June 9, 2025   |   5 min read

with Dan DeFrancesco Welcome back! Do you know where your friends are? No seriously. Do you? If you’re part of Gen Z, there’s a good chance you’re tracking their locations with the Find My Friends app. The rest of us … not so much.  In today’s newsletter, the case for the economy heading in the right directionis growing.

What’s on deck   Markets: Three big things Citadel interns will learn during their first week on the job.      Tech: What analysts are expecting ahead of Apple’s big annual event.    Business: Online communities for helping people who were laid off are gaining steam.    But first, don’t sweat it.

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Joe Raedle/Getty Images THE BIG STORY Economic optimism  It turns out the economy might be fine after all.  After plenty of handwringing about what the future might hold, the hard data indicates an economy that’s in decent shape.  The latest good news was May’s better-than-expected jobs report. The 139,000 jobs added were more than the 126,000 economists had expected.  I don’t mean to be too optimistic — when I mentioned this newsletter topic to my boss, they responded earnestly, “IS IT?” — but investors are also feeling a lot better about things.  The Leuthold Group wrote in a recent note that the market believes the US economy will keep growing and is trading like there’s “no recession risk whatsoever,” writes BI’s Christine Ji.  The focal point of the investment firm’s argument is the S&P 500 Cyclical/Defensive Ratio, which compares economically sensitive sectors to consumer staples. The higher the number, the more bullish investors are about the economy’s prospects.  Last month, the ratio hit an all-time high of 1.19, meaning cyclical stocks have a 19% edge over defensive ones. Translation: Investors aren’t sweating a downturn.

REUTERS/Lucas Jackson That’s not to say we’re totally in the clear. (You didn’t think it would be all sunshine and rainbows, did you?) Bank of America, for one, recently warned of two big sell signals in stocks that are close to flashing, writes BI’s William Edwards.  One is the amount of money flowing into global stock funds: nearly 1% of their current assets under management within a four-week span. The other is that the vast majority of countries’ indexes (84%) are trading higher than their moving targets. Both signals suggest investors could be getting too bullish for their own good.  But BofA’s warning is like a lot of the concerns about the economy and market going around these days: things that could happen.  That’s not to say those worries aren’t valid. The uncertainty around tariffs remains a real question mark. And if the US posts a second-straight quarter of GDP contraction, it will be in a technical recession. Still, those issues haven’t necessarily materialized in the economic data. Outside of last week’s weaker-than-expected ADP jobs data, things are looking good. And Wednesday will be another chance to review the hard data with the monthly inflation report.   Read the full story