Markets have priced Nvidia as the clear winner in AI chip production. To some, its moat appears impenetrable. Google’s developments suggest there may be some competition. Google has been training and serving its AI platform with in-house tensor processing units (TPUs). These chips are more cost-effective and power-efficient than Nvidia’s GPUs. By using TPUs in […]
Ray Dalio is considered by many investment professionals to be a market maven. This is because of the wild success of his hedge fund, Bridgewater, with assets under management of $136 billion, as well as several best-selling economics/finance books he has written. In recent times, Ray Dalio has repeatedly emphasized that markets are in a […]
Given the two-month delay, Thursday’s BLS employment report on September labor market conditions was not nearly as pertinent as the BLS data typically is. Despite it being old news, it is worth sharing that the number of jobs increased by 119k, but the unemployment rate ticked up from 4.3% to 4.4%. The markets didn’t seem […]
As we share below, the odds of a Fed Funds rate cut at the December FOMC meeting are down to 33%. On Wednesday, there was an abrupt repricing of rate cut odds after the BLS cancelled the October employment report and delayed the November data until December 19th. Furthermore, the BLS JOLTS report for September […]
Fear is being spread on social media that some AI players are nearing default. The evidence, some say, lies in the Bloomberg graphs below showing the widening CDS spreads of Oracle and CoreWeave. Before getting into some details about what the CDS markets may be warning about Oracle and CoreWeave, let’s explain what CDS is. […]
There is a strong historical relationship between margin debt and the stock market. Given that margin debt just set a record at $1.18 trillion, it’s worth appreciating the mechanics that support this relationship and what it may tell us about how much longer the bull market may run. When stocks rise, the wealth effect kicks […]
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has long viewed Apple as its crown jewel. In early 2024, Apple shares accounted for nearly 25% of the Berkshire Hathaway portfolio. However, Buffett has been selling out of Apple since then, trimming its stake by over 40%. Based on Buffett’s comments, they are reducing their holdings due to concerns about […]
Bitcoin is up 2% year to date, but the share price of the world’s largest holder of Bitcoin, Strategy (MSTR – formerly MicroStrategy), is down about 30% year to date. As we have noted in the past, Strategy is a Bitcoin holding company, a leveraged alternative to holding Bitcoin. Its original business, enterprise analytics software, […]
Not that long ago, bond yields were rising as concerns over deficits, inflation, and a series of bad Treasury auctions were paraded through the media. We bring this to your attention as the Ten-year Treasury auction on Wednesday was on the weaker side, yet the bond market reaction was minimal. Additionally, government deficits are just […]