—
C+
C+ The full Closelook — membership. Open the C+ overview

Fed Hikes — 10-Year Closes Above 5%, the Relief Unwinds

Rates — the Fed hikes and the 10-year closes above 5%: the belly sold, the relief unwound, chips back under $505

The Federal Reserve raised rates on Wednesday for the first time since 2023 and, in the wires’ reading, signalled one more before the year is out; Reuters’ line was a hike ‘in search of a timelier drop in inflation’ with more tightening ahead. The bond market answered the way we said it would if the hike was a sequence and not a step: the 5-year yield rose to 4.859%, the 10-year closed at 5.006% — its first close above 5.00% of this cycle, a level it only touched intraday in October 2023 — and the 30-year fell to 5.349%. The belly sold, the long end was bought, and the curve flattened into the hike. Equities gave back the midday relief. The S&P 500 ETF closed at $754.05, −0.4%, its second close under Thursday’s $757.83; the Nasdaq-100 fund closed flat at $704.72, on the 704 shelf and under $708.69; the equal-weight S&P −0.8%. The semiconductor ETF, at $508.60 two hours before the decision, closed +0.6% at $502.06 — reclaimed $505 at midday, lost it by the bell. Inside chips the day was not one story: optics and interconnect were bought hard — Lumentum +9.6%, Credo +7.4%, Coherent +6.9%, Astera Labs +6.6%, Soitec +13.4% in Paris — and the equipment names were sold again, Applied Materials −1.4%, Lam −0.6%, KLA −0.4%, onsemi −9.0%. Rubin closed +1.9% at 1,880.81 on the interconnect bid; the Agentic Winners 40 −1.3%, Adobe −2.8%, Intuit −3.4%, the software ETF −0.6% — the buyers of compute marked on the discount rate a third day. Gold sold on the hike, −0.6% by the close and −1.2% overnight to $4,335; the dollar index 100.27; Brent $105.31, under $107.63 a second day. Overnight the tape is trying to take the relief back: S&P futures +0.5%, Nasdaq-100 futures +0.5%, the after-hours prints of the three ETFs back at their lines; the Taiex +1.0% with TSMC +1.9%, the Nikkei and Kospi +0.2%, the Hang Seng −0.9%; the yen 155.8 into the Bank of Japan’s decision on Friday. Line 11 is about why a flattening curve on a hiking day is the bond market believing the sequence works, what a 10-year that closes above 5% costs the multiple, why the AI trade’s volume story showed up in the wiring rather than the tools, and what we do with three lines lost at the close and retaken overnight.

In this edition

TLT HYG GLD SPY QQQ RSP IWM MAGS

The Morning 10 Thu, Sep 17, 2026 ~90 seconds 08:00 CET

The ten points

The Federal Reserve raised rates on Wednesday, the first hike since 2023, and the market’s first job was to decide what kind of hike it was. We set the reading in advance: a step is priced in the front end and forgotten; a sequence shows up in the belly of the curve. The belly sold. The 5-year yield rose to 4.859%, the 10-year closed at 5.006% — the first close above 5.00% of this cycle; in October 2023 the 10-year touched 5.02% intraday and never closed there — and the 30-year fell to 5.349%. A curve that flattens on a hiking day is the bond market saying two things at once: it expects more, and it believes the more will work. Reuters’ headline caught the committee’s own framing, a hike ‘in search of a timelier drop in inflation, sees more tightening ahead’; CNBC counted one more this year.

Equities did what a tape does when it has priced the step and not the sequence: it took the relief back. Two hours before the decision the S&P 500 ETF was $760.70 and above Thursday’s $757.83, the Nasdaq-100 fund $710.89 and above $708.69, the semiconductor ETF $508.60 and above $505. At the close the three were $754.05, $704.72 and $502.06 — under, on, under. The S&P ETF has now closed under its line twice, Tuesday by six cents and Wednesday by $3.78; the Nasdaq-100 fund sits on the 704 shelf that has held since the sort began; the chip ETF reclaimed and lost $505 inside one session. The equal-weight S&P was −0.8%, the Russell −0.4%, the VIX 17.7. Overnight the futures are +0.5% and the after-hours prints of the three ETFs are back at the lines, which is not a close and is not nothing.

