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Investors will focus on Japan’s new government and key export data out of Tokyo.

Gold was down $10 a short time ago in early Asia-Pacific trading but steadied there and has since rebounded to unchanged since the NY close. We’re coming up on 9 am in Tokyo and 8 am in Beijing so the next few hours will be a big test. Gold was steady in Asian trade yesterday before the route started in Europe and (particularly) US trading.

This article was written by Adam Button at investinglive.com.

The biggest takeaway from the quarter was better-than-expected credit performance.

The USD/JPY pair attracts some buyers to six-day peaks near 151.90 during the early Asian session on Wednesday. The Japanese Yen (JPY) weakens against the US Dollar (USD) after dovish Sanae Takaichi was elected as Japan’s Prime Minister.

The New Zealand Dollar recovers some ground as Wednesday’s Asian session begins, yet it remains hoovering at around 0.5740 for the third straight day, below the 20-day Simple Moving Average (SMA).

Gold (XAU/USD) drifts lower on Tuesday after retesting its record high near $4,380 on Monday. The pullback comes as the US Dollar (USD) extends its recovery gains and traders lock in profits following an overextended rally.

Front month copper traded at $4.94 and held up well in the rout in precious metals prices. Many copper miners (often because of associated gold production) were beaten up anyway.

Today, TD Cowen was out with a report highlighting a tightening market and they boosted their 2026 price to $5.25 from $4.40 previously. They also took up their long-term price to $4.50 from $4.25/lb.

The swing has been that trouble at several major mines has taken about 5% of global supply offline. The recent run-up in copper prices came after the mudslide at Grasberg.

On September 8th, Grasberg operations in Indonesia were subject to a
massive mudflow into the mine, causing a shutdown of operations and Freeport
declaring force majeure on its contracts. A subsequent announcement from Freeport
later in the month revealed preliminary impacts suggesting a production impact of
roughly 200kt and 270kt Cu in Q4/25 and 2026, respectively, from the world’s
second-largest copper mine (~3.4% total mined supply in 2024). Further disruptions
this year include the seismic event at Kamoa-Kakula (~200kt), ramp-up difficulties at
QB (~100kt), and El Teniente’s mine collapse (~48kt), which when combined represent
~2% of global supply.

Prices have been consolidating in the $4.90 to $5.20 range, which is near the top end of all-time highs.

Looking ahead, TD Cowen sees a 222kt deficit in 2026, which they warn could be conservative.

Longer term, lower production from mines entering mature stages of their mine life
along with the lack of greenfield investments imply that a larger copper price is
inevitable to incentivize development and support growing demand

So far this year, copper demand has been stronger than anticipated, with Wood Mackenzie now seeing 3.7% growth. The swing factor is often Chinese growth and that’s held up better than feared. In the years ahead, power generation/transmission, AI datacenters and greening the economy could be massive tailwinds.

Note that the US appears to be scrambling for copper supplies.

In terms of miners, TD’s top
picks include Lundin with buy ratings on Capstone, Ivanhoe and Teck along with top developer pick
Arizona Sonoran, where they are particularly bullish.

This article was written by Adam Button at investinglive.com.

Netflix (NFLX) shares fell roughly 6% in after-hours trade Tuesday after the streaming giant’s Q3 earnings revealed healthy topline growth but a notable step back in profitability — with investors noting margin compression.

• Revenue: $11.51B vs $11.51B expected
• EPS: $5.87 vs $6.97 expected

Revenue rose 17% year-on-year to $11.51B, right in line with Netflix’s forecast, driven by steady membership gains, ad revenue momentum, a weaker US dollar and pricing adjustments. A drag was that operating income of $3.25B fell short of expectations, with margins compressing to 28.2% from 31.7% in the prior quarter and below the 31.5% guidance. The caveat is that there was a $619 million charge tied to a dispute with Brazilian tax authorities, which cut 5 percentage points from margins. Full-year operating margin guidance was trimmed to 29% from a prior 30% due to the same issue.

Happy Gilmore 2 and KPop Demon Hunters (a record 325m views on the platform) were hits in the quarter while the advertising business logged its best quarter ever in a sign of where things might be headed for viewers.

Free cash flow remained a highlight at $2.66B in Q3 — flat from Q2 and up from $2.19B a year ago. The company sees $9 billion in FCF against a market cap of $526 billion (pre drop), which is about a 1.7% FCF yield. The company is virtually debt free.

What investors are paying for is growth and the company guided for 17% revenue growth in Q4. What could be further hurting the stock though is that the company sees a 23.9% operating margin in Q4. That’s been reeled back in after a rise starting in 2024.

• Q1 2023: 16.8 %

• Q2 2023: 17.5 %

• Q3 2023: 18.4 %

• Q4 2023: 20.6 %

• Q1 2024: 22.5 %

• Q2 2024: 23.8 %

• Q3 2024: 25.7 %

• Q4 2024: 26.7 %

• Q1 2025: 31.7 %

• Q2 2025: 34.1 %

• Q3 2025 (actual): 28.2 %

• Q4 2025 (forecast): 23.9 %

I assume that the combination of the collapse of Hollywood salaries and the use of generative AI will ultimately goose margins but the risk is that users (particularly young ones) tune out of Netflix and tune into YouTube and video games.

The company sees revenues at $44.8 billion to $45.2 billion and shares are trading at 11.6x that. Looking way, 2027 consensus revenue is $56 billion and EPS of $39.40 per share, which is still 29.5x earnings (after the 6% drop after hours).

In short, shares are rich and any signs of a slowdown in growth or profitability are a drag.

For Netflix watchers, the company touted a slate of returning favorites coming this quarter:

The final season of Stranger Things, The Diplomat S3, The
Witcher S4, Nobody Wants This S2, Emily in Paris S5, Love is Blind S9, Squid Game: The Challenge
S2, Selling Sunset S9, Culinary Class Wars S2 from South Korea, The Believers S2 from Thailand,
The Accident S2 from Mexico, Envious S3 from Argentina, and Delhi Crime S3 from India.

There is also Death by Lightning from Game of Thrones producers David Benioff and D.B. Weiss.

On the film side we get Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein, Kathryn Bigelow’s A HOUSE OF
DYNAMITE, Rian Johnson’s Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery, documentary The Perfect
Neighbor, Train Dreams, Noah Baumbach’s Jay Kelly starring George Clooney and Adam Sandler,
Troll 2 from Norway, Edward Berger’s Ballad of a Small Player from the UK, and Raat Akeli Hai 2
from India.

I don’t watch much TV but I’m looking forward to Frankenstein (Nov 7 release on NFLX)) and another Knives Out film (Dec 12).

This article was written by Adam Button at investinglive.com.

EUR/USD falls during the North American session, edges lower 0.31% as the Greenback remains bid as a sign of relief as US President Trump tempers his rhetoric on China. The pair trades at 1.1599 after reaching a high of 1.1655.

All eyes are on precious metals as we head into Asia-Pacific trading, following the 5.3% drop in gold yesterday and 7.11% in silver. Will Asia buy the dip or will the selling continue?

Economic data and news won’t be a big distraction, at least the scheduled variety. The lone indicator on the calendar is the September Japan trade balance report at 1950 ET or 8:50 am in Tokyo. The consensus is a surplus of 22.2 billion yen in a big recovery form 242B deficit in the August data.

There are no notable central bank speakers scheduled.

Eamonn is traveling for work this week and will be back Friday.

This article was written by Adam Button at investinglive.com.