• Investinq
  • Posts
  • 🏛️ Wall Street To Cap Banker’s Weekly Hours... To 80 Hours?

🏛️ Wall Street To Cap Banker’s Weekly Hours... To 80 Hours?

+ Spacewalks and Space Suits — Just Another Day for SpaceX

Good (late) afternoon! Lego’s latest flex? A life-size, fully drivable McLaren P1 made from over 342,817 Technic pieces. This brick-built beauty isn’t just for show either—it’s powered by 768 Lego electric motors, and while it won’t break any speed records, it can still hit a solid 40mph. That’s a far cry from the real McLaren’s horsepower, but hey, for a car made of tiny plastic bricks, it’s impressive.

The build took over 8,000 hours, features a metal frame, and rolls on the same wheels as the actual P1. McLaren F1 driver Lando Norris even took it for a spin around Silverstone. Sure, it’s 385 pounds lighter than the real deal, but this Lego masterpiece proves it’s more than just a big toy—it’s a fully functional, street-legal (sort of) engineering marvel.

MARKETS

  • Stocks capped off the week with a bang, as the S&P 500 and Nasdaq closed out their strongest week of 2024. The S&P 500 climbed 0.54%, finishing just shy of its July all-time high, while the Nasdaq added 0.65%. Both indexes notched their fifth consecutive winning day. The Dow Jones also joined the party, jumping 297 points to close at 41,393.

  • What’s fueling the rally? Growing bets that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates by a hefty 0.5 percentage points at its upcoming meeting. The odds of this larger rate cut jumped to 47% by Friday, up from just 14% earlier in the week, according to the CME FedWatch tool. Investors seem ready for the Fed to kick off its easing campaign in style.

STOCKS
Winners & Losers

What’s up 📈

  • RH ($RH) surged 25.49% after posting stronger-than-expected second-quarter results, reporting $1.69 in adjusted earnings per share on $830 million of revenue.

  • DJT ($DJT) rose 11.79% as Donald Trump, the majority owner, stated he has no plans to sell his 57% stake once the lockup agreement expires next week.

  • WBD ($WBD) climbed 10.84% after renewing an early agreement with Charter Communications, with Warner Bros. Discovery's CEO predicting over six million new subscribers this quarter.

  • MicroStrategy ($MSTR) gained 8.18% after purchasing an additional $1.11 billion worth of Bitcoin.

  • Etsy ($ETSY) was up 7.56% following the Biden administration's announcement of plans to close trade loopholes related to low-cost imports into the U.S.

  • Uber ($UBER) increased 6.45% after revealing its partnership expansion with Waymo to offer robotaxi services in Austin and Atlanta starting next year.

  • Arm Holdings ($ARM) rose 5.88% after Raymond James initiated coverage with an "overweight" rating and a $160 price target.

  • Affirm Holdings ($AFRM) saw a 5.44% rise.

    General Electric ($GE) inched up 5.06%.

What’s down 📉

  • Adobe ($ADBE) tumbled 8.47% after issuing weaker-than-expected guidance for the current quarter, despite beating fiscal third-quarter estimates on both the top and bottom lines.

  • Garmin ($GRMN) dropped 5.13% after Barclays downgraded the stock to "Underweight" from "Equal-Weight" and cut the price target to $133 per share.

  • Boeing ($BA) slid 3.69% after factory workers went on strike and rejected a new labor contract, which could affect the production of its 737 Max aircraft.

  • Norfolk Southern ($NSC) declined 3.45% after recently firing its CEO due to an inappropriate relationship.

  • Sirius XM ($SIRI) fell 3.96%.

    First Solar ($FSLR) dipped 3.03%.

FINANCE
Wall Street To Cap Banker’s Weekly Hours… To 80 Hours

JPMorgan and Bank of America are stepping up to address the workload crisis for junior bankers. JPMorgan is capping weekly hours at 80, though exceptions for live deals remain—so don’t throw out the energy drinks just yet. Meanwhile, BofA is introducing a new platform where junior bankers will log their hours daily, ensuring managers can better distribute tasks and keep workloads in check. These changes come after mounting pressure, following reports of junior bankers logging 100-hour weeks to keep up with deal demands.

The tipping point? A tragic death earlier this year of a 35-year-old BofA banker after weeks of excessive work hours. JPMorgan’s cap on hours might seem like a win for work-life balance, but there’s a catch: deals in progress are exempt. Over at BofA, while the new platform sounds promising, it's still unclear whether it will lead to meaningful changes or just offer a digital diary for logging those inevitable late nights.