Inside the AI trade the day was two stories. The optics and interconnect names were bought as hard as anything has been bought this month — Lumentum +9.6% and Coherent +6.9% were the two largest gainers in the S&P 500, Credo +7.4%, Astera Labs +6.6%, Soitec +13.4% in Paris, Lenovo +8.3% in Hong Kong — and that bid took Rubin +1.9% to 1,880.81 on a day the chip ETF gained 0.6%. The equipment names were sold a third time, Applied Materials −1.4%, Lam −0.6%, KLA −0.4%, onsemi −9.0%, and the software names were marked on the discount rate: the Agentic Winners 40 −1.3%, Adobe −2.8%, Intuit −3.4%, Duolingo −3.7%, the software ETF −0.6%. Gold sold on the hike, −0.6% by the close and −1.2% overnight to $4,335, the dollar index 100.27, Brent $105.31 and under $107.63 a second day. Asia is mixed into the Bank of Japan on Friday: the Taiex +1.0% with TSMC +1.9%, the Nikkei and Kospi +0.2%, the Hang Seng −0.9%, the yen 155.8 after 156.2 overnight. Weekly claims and the Philadelphia Fed survey come at 12:30 UTC; Friday is the BoJ and the quarterly expiry. We hold the lines and let the close decide.

  1. The decision and the curve: the Fed hikes, first since 2023, ‘sees more tightening ahead’ (Reuters), one more this year (CNBC); the 5-year +3 bp to 4.859%, the 10-year closes 5.006% — first close above 5.00% of the cycle — the 30-year −1.5 bp to 5.349%; the curve flattens into the hike
  2. The equity close, the relief unwound: S&P 500 ETF $754.05 (−0.4%), second close under $757.83 — $760.70 at midday; Nasdaq-100 fund $704.72 flat, on the 704 shelf, under $708.69 — $710.89 at midday; equal-weight S&P −0.8%, Russell −0.4%, VIX 17.7; overnight futures +0.5%, the after-hours prints back at the lines
  3. Chips, reclaimed and lost: semiconductor ETF +0.6% to $502.06 — $508.60 at midday, under $505 at the bell; design bought, AMD +1.6% to $512.50, Marvell +3.6%, TSMC +1.2%, Nvidia +0.8% to $213.90; equipment sold a third day, Applied Materials −1.4%, Lam −0.6%, KLA −0.4%, onsemi −9.0%; memory ETF +0.6% to $55.33, Micron −0.1%
  4. Rubin +1.9% to 1,880.81 on the wiring, not the tools: Interconnect +4.6%, Advanced Materials +4.2%, DC Power +4.1%, Systems +3.5% — Soitec +13.4%, Lumentum +9.6%, Lenovo +8.3%, Credo +7.4%, Coherent +6.9%, Astera Labs +6.6%; Power Semiconductors −1.0%, onsemi −9.0%, Technoprobe −6.7%; the week −5.3%, the month −7.4%, the year +83.0%
  5. The other three on the hike: Agentic Winners 40 −1.3% to 921.21 — Applications −1.5%, UiPath −4.2%, CoStar −3.8%, Duolingo −3.7%, Intuit −3.4%, Adobe −2.8%, ServiceNow −1.5%, Microsoft −1.4%, Oracle +2.0%; HALO −0.3% to 1,005.06, Energy Transition −2.6%, First Solar −5.6%, Axon +6.0%; Agentic Ecosystem +0.3% to 1,606.60, OVHcloud +8.0%, DigitalOcean +5.0%, CoreWeave +3.0%
  6. Print record, the drift after the verdicts: Oracle +2.0% to about $143, still under its $148.35 sold line; Adobe −2.8% to about $250, now under the $256.29 line it was paid above — the three-day verdicts stand, the tape has moved on; no windows open, both names next print 9 December
  7. Asia into the Bank of Japan: Nikkei +0.2% to 64,024, SoftBank +1.0%, Tokyo Electron −2.1%; Kospi +0.2% to 6,733, SK Hynix −0.2%; Taiex +1.0% to 46,313, TSMC +1.9% to NT$2,425; Hang Seng −0.9% to 24,480; the yen 155.8 after 156.2 overnight; the BoJ decides Friday, expected to raise
  8. The other prices: gold −0.6% by the close and −1.2% overnight to $4,335 — sold on the hike; dollar index 100.27; Brent $105.31 after $105.83, under Thursday’s $107.63 a second day; long bond ETF +0.2%, high-yield ETF flat; bitcoin $76,318, +0.5%
  9. The wires this morning: ‘Fed raises rates in search of “timelier” drop in inflation, sees more tightening ahead’ (Reuters) · ‘Fed approves interest rate hike, signals one more to come this year’ (CNBC) · ‘The Key Takeaways From Kevin Warsh’s Press Conference’ (WSJ) · ‘Fed hikes interest rates for first time in three years, drawing rebuke from Trump’ (New York Post) · ‘US rate rise jolts yen ahead of Bank of Japan meeting’ (FT) · ‘U.S. stock futures rise after hawkish Fed dents Wall St’ (Investing.com) · ‘Why optical stocks Lumentum and Coherent were the day’s biggest S&P 500 gainers’ (MarketWatch)
  10. The clock: weekly jobless claims and the Philadelphia Fed survey 12:30 UTC; the Bank of Japan’s decision in Tokyo on Friday morning, expected to raise; the US quarterly options expiry Friday; Micron’s print next week, the first order-book fact of the quarter; the lines — S&P ETF $757.83, Nasdaq-100 fund 704 and $708.69, chip ETF $505, memory ETF $58, the 10-year 5.00%

