Two lane economy coincides with two lane stock market/French markets/US oil production topping/Other

I'll start by chiming in on the growing bifurcation in the US stock market that really has widened out over the past month. This is not just a rotational thing that continues into the very biggest companies driven by AI excitement, it's reflecting the ever growing two lane highway that is the US economy as I say again I haven't seen a more uneven and mixed situation. 

S&P 500 mkt cap weighted in white/Equal weighted in orange performance ytd

Since the Mario Draghi 'whatever it takes' statement in 2012 that helped to quell the panic in the sovereign bonds of Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal, whenever I see chaotic politics in Europe I usually roll my eyes and want to do the same with the worries about France. That said, the rise in bond yields in France is a reminder that the ever exploding debt and deficits in many countries, including our own, have left them little prepared to deal with an investor revolt. More so in Europe where individual countries don't have their own printing press and must rely on the ECB to put out any fires. 

At the end of 2023 that I have numbers on from Eurostat, France had a debt to GDP ratio of 110% and a budget deficit as a % of GDP of 5.5% which is not far from the depths of the 2008-2009 recession when it got to 7.4% and I'm not including Covid. Little room for maneuver and the ECB today is telling France, 'don't look at us.' Reuters is reporting today "ECB policymakers have no plan to discuss emergency purchases of French bonds and still think it is for French politicians to reassure investors spooked by the prospect of a far-right government, five sources told Reuters...speaking on condition of anonymity given the sensitivity of the situation, they hadn't discussed activating an emergency bond buying scheme to support French debt, nor do they currently plan to do so." They shouldn't have plans at least for now as the parliamentary elections haven't even taken place yet, we therefore have no idea what any coalition government might look like and what policies may come of it.