In early 2021, inflation was something written about in history books. Unless you remembered the late 1970s, you had never really experienced inflation. At the end of 2021, inflation was a very real problem for real people, but the market thought it was a short-term event. Stocks rose nearly 30% during the year, and there was reason to be optimistic as jobs opened up and the pandemic subsided. But that euphoria only lasted so long. Inflation caused very real changes in how people spent money and prompted a major response from the Federal Reserve. When the market finally woke up, it wiped out all of 2021’s gains and, in the case of the Nasdaq, then some. Are we in the same place today? It may be worse. But more on that in a moment. What’s Up With Inflation? April inflation data — known as t

$S&P 500(.SPX)$ profits are soaring, there’s no doubt about that. And the market has gone higher with those profits. My question is around what’s sustainable and what isn’t in today’s economy. For example, can you guess what company this quote is about? [Company X] today posted robust earnings that roughly tripled expectations, a surge primarily caused by sales in its memory division. Yep, it’s Micron $Micron Technology(MU)$ ( ▼ 6.62% ). Now, guess what year this was written? I’ll give you a hint, it wasn’t 2026. It was 2000. September 26, 2000, to be exact. Micron is by its nature a cyclical stock. When times are good, profits surge and the money is reinvested in growing capacity, which inevitably lead

1. $Hims & Hers Health Inc.(HIMS)$ Earnings after close today. I'm looking at 2 things. 1. Market share (vs Ro), which has been falling. Is that trend starting to shift? 2. Revenue guidance. Info below, but Q1 may be bad and guidance may be 📈. Hims Guidance: $2.7-$2.9 billion Analyst Est.: $2.72 billion Guidance up $100 million on the revenue side, but Adj. EBITDA margins at the low end. IMO, growth is more important now, not margin. Shares choppy after hours. More soon. 2. $GoPro(GPRO)$ Sad to see $GPRO slowly meeting an end. For me, a lot of lessons were learned with this company about differentiation, bundling, and moats in technology. The biggest lesson: A cool product doesn't = a great business.

My wife called this week at an unusual time for her. What could it be? Was she in an accident? Did something happen at work? Are the kids OK? None of the above… It cost $80 to fill the gas tank! That was the emergency. This is a very real problem for the economy and the market. Food and gasoline are the two items we buy that we feel almost vividly. And prices seem to be going up and up. On the jobs front, it isn’t much better. If you’ve known anyone who has had to look for a job recently, you know the job market isn’t great. No wonder consumer confidence is low. But more on that in a moment. The Confusing State of the Market I watch earnings and economic data on a daily basis, and at times, the data and the market seem to move in opposite directions. This is one of those times. Consumer Co

The stock market has always had a problem with the known versus the unknown. We know what’s happened in the past, and that can create a narrative that’s either positive or negative. And it’s easy to extrapolate the recent past to infinity. But the future is inherently unknown. In 2022, $Netflix(NFLX)$ saw revenue fall sequentially in the fourth quarter, and the company’s growth was clearly decelerating. The slowdown was a shock following solid numbers during the pandemic, and shares lost 75% of their value in early 2022. But late 2022/early 2023 was also an inflection point for the business. Revenue growth picked up in the back half of 2023, and the company has posted solid revenue growth from then until today. No surprise, the stock also did well

There’s a reason investing in energy is (usually) boring. The energy industry is usually a relatively slow-moving industry with periodic spikes and crashes in commodity prices, leading to bankruptcies when someone takes a few too many risks. It’s possible to make money in energy, but it’s usually a slow and steady wins the race kind of business. The current environment is telling us “this time is different” as AI changes energy needs around the world. But is it? Euphoria in energy often ends in disaster. I’m seeing a lot of new energy experts these days. Investors who a few months ago were experts on chips are now lecturing about the economics of gas turbines and fuel cells. They cite backlogs measured in years and a new bottleneck to AI’s explosive growth. We’ve seen this before. I’ve see

When I first covered $Alphabet(GOOG)$ in a spotlight article on September 23, 2023, the consensus in the market was that the company was in real trouble. ChatGPT was gaining momentum, Google search was under threat, and even if Google could do something in AI, it may have to kill the golden goose to keep from being disrupted. I usually bet on disruption, but in a lot of ways, my Alphabet pick was going against disruption. And it was because I saw AI being more of a sustaining innovation rather than a disruptive innovation. I used ChatGPT in the early days, but I saw my wife look at me sideways when I talked about AI. Conversations with friends and neighbors never touched on AI. The conversation online wasn’t real life, and I thought owning Google

1. $MGM Resorts International(MGM)$ $MGM is generating enough free cash flow to buy back ~15% of shares outstanding each year. But there are major tailwinds ahead. 1. Macau gaming revenue is up 14.3% YTD and the COVID recovery is gaining momentum. 2. Online gaming is reaching an inflection point. 3. MGM Japan opens in 2030 and may be the most profitable casino in the world, providing over $1 billion in cash flow to MGM from Day 1. I like the risk/reward. 2. $Robinhood(HOOD)$ Robinhood's biggest challenge in 2026 is user growth. We know another 400k customers have been added thru February, but growth needs to pick up for the stock to move higher. The long-term growth thesis relies on (1) user growth AND (2)

