Looking to the Week Ahead with Partial Visibility: Markets, Policy, and People in a Data Fog (November 24-29, 2025)

Written By Connor

Let’s take a deep dive into the week ahead and help you digest the news, markets, and macro noise that is occurring around us. First, now that we are heading into the week of being thankful and sharing gratitude, I want to say thank you to everyone who is supporting my dream of writing and researching. Next, I want to congratulate the Kansas City Chiefs; you surprisingly pulled off a win today, barely, I must add. Hopefully, we can turn the season around.

Alright, now back to our regular scheduled programming, when I opened the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) release calendar late this last week, the thing that hit me was not a new number, but the missing ones.

I am now showing that the Q3 GDP (second estimate) and the October Personal Income and Outlays report were both sitting there with a new label: “To be rescheduled.” These are not a fringe series; they are the backbone of how we talk about growth and inflation. However, now they simply are not there. On the policy side of things, this matters big time, but I spend most of my time thinking like an investor, not a policy nerd. The question in my head is simple:

“How do you manage a portfolio when the macro dashboard has blank spaces where the most important gauges usually sit?”

I want to assure you that this is still a reflective piece, but it is first and foremost an investment commentary. We need the economics to be there in order to frame the trade, but it cannot be the whole story.

What My Screens Are Telling Me Right Now

Before getting philosophical, I like to ground myself in prices. Roughly speaking, here is the picture coming into the week:

  • Equities Markets: We can see that the S&P 500 is hovering near recent highs after a choppy stretch. We have had a tech-led shakeout, followed by broad-based “everything up” rebound days where more than 80 percent of the index is green at once. Under the surface, there is a quiet tug-of-war between quality growth and lower quality cyclicals.

  • Rates: The 10-year Treasury yield sits close to 4.1 percent, down from its peak but still a world away from the post-COVID “easy money” era. The curve is still kinked, which does not exactly provide us with a clean picture of either a boom or a recession.

  • Policy rates: The Fed Funds Rate is currently parked in a 3.75 to 4.0 percent range after two cuts. According to the FedWatch tool by the CME Group, we can see that markets keep repricing the odds of a third cut in December, swinging from “done deal” to “maybe” and back again as each Fed speech and headline lands.

  • Credit: High-yield and investment-grade spreads are tighter than you would expect for an economy that just lost a clean read on its own inflation and growth data. The message from credit right now is “no near-term stress.”

  • Volatility: The dollar is firm, equity volatility has faded back toward its lower band, and cross-asset price action looks more “annoyed” than “panicked.”

If I looked only at screens and never read a macro release calendar, I could easily tell myself a simple story: Right now, I see the economy is slowing, but in an orderly way. The Fed is close to being done, and risk assets “still have room as long as nothing snaps.” The dissonance comes from what I do not see, which is the incoming data that would normally help me check that story in real time.

1. The Data That Is Not There, And Why Investors Should Care

The BEA pushing back Q3 GDP and October Personal Income and Outlays means no updated sense of how fast the economy really grew last quarter, and no PCE inflation print for October. For investors, the layer on top of that means:

  • No October CPI report at all.

  • A November CPI release that will land with missing month-over-month context.

  • A partially impaired jobs picture, with gaps in the household survey that normally gives us the unemployment rate.

From an investing point of view, this changes a few things for me.

a) The macro “backdrop” gets fuzzier

Normally, when I see the big releases, I treat them as a shared reference point. I may disagree with how the market reacts, but at least we are all reacting to the same clear numbers. This time, that reference point is weaker. We are stitching together:

  • Clean September data

  • Partial October data

  • Private estimates for spending, pricing, and hiring

  • A lot of macro and geopolitical narrative

From my perspective, I believe that this raises the risk of over-anchoring to whatever number comes out on time, even if it is a secondary indicator. For example, PPI or a regional Fed survey might suddenly feel more important than it really is simply because it shows up. As an investor, I want to be very conscious of that bias. Not all data points deserve equal weight just because they cleared the publication hurdle.

b) Macro trades become more emotional

The less data does not mean fewer decisions; in fact, portfolios still must be managed, and the day continues to drag on for us, and risk still has to be sized. The vacuum will need to be filled by other entities:

  • Market-implied signals

  • Storytelling

  • Whatever charts look clean

I expect more narrative-driven trading in this kind of environment, which can cut both ways:

  • On one side, it can create air pockets where asset prices overshoot on thin evidence.

  • On the other side, it can create entry points for patient investors who are willing to fade overreactions.

The key for me is to decide in advance where I am willing to lean against the tape, and where I am not.

c) The Fed reaction function is harder to handicap

When it comes time for the Fed to walk into its December meeting, it will do so with:

  • No official inflation print for October

  • A messy read in November

  • Labor data that are spliced together

It is important to know that markets will still try to price the next few moves. That means that we can expect the Fed will wobble more than usual on each speech and interview. From an investment standpoint, I care less about whether the December outcome is “25 basis points or not,” and more about:

  • How violent the path of expectations looks in the run-up

  • How that path ripples through duration, growth stocks, financials, and the dollar

I want to be very careful about chasing the Fed narrative intraday. In a fog, the road looks more crooked than it really is.

