Official liquidity measures like Fed balance sheet levels are too slow to be tradable. A better approach is to monitor the symptoms of liquidity conditions in real-time market data. Indicators like SOFR spreads, commercial paper spreads, and unusual yield curve shapes reveal the health of private credit creation.

J.P. Morgan maintains a constructive stance on the Eurodollar due to its asymmetric response to Fed pricing. The currency strengthens more when the Fed's terminal rate is priced lower but shows stickiness when it's priced higher, creating a favorable risk-reward profile for bullish positions despite lowered upside targets.

With the European Central Bank firmly on hold, a low-volatility regime is expected to persist. However, the options market is not fully pricing in the potential for directional curve movements, such as steepening or flattening. This creates opportunities to express curve views through options where the risk is undervalued.

Simple replication of managed futures indices is slow and has high tracking error. A superior “informed replication” approach combines backward-looking index data with forward-looking trend system priors and active risk management, resulting in a more robust beta-like exposure.

J.P. Morgan expects gold to continue rallying while traditional haven currencies like the Yen and Swiss Franc weaken. The firm notes that option markets are not priced for this divergence, creating a value opportunity for traders to position for gold's relative strength against these specific fiat currencies.

Asset managers tend to roll their futures positions early to avoid the complexities of the physical delivery period. This concentrated activity creates predictable market pressure. In sectors where these managers are net long, their early rolling can exert a bearish influence on calendar spreads.

Despite high Euro risk reversals against the dollar, J.P. Morgan identifies a broad underperformance in Euro skew, particularly in LATAM crosses like EUR/BRL and EUR/MXN. This dislocation creates an attractive setup for volatility harvesting strategies, such as selling topside Euro calls through delta-hedged structures.

A US government shutdown created a "data fog," making it impossible to form a view on short-term funding rates, a key driver for bond futures rolls. This forced J.P. Morgan analysts to neutralize their view on this factor and focus on other drivers like optionality.

While the "quad" economic outlook is crucial, the ultimate authority is the market's "signal"—a multi-factor model of price, volume, and volatility. Keith McCullough states if he had to choose only one, he would rely on the signal, as it reflects what the market *is* doing, not what it *should* be doing.