Somehow, the biggest, most popular companies in the world decided to report earnings in the same 48-hour period this quarter. Between the close of the market on Tuesday and the same period of time on Thursday, we may see what the next year looks like for businesses around the globe. I’ll be following them closely, so I wanted to go over five things I’m looking for that will drive the portfolio. More on that in a moment. 5 Things I’m Watching Here’s what I’m looking at this week. Spotify’s User Growth & Operating Leverage Shares of $Spotify Technology S.A.(SPOT)$ are down 33% from their high last year, and most of that drop is because the stock’s valuation got a little stretched. Shares currently trade for 34x forward earnings estimates and 26x

Waymo is scaling to city after city, but $Tesla Motors(TSLA)$ is falling behind, and very few vehicles today have “hands off” capability. Still, the foundation is being laid, and slowly but surely, there will be thousands, then millions, of autonomous vehicles on the road. Today, I want to give you an idea of why I like the positions I have in the industry and explain why, long-term, the aggregator/modular supplier models will win. Tesla’s Full Autonomy Is Delayed…Again We can’t start a discussion of autonomous driving without mentioning Tesla. In January 2025, I shorted Tesla stock via long-term puts, partly on the thesis that Tesla wasn’t going to reach full autonomy anytime soon, despite what Elon Musk said. Much of Tesla’s $1.4 trillion valuat

Between now and then, we’ll get a few more earnings reports, but early in earnings season, the news seems positive if a little muted. The market is back in positive territory, and the worst potential outcomes of everything from tariffs to Iran have rolled off investors’ backs. The good news for us is that April has once again been a turnaround for the market. More on that in a moment. Weekly Update April has been a rocket ship for the stock market for somewhat questionable reasons. The market was down because of the Iran conflict/war, and as that has moved toward a tentative ceasefire, the “risk on” trade took hold. It wasn’t earnings or great economic data that caused the pop, simply undoing damage that didn’t need to be done in the first place. Call me skeptical that this pop will hold.

$Hims & Hers Health Inc.(HIMS)$ has been one of my highest-conviction stocks for most of the past year, only to see its shares go through the market ringer. But the past few weeks, we’ve gone from market capitulation to euphoria as shares become semi-loved again. Sentiment hasn’t fully flipped, but it’s getting there, and I continue to think this is one of the highest potential stocks in the market. The reason shares are up over the past week is peptides. The FDA officially removed 12 peptides from “Category 2”, which meant they couldn’t be compounded, and scheduled a meeting in July with an advisory panel to discuss whether some of these peptides can be compounded again. This could be a huge deal. I called Peptides a 1,000x opportunity for Hi

An IPO used to be the start of a new era for companies. $Apple(AAPL)$ IPO’d four years after it was founded in 1980 with a $1.8 billion valuation. $Microsoft(MSFT)$ went public in 1986 as a relatively mature 11-year-old company with a $777 million valuation. $Amazon.com(AMZN)$ went public three years after it was founded in 1997 with a $438 million valuation. $Alphabet(GOOG)$ went public six years after its founding at a $23 billion valuation. It used to be the case that companies would go public because they needed money on a scale that only public markets could offer. And in some cases it was a way to unlock value for

I’ve been in something of a rut for weeks. Maybe it’s writer’s block. Maybe it’s a weird market. It seems like stocks are slowly sliding lower while some kind of economic calamity is on the horizon. If the oil experts are right, oil $WTI Crude Oil - main 2605(CLmain)$ could go to $200 per barrel, and an economic slowdown on a global scale would likely be a matter of time. If AI experts are right, we’re all going to lose our jobs and be irrelevant by the end of the year. And yet, the market doesn’t seem to care. And maybe that’s the right answer because both oil and AI fears are overblown. In fact, the market is welcoming a SpaceX IPO at a $2 trillion valuation, which is insane on so many levels. Surely, Anthropic or OpenAI are next, despite bu

TBPN x OpenAI 2 things can be true. 1. Amazing financial outcome for TBPN. I’ll never hate on anyone for getting a bag that big. 2. TBPN will wither and fade under OpenAI. It’s just reality. The entire TBPN experience was about fun, trust, and access. Now, the reason to watch is gone. What’s strategic marketing content and what isn’t? What’s done in service of OpenAI controlling the narrative or winning deals with customers or suppliers? The trust is already gone, IMO. I don’t hate the bag, but I do hate losing the old TBPN. Execs won’t feel the need to go on an independent show when it’s an arm of OpenAI media and I feel less need to watch. My 2c. Hope I’m wrong. For SG users only, Welcome to open a CBA today and enjoy access to a trading limit of up to SGD 20,000 with unlimited trading o