2. Reading the Consumer Through Markets, Not Just Through Data

Most macro stories eventually come back to the household. The good news this week is that the consumer is still visible, even if official PCE data are not. Instead of waiting for a clean spending print, I am watching a three-part mix:

a) Sentiment as context

Consumer sentiment and confidence surveys are not tradeable on their own, but they frame how I interpret other signals.

  • Michigan sentiment is currently hovering in the low 50s, which tells me that people feel squeezed, not relaxed. (Are we in an affordability crisis? That’s a topic for another blog post.)

  • Conference Board confidence is below 95, with expectations to fall under 80. This tells me that people are not exactly planning a big splurge year.

When I see strong retail sales or upbeat company commentary in that context, I translate it as:

“Households are finding a way to keep spending, so they can keep traditions alive, despite feeling stressed.”

From an economic perspective, that could be encouraging for growth, but I think that it also hints at a future hangover through higher credit balances or thinner savings. From a human and behavioral perspective, I feel as if it looks like people are trying to buy a sense of normalcy and connection today, even if it means quietly making tomorrow a bit harder. It is present bias, social pressure, and “I don’t want to disappoint anyone” all rolled together, which I believe is a stark reminder that what shows up as “resilient consumption” in the data often feels more like emotional triage in real life.

On a personal note, as we head into the holiday season, I keep coming back to how important it is to look out for one another and to lead with care, kindness, and respect. The headlines and the data only tell part of the story; the rest is playing out in people’s lives in ways we usually cannot see. The person beside you in the checkout line, on the train, or at the office might be carrying stress you know nothing about, whether it is financial pressure, health worries, or something going on at home. We are all moving through the same uncertain environment, trying to make sense of it in our own way, and that is reason enough to give each other a bit more grace. We are all along for this journey of life together, so this season I want to be intentional about showing simple human compassion and making it clear, in small but concrete ways, that we are there for each other.

b) High-frequency market clues

Instead of one big PCE release, I am piecing together the following data:

  • Management commentary from major retailers and payment networks.

  • Online sales updates through the Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday corridor.

  • Price and discount tracking from industry sources.

For equities and credit:

  • If I see healthy unit volumes with only modest discounting, I become more comfortable with cyclical and consumer-exposed names.

  • If I see flat units but very aggressive promotions, I get cautious on margins and more selective on retail and consumer credit.

  • If off-price and discount names lead while aspirational brands lag, that confirms a trade-down dynamic that favors value retailers and pressures premium discretionary.

I am not merely trying to “day-trade Black Friday,” but I am absolutely using this period to adjust my mental map of where the consumer strength really is.

c) Balance sheets and behavior

From an investment perspective, I genuinely care about how the consumer is funding this spending:

  • We are seeing more use of “buy-now-pay-later” and revolving credit, both of which point to a more fragile kind of resilience.

  • Spending funded out of rising real incomes and job security is a different story.

Since we do not get a clean, real-time read on all of this, we can get different reads from credit card delinquency trends, bank commentary, and the shape of consumer ABS spreads, all of which offer hints at what the economic data will eventually show.

The behavioral angle here is important. Around the holidays, people are not just maximizing utility in a spreadsheet. They are trying to protect rituals, keep up appearances, and avoid disappointing people they care about. On one hand, that can keep spending strong longer than the macro models can expect, but it also shows that it can store up vulnerability, which will show up later.

When I hear investors cheer “resilient” consumption, I try to remember that it often means households are stretching to keep life feeling normal. It may look great for near-term earnings, but it can come at the cost of more debt, less cushion, and a little more stress for the people behind those numbers.

3. The Periphery: Where Macro Meets Trade Ideas

While the U.S. statistical system is catching its breath, the rest of the world is still on schedule.

a) Energy and OPEC+

What we are seeing from OPEC+ is that they have signaled a cautious approach of modest supply increases followed by a planned pause, against a backdrop of sanctions on Russian barrels and concerns about oversupply next year. For portfolios, I translate that into:

  • A cap on how far energy prices are likely to fall, if the demand behind it disappoints.

  • There is a floor under certain producer revenues and EM fiscal positions.

  • I see a bit more confidence in owning selective energy names or energy-linked credits, with an eye on discipline rather than volume growth.

I want to be frank here, I am not trying to call every dollar in oil prices here. I am asking: “Is this a world where high-cost producers get crushed, or a world where the group is trying to manage a reasonable band?” Right now, in my opinion, it looks more like a band.

b) Frontier and emerging markets

Within this space, small elections, fiscal adjustments, and regulatory shifts across EM and frontier markets rarely shake the S&P on their own. They do matter if you hold:

  • Local-currency debt

  • High-beta EM equity

  • Real-asset strategies tied to specific regions

In a week where U.S. data are missing, I find myself less comfortable treating EM noise as background. If the domestic picture is fuzzy, I do not want to ignore clear information coming from the edge of the map. This might mean:

  • Letting idiosyncratic country risk talk me out of a “broad EM beta” position.