  1. The decision and the curve: the Fed hikes, first since 2023, ‘sees more tightening ahead’ (Reuters), one more this year (CNBC); the 5-year +3 bp to 4.859%, the 10-year closes 5.006% — first close above 5.00% of the cycle — the 30-year −1.5 bp to 5.349%; the curve flattens into the hike

    Context

    TLTHYGGLD

    What
    The Federal Reserve raised its policy rate on Wednesday, the first increase since 2023, and the statement and Chair Warsh’s briefing were read by the wires as a committee that intends to keep going: Reuters’ headline was a hike ‘in search of a timelier drop in inflation’ with more tightening ahead, CNBC’s that the Fed ‘signals one more to come this year’. The reading we set on Tuesday was that the hike itself was priced at roughly four in five and would tell us nothing; the belly of the curve would tell us whether the market was pricing a step or a sequence. The belly sold. The 5-year yield rose from 4.826% to 4.859%, the 10-year from 4.996% to 5.006% — the first close above 5.00% of this cycle; in October 2023 the 10-year printed 5.02% intraday and closed below the level — and the 30-year fell from 5.364% to 5.349%. That is a bear flattener: the part of the curve that prices the next four years of policy went up, the part that prices the next thirty years went down. The long bond ETF closed +0.2%, the high-yield ETF flat — credit did not move, duration did. The dollar index closed near 100.27 and gold sold, −0.6% by the bell and −1.2% overnight to $4,335, which is the market pricing a central bank that means it.
    If
    The 5-year against 4.86% and the 10-year against 5.00% at Thursday’s close — a 5-year that keeps rising with a 30-year that keeps falling extends the sequence read; a 5-year that gives back Wednesday’s move with the 10-year back under 5.00% says the belly overshot and the hike is being re-priced as a step.
    Why
    A hike the market has already priced moves nothing on the day; what moves is the shape of the curve after the statement, and a flattening on a hiking day is the bond market’s vote that the sequence continues and that it works — the one combination that lowers the equity multiple without raising the inflation premium.
    Then
    We keep 5.00% on the 10-year as the line and read the 5-year as the meter of how much sequence is priced; we do not trade the hike, we trade the level the 10-year closes at on Thursday, and we treat gold’s sale on the hike as confirmation, not as a signal to buy.

    Open the detail →

  2. The equity close, the relief unwound: S&P 500 ETF $754.05 (−0.4%), second close under $757.83 — $760.70 at midday; Nasdaq-100 fund $704.72 flat, on the 704 shelf, under $708.69 — $710.89 at midday; equal-weight S&P −0.8%, Russell −0.4%, VIX 17.7; overnight futures +0.5%, the after-hours prints back at the lines

    Context

    SPYQQQRSPIWMMAGS

    What
    The tape that went into 18:00 UTC relieved came out of 18:30 sold. At midday the S&P 500 ETF was $760.70 and above Thursday’s $757.83, the Nasdaq-100 fund $710.89 and above $708.69; the closes were $754.05 and $704.72. The S&P ETF has now closed under its line twice, Tuesday by six cents at $757.39 and Wednesday by $3.78; the Nasdaq-100 fund closed flat on the day, on the 704 shelf that has held since the sort began on Monday and under the $708.69 line it reclaimed for two hours. The breadth was worse than the cap-weighted number: the equal-weight S&P −0.8% to $212.28, the Dow −1.1% at the time of the 19:05 read, the Russell 2000 −0.4% to $283.92. The VIX closed 17.7, +3%, which is a tape that repriced without panicking. Overnight the futures have taken half the afternoon back — S&P futures +0.5% at 7,661, Nasdaq-100 futures +0.5% — and the after-hours prints of the three ETFs sit back at their lines, $757.80, $708.27 and $505.50. Those are extended-trading prints, not closes; we record them because they say the sellers of the afternoon were not followed overnight, and we do not trade them because a line is a close.
    If
    Thursday’s close on $757.83 and $708.69 — a close back above both with the futures’ gain held says the afternoon was position-squaring into the press conference; a third close under $757.83 with the Nasdaq-100 fund off the 704 shelf is the first event of the resolution month, booked.
    Why
    Two closes under a level are a fact and three are a trend; a tape that loses its lines in the two hours after a hawkish statement and retakes them in the futures overnight has not decided, and the deciding print is the close, not the open.
    Then
    We change nothing on the lines: 757.83 on the S&P ETF, 704 and 708.69 on the Nasdaq-100 fund, 69.5 on the Magnificent Seven fund, which closed at $69.52; we watch the equal-weight index, which has now fallen on both post-decision days, as the read on whether the selling is the AI trade or the market.

