Welcome to Seeking Alpha's Wall Street Lunch. Our afternoon update on today's market action news and analysis.

Good afternoon. Today is Thursday, February 15th, and I'm your host, Kim Khan. Our top story so far.

U.S. consumers stumbled last month as January's retail sales figures arrived with a sharp decline.

Retail sales fell 0.8% last month, much more than the 0.1% drop

predicted. December's gain was revised down to 0.4%. Core retail sales fell 0.6% with economists expecting a 0.2% rise, sales X

auto and gas fell 0.5%. Building and garden materials, cars and parts, and gas sales saw the biggest declines.

Furniture sales and spending at restaurants, bars, and grocery stores did the best.

The soft sales figures initially brought some cheer to fed doves on the hopes that it would encourage the FOMC to cut rates sooner rather than later, but sentiment in the market turned later on.

Treasury yields are cutting losses, and the 10-year yield is at 4.25

having been below 4.2 percent earlier. Stocks are mixed with growth struggling.

While data on the consumer side was weak, two Fed manufacturing measures beat expectations.

The New York Fed's February Empire State Manufacturing Index rose more than expected, just shy of zero,

and the Philly Fed Index moved into expansion territory for the first time since August.

The Philly Fed employment component was the weakest since March, but the more recent weekly jobless claims figures remained stubbornly low, falling to 212,000.

In other news of note, it's 13F time when hedge funds and large investors disclose holdings

of regulatory filings.

As you heard in this warning's Wall Street breakfast,

Invidious stole the spotlight, filing its first ever 13F.

Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway trimmed its steak and apple by about 10 million shares. It exited its its stake in Paramount Global. Berkshire increased its holdings in Serious XM Holdings and Chevron.

Elon Musk disclosed that he held a 20.5% stake in Tesla valued a little more than 120 billion dollars.

Musk has stated recently that he would like to hold a voting position of 25% in

Tesla to help decide the future of the AI business.

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