Both banks are looking for ways to prevent further incidents and reduce the negative stigma surrounding the grueling investment banking lifestyle. JPMorgan already had a “pencils down” period from Friday night to Saturday noon and a guaranteed weekend off every three months, but the new 80-hour cap marks a more structured approach to limiting work hours. BofA’s new system aims to catch workload imbalances early, but it remains to be seen whether junior bankers will actually see relief.

More Change or More of the Same?

Wall Street’s notorious “work-till-you-drop” culture has long been a rite of passage for those seeking high-flying careers in finance. Junior bankers sign up knowing the drill—punishing hours in exchange for sky-high salaries. However, with Silicon Valley offering better work-life balance (and still plenty of cash), the appeal of endless all-nighters is fading fast. While these new measures might improve conditions on paper, real change will depend on whether banks truly enforce these guidelines, or if they simply become another box to check off in the workday marathon.

There’s also skepticism about whether these reforms will hold up under pressure, especially during deal-heavy periods. With lucrative mergers and acquisitions at stake, junior bankers may still be forced to push the limits, leaving the promise of better hours more of an optimistic goal than a hard-and-fast rule. Will Wall Street finally change its tune, or will the grind remain part of the game? Only time will tell.

NEWS
Market Movements

SPACE
Spacewalks and Space Suits — Just Another Day for SpaceX

Move over, NASA. SpaceX just took commercial space travel to a whole new level. On Thursday morning, billionaire Jared Isaacman and SpaceX engineer Sarah Gillis strutted out into space—well, sort of. The two became the first private astronauts to complete a commercial spacewalk, testing out shiny new SpaceX-designed suits while floating 870 miles above Earth. That’s three times higher than the International Space Station, for those keeping score at home.

This is all part of the Polaris Dawn mission, which Isaacman funded himself. It’s the kind of mission that makes you rethink your morning commute as these astronauts spent an hour doing mobility tests before heading back inside the SpaceX Crew Dragon. No big deal, just another day at the office—if your office is outer space.

The real highlight? These SpaceX suits. They’ve never been tested in orbit before, and now they’re out there proving they can handle the vacuum of space. This is a major step for SpaceX, as the company plans to build even more suits for future missions to the moon and Mars. Thousands of spacesuits will be needed for those long-term goals, so this was their first big real-world test.

Beyond the Walk: Space Tourism’s Next Big Thing?

Isaacman’s spacewalk wasn’t just for show—it’s part of SpaceX’s broader mission to make space tourism the next big thing. While Isaacman and Gillis were testing their suits, the rest of the crew was busy helping advance SpaceX's Starlink communications network and conducting scientific experiments. It’s all in a day's work when your job involves pushing the limits of human exploration.

The real kicker? This spacewalk wasn’t just a leap for Isaacman and his crew but for anyone dreaming of a cosmic getaway. With SpaceX pushing boundaries like these, it’s no longer a question of if, but when, space tourism will take off in full swing. Soon, your next vacation might involve packing a spacesuit instead of sunscreen. So, who’s ready to orbit?

Calendar
On The Horizon

Next Week

Next week is packed with housing data: Tuesday kicks off with the Homebuilder Confidence Index, followed by Housing Starts and Building Permits on Wednesday, and Existing Home Sales rounding things out on Thursday.

But the real headliner? The Federal Open Market Committee’s rate decision on Wednesday. A rate cut is all but guaranteed—the only question is whether it’ll be 25 or 50 basis points, with most bets leaning towards the smaller slice.On the earnings front, it’s a bit of a snooze fest, with only a few big players reporting their quarterly results.

Earnings:

Tuesday: TD Ameritrade ($AMTD)

Wednesday: General Mills ($GIS)

Thursday: Darden Restaurants ($DRI), FactSet ($FDS), Cracker Barrel Old Country Store ($CBRL), FedEx ($FDX), Lennar ($LEN), and Scholastic ($SCHL)

Friday: British American Tobacco ($BTI)

NEWS
The Daily Rundown

RESOURCES
The Federal Reserve Resource

Join our small yet growing subreddit 🚀: https://www.reddit.com/r/investinq/

Wall Street Reads 💎 (Best Books):

Check out our latest issues 🎯: https://investinq.beehiiv.com