starts to wobble, the whole structure can crack surprisingly quickly.
“This one piece of cyber paper now dominates dozens of instruments… if one firm can’t keep borrowing, maybe the whole speculative edifice collapses.”
Harsh? Maybe. Realistic? Absolutely.
Japan’s Bond Yield Just Hit a 16-Year High — Say Goodbye to Easy Carry?
Across the Pacific, something quietly massive is happening. The Japanese 10-year yield touched 1.84% — the highest since 2008. For years, traders borrowed in yen at basically zero and plowed the money into everything from Nasdaq stocks to emerging-market bonds. Classic yen carry trade.
When Japan finally moves rates, the unwind can be vicious. We saw a taste of it last summer. If the Bank of Japan actually hikes this month (still a big if), a lot of leveraged “genius” trades from the last decade suddenly won’t look so smart anymore.
Alphabet Keeps Getting Love — $375 Price Target
Meanwhile, Wall Street can’t stop raising numbers on Google’s parent. Guggenheim just boosted their target from $330 to $375. Why? Because all that “wasteful” AI spending is looking pretty brilliant in hindsight.
Think about it: Alphabet has poured tens of billions into data centers and chips (a lot of it flowing straight to Nvidia). Critics screamed about capex bloat. The stock responded by adding roughly $1.5 trillion in market cap over the past twelve months. Sometimes the market’s definition of “failed spending” is hilarious.
Nvidia Quietly Takes $2 Billion Stake in Synopsys
Speaking of Nvidia, they just dropped a cool $2 billion on chip-design software giant Synopsys as part of a deeper partnership. Synopsys shares jumped almost 8% pre-market; Nvidia dipped a bit (classic “sell the news”).
This move makes perfect sense when you zoom out. Nvidia isn’t just selling picks and shovels anymore; they’re buying pieces of the mine itself. Vertical integration in the AI era looks very different.
Cell Tower Stocks Feel the Dish Pain
Barclays downgraded American Tower to hold and trimmed their target to $200. The worry? Dish’s parent EchoStar wants to sell spectrum to SpaceX and AT&T, which could make rent collection… complicated. When your tenant is fire-sales the very assets they use your towers for, that’s rarely a good sign.
Joby Aviation Gets a Rare Sell Rating
Goldman came out swinging with a sell on Joby and a $10 target. They’re questioning whether the eVTOL darling actually has the regulatory moat everyone assumes. I’ve been skeptical of the entire flying-taxi narrative for years — physics is hard, certification is harder, and Boeing (yes, even battered Boeing) has decades of institutional knowledge most startups can only dream of.
Eli Lilly Goes Direct and Hits $1 Trillion
In the middle of all this gloom, Eli Lilly just became the first pharma company ever to touch a trillion-dollar valuation. They’re also slashing the cash price on single-dose Zepbound vials through their direct platform — a clear nod to working with the incoming administration on drug affordability.
Novo Nordisk did something similar with Wegovy last week. The GLP-1 wars are entering a fascinating new phase: competition on price instead of just coupons and rebates. Patients win, margins… maybe not so much.
The Home Improvement Horse Race
Stifel lowered their Home Depot target to $350 (from $370) but raised Lowe’s to $250 (from $230). Translation: Home Depot’s quarter exposed some cracks, while Lowe’s looks sturdier.
- Higher ticket items (appliances, lumber) are weak
- Pro business is slowing
- But rates are almost certainly coming down in 2026
When the Fed finally cuts aggressively, both stocks will probably rip together. Until then, Lowe’s might have the smoother ride.
Zscaler — Good, But Not Accelerating
Bernstein downgraded Zscaler to hold, and Citi trimmed their target. The message is consistent: business is solid, billings are fine, but the hyper-growth phase feels like it’s in the rear-view mirror. That’s the curse of getting big in cybersecurity — eventually you lap tough comps.
Look, no one rings a bell at the top, and no one sends you a polite memo when the party is getting sloppy. December has a habit of delivering violent reversals disguised as “seasonal strength.”
My takeaway this morning? Cash isn’t trash yet, Bitcoin maximalism has real tail risk, and sometimes the best trade is the one you don’t make on the first day of the month.
Stay nimble out there. The tape feels twitchy, and twitchy tapes have a way of punishing the overconfident.
