Five anonymised historical charts were dealt to every player. The Monkey Index returned +0.14% across the same tape.
84 desks completed all five charts.
Corporate efficiency was in fashion and 3M was squeezing out record margins, so the street treated it as an unshakeable cash machine. The steady autumn grind held up, but the buyers had called it a year.
A natural gas glut had battered the drilling sector, but EOG had just shown the street that American shale could pump crude oil at scale. The buyers were not done yet.
The regional banking crisis was tearing through smaller lenders, but the biggest balance sheet in America was being treated as the ultimate safe haven. Even as it stepped in to swallow a failing rival, the sellers were not quite done.
Cheap shale gas was depressing power prices and post-crisis money was chasing risk, leaving defensive utilities firmly out of favour. This is the week the dividend buyers stepped back in.
The US-China trade war had spent months battering freight volumes, but talk of an autumn tariff truce had the street betting the worst was over. Then trade fatigue set in, and the rally hit a wall.