    Open the detail →

  3. Money Temperature One number for risk appetite across eight instruments — updated through every trading day. Take the temperature →

  4. Chips, reclaimed and lost: semiconductor ETF +0.6% to $502.06 — $508.60 at midday, under $505 at the bell; design bought, AMD +1.6% to $512.50, Marvell +3.6%, TSMC +1.2%, Nvidia +0.8% to $213.90; equipment sold a third day, Applied Materials −1.4%, Lam −0.6%, KLA −0.4%, onsemi −9.0%; memory ETF +0.6% to $55.33, Micron −0.1%

    Structure

    SOXXSMHAMDMRVLNVDAAMATLRCXKLACONDRAMMU

    What
    The semiconductor ETF closed +0.6% at $502.06 after trading $508.60 two hours before the decision — above $505 at midday, under it at the bell, the same reclaim-and-lose the S&P ETF printed on its own line. The sort we have carried since Monday held its shape: the design names were bought, AMD +1.6% to $512.50, Marvell +3.6%, TSMC +1.2%, Arm +0.9%, Nvidia +0.8% to $213.90; the equipment names were sold a third session, Applied Materials −1.4%, Lam Research −0.6%, KLA −0.4%, and onsemi −9.0% was the day’s loser in the power-semiconductor sleeve, which fell 1.0% inside Rubin while every other layer rose. Memory sat between the two: the memory ETF +0.6% to $55.33, still under the $58 line it lost on Monday, Micron −0.1%. Seoul’s Wednesday session, which closed before the decision, had SK Hynix +4.1% and Samsung +2.0%; overnight SK Hynix is −0.2% and Tokyo Electron −2.1%, Asia’s equipment name following the American ones. Overnight the chip ETF’s after-hours print is $505.50, Nvidia $215.45 and AMD $517.00 in extended trading — the design bid continuing, not a close.
    If
    The chip ETF against $505 at Thursday’s close with the equipment three against flat — a close above $505 with Applied Materials, Lam and KLA no longer sold is the sort finding its level; a fourth day of equipment selling with the ETF under $500 is the volume question moving from the tools to the order book, which Micron answers next week.
    Why
    A chip index that reclaims its line on a rates relief and loses it on the hike is trading the discount rate, not the orders; the tell that the orders are the problem would be the equipment names falling on a day rates fall, and that has not printed — they fell on Wednesday with the 5-year.
    Then
    We do not buy the chip ETF under $505 on an after-hours print; we keep $505 and $58 as the lines that separate a premium repricing from a volume story, and we read the equipment three against the design four at each close until Micron reports.

    Open the detail →

C — free account

The free C account unlocks points 4 through 10 — the full morning read.

One tap with Google or one email — no password, no card. You are signed in until you sign out, on this browser, from then on.

Join the Look — free

Already joined on this browser? The full edition shows automatically — if it doesn't, sign in again here. Looking for the archive, portfolios and realtime? That is C+.

C · point 11 · members

Today in line 11: why a curve that flattens on a hiking day is the bond market believing the sequence works, and why that is the one shape that lowers the equity multiple without raising the inflation premium; what a 10-year that closes above 5% costs the S&P 500 in Yardeni’s arithmetic and in ours; why the AI trade’s volume story printed in the wiring on Wednesday while the tools were sold a third time; what the Bank of Japan on Friday does to the Treasury market’s marginal buyer; and what we do with three lines lost at the close and retaken overnight.

The privileged, actionable read — what we do, and at which level — is in point 11, for members only.

Join the Look — it’s free

Free members account · one click · the ten points stay free, always.

Agentic Winners 40 Forty names positioned to win the agentic transition — tracked as a live index, daily. Open AW40 →

Further reading on Closelook

A daily overview, not advice — an investment diary. Published every trading morning at 08:00 CET. See the Daily Pulse and today’s check-in.