  • Focusing more on country-by-country stories and less on the asset class label.

  • Being patient with entries, since liquidity often thins out in late November anyway.

c) Cross-asset tone

One of the stranger features of this moment is how calm cross-asset markets look given the data chaos:

  • Equities near highs

  • Credit spreads tight

  • The dollar is firm

  • Volatility is relatively subdued, although that can change given the macro climate we are in.

As an investor, that puts me at a crossroads:

  • I can join the calm, assume the shutdown and data gaps are a sideshow, and lean into risk.

  • Or I can treat today’s pricing as generous and use it to quietly improve quality, upgrade balance sheets, and reduce exposure to the most narrative-dependent trades.

Emotionally, it is easy to do the first. Reflectively, I would like to think that I lean more toward the second.

4. How am I positioning My Thinking?

I would not phrase this as a “buy this, sell that” note. I am more interested in being explicit about how I want to think this week.

a) Data impairment as a risk factor

I am treating the data gap as a real input, not a footnote. In practice, that means:

  • Wider error bands around macro forecasts that touch October.

  • Less trust in any model that depends heavily on CPI, PCE, or the unemployment rate for that period.

  • More willingness to be late rather than early on big macro calls that depend on the missing data.

If something would usually feel “60 percent likely,” I am forcing myself to treat it as closer to “coin flip” in this environment. Which, from a statistical probabilistic sense, can feel terrifying for some.

b) Multiple lenses, explicit biases

I am leaning heavily on:

  • Market pricing

  • Private trackers

  • Company-level information

But I keep a running note of each lens’ bias:

  • We know that markets love clean stories and can chase their own reflection.

  • Private data tends to over-represent card users, online shoppers, and certain income brackets.

  • Anecdotes are compelling but not always representative.

Simply seeing those caveats in writing helps me resist the urge to treat any one feed as the oracle.

c) Time horizon discipline

In a fog, one must note that mixing timeframes is dangerous. So, I want to split my thinking:

  • Very near term (days): I care about flows, Fed headlines, and positioning. This is where I try not to get cute. I would rather miss a 1 percent move than get whipsawed chasing a narrative that flips on the next speech.

  • Tactical (months): I watch the labor market, earnings revisions, and the evolution of inflation expectations. Here, I might make measured tilts in equity sectors, duration, or credit.

  • Strategic (years): I pay attention to the fact that a 100-year-old inflation series just picked up a gap, and that governance risk around data and budgets is now visible. That nudges me toward a slightly higher long-term risk premium for “policy stability” and a bit more appreciation for diversification outside U.S. assets.

d) Keeping the human texture

Even in investments, I want to keep sight of the people behind the numbers. When I see:

  • Strong holiday sales

  • Solid bank data on spending

  • Headlines about consumer “resilience”

I translate them mentally:

“People are still trying to have a good life, even in a tougher environment, and some of that shows up as more leverage and less buffer.”

That does not mean that I avoid all consumer-linked assets. It does mean, however, that I am cautious about extrapolating today’s “resilience” too far into the future without asking how it is being financed.

5. Where I Know I Could Be Wrong

As we know, hindsight is 20/20, and I know that I need to prepare for the “what could go wrong scenario.” From my point of view, I think that every honest market view needs an error section. Here are the main ways this framework could miss:

  1. The economy might be stronger than the mood.
    The weak sentiment we are seeing might be more about politics and prices than about actual spending power. Clean data, when it finally arrives, could confirm a sturdier cycle than my cautious tone implies.

  2. Markets may be right to be calm.
    Maybe this really is just a weird statistical blip, and the system absorbs it with little lasting damage. In that case, trimming risk into strength could look overly conservative.

  3. The data gap could fade into a footnote.
    A year from now, we might talk about this as “that annoying period where some time series were patchy,” rather than a meaningful structural event.

I do not know which of these paths we will be on. The point is not to predict perfectly. The point is to be honest about the uncertainty and intentional about how we respond.

How I Am Choosing to Hold This Week

So here is my stance for this particular November week:

  • Treat missing data as a signal about the system, not just a scheduling glitch.

  • Let the prices speak for themselves, but remember they are speaking into a fog.

  • Use multiple lenses, and keep their biases in plain view.

  • Be more willing to upgrade quality and risk management when markets feel calm in the face of real uncertainty.

  • Keep in mind that every “resilient” datapoint has a human story behind it. We must not lose focus of that.

We are not just data dependent. We are data-infrastructure dependent. This is one of those rare weeks when the infrastructure itself is the story, and the job as an investor is to look ahead anyway, with partial visibility, and still make choices that your future self can live with.

Sources:

Connor
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