Lucky number seven? We’ll see. That’s how many sessions in a row the Dow industrials have closed in the red. We haven’t witnessed a dry streak like this since 2011, when the blue chips slumped for eight straight, a rout that saw a 6.7% plunge overall. The current stretch is nowhere near as severe as that one, but it’s still stoking fears that the market’s relentless bull market is done.

Blogger Mark St. Cyr mulled the rising number of warning signs.

“It’s getting harder and harder for even the most vocal among Wall Street as they try to sing the ‘everything is awesome’ song when the ground around them continues to be littered with an ever-increasing amount of sprawled out – motionless – canaries,” he wrote.

So what’s a fretting investor with rate hikes on the horizon to do? There’s the obvious choice: Ease up on the equity throttle and seek the security of the fixed-income market. That’s what Warren Buffett’s favorite valuation indicator seems to be saying (see “the chart” below).

We’re seeing some of that thirst for safety prop up Treasurys lately. Even as China has cut back its holdings in U.S. debt by about $180 billion, according to Bloomberg, the market has barely budged. That’s because, from banks to mutual funds, there are plenty of buyers out there.

And buyers appear to be picking up the slack in the U.S. stock market too, in the early stages.

Key market gauges

Futures on the Dow US:YMU5 and the S&P US:ESU5 are leaning higher again, but that hasn’t mattered much lately. The Shanghai Composite SHCOMP, -0.38% logged its best day in a month in an otherwise mixed showing in Asia ADOW, -0.29% , while Europe SXXP, -3.24% is off to a mainly positive start this week. Gold US:GCU5 is higher, while crude CLU25, is moving south, but just fractionally.

The quote

“What we have had is politicians and lawyers who have constipated America. Let’s get a businessman in there and get things moving! We need our new MiraLAX!” — Diane, quoted in this great GQ story about the kind of people who will vote for Donald Trump.

The stat

Tesla owners take a ride in the souped up version of the Model S Getty Images

$4,000 — that’s how much Tesla TSLA, +1.63% reportedly loses on every Model S electric sedan it sells. The stock is struggling following last week’s quarterly earnings release. There could be more struggles ahead, if our “call of the day” is on point (see below).

The economy

The key report doesn’t come until Thursday, and that’s July retail sales. For today, the Federal Reserve will post the monthly labor-market conditions index at 10:00 a.m. Eastern. Read: Seesaw retail spending may finally be on upward slope.

The buzz

Sounds like there’s less than a month to go before Apple AAPL, +3.03% reportedly hosts a special event to unveil its latest iPhone and Apple TV. Any chance we can spend the next few weeks getting super-excited about it? Taster: The new iPhones are expected to be equipped with Force Touch display, a better camera system and a faster wireless chip.

A twist on the war on obesity caused a bit of a stir over the weekend. Scientists, reportedly funded by Coke KO, -2.69% , are trying to spread the word that shedding pounds is more about exercise and less about cutting calories. “Most of the focus in the popular media and in the scientific press is, ‘Oh they’re eating too much, eating too much, eating too much’ — blaming fast food, blaming sugary drinks and so on,” the Global Energy Balance Network’s VP Steven Blair said in a video announcing the Coca-Cola-backed organization. “And there’s really virtually no compelling evidence that that, in fact, is the cause.”

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway BRK.A, -2.46% just announced its biggest buyout deal ever, a takeover of Precision Castparts US:PCP for about $32 billion. Precision shares rallied 19% ahead of the bell.

The chart

Speaking of Buffett... here’s that chart that might send you running for the relative safety of the bond market. Jesse Felder of the Felder Report trotted out the Oracle’s favorite valuation yardstick — market cap-to-GNP — to get a reading on what it’s telling investors to do. Check out his full post for more detail, but this chart basically overlays the 10-year Treasury bond yield (red line) against the 10-year forecast for stocks (blue line). Stocks usually have the upper hand, but sometimes bonds offer better opportunity. That time is apparently now.

Felder pointed out that only a handful of times in the past 50 years has there been a better opportunity to increase bond exposure. “The last time the spread was this wide was during the second and third quarters of 2007, just prior to the financial crisis that led to a 50% drop in the stock market,” he said. “Now this doesn’t mean you should sell all of your stocks and run for the hills. A practical way to implement this would be to simply underweight stocks and overweight bonds based on today’s reading.”

The call

Tim Knight, the man behind the Slope of Hope blog and proud owner of a Model S, pieced together an anecdotal bear case for Tesla TSLA, +1.63% over the weekend, in which he aired some grievances. The focus was on Tesla’s refer-a-friend approach and how it smacks of desperation. It started with an email. Refer a friend, he gets $1,000 off and you get $1,000 off your next purchase. Fine. Then shortly thereafter another email, this time with a ready-written form letter for Knight to send to his friends. Elon Musk REALLY wants you to start selling for him.

Starting to feel a little much. But then there was the final straw. A button appeared on his Tesla app that said, “From Elon.” It linked to a letter like the two he received via email. Knight said it then wanted access to his friends list for quick and easy spamming. “The Model S is still the best car I’ve ever owned, and I’d still recommend it,” he wrote. “But if Tesla doesn’t start to get its act together with respect to delivering new products and getting their service back into its former tip-top shape, I suspect the symbol TSLA will make a long, tortured trip back down to the double digits.” Read his entire take on why Tesla’s star has been dimming lately.

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