All posts by Michael Comeau
5 Charts You Need to See: Nvidia the Value Stock?
We just closed out the first full trading week of the year, featuring new all-time highs, a crappy jobs report, and the Supreme Court failing to render a decision on President Trump’s tariffs. But we’re here with the 5 charts you need to see right now, covering Uranium, Nvidia (NVDA), and MORE! 1. Uranium Is Shocking the World… Again The Global X Uranium ETF (URA) is now up 18% YTD vs. +1.4% for $SPY. That’s after URA surged 67% last year. The latest catalyst was Meta (META) signing nuclear power deals with Vistra (VST) and Oklo (OKLO), plus the Bill Gates-backed TerraPower. This is a fascinating point in the AI cycle. Because it’s uncertain how long Nvidia (NVDA) can dominate chip performance. But it seems 100% certain that AI is sucking up a lot of electricity. And insider the uranium mining complex specifically, there is just not a lot of supply in terms of stocks to buy. Look at the market caps of the better-known uranium companies: Cameco (CCJ): $46 billion Uranium Energy (UEC): $7.1 billion Energy Fuels (UUUU): $4.3 billion Denison Mining (DNN): $2.9 billion And the URA ETF itself has just $6.3 billion in assets. 2. Nvidia: Value Stock? Traders and investors are increasingly focused on the skyrocketing “second-order” AI stocks in areas like nuclear power and memory. Former AI Kingpin Nvidia (NVDA) feels left behind to the point where it looks like a value stock, even though its earnings winning streak shows no sign of slowing. It’s trading at just 26.6 times forward earnings. Meanwhile, Costco (COST) trades at 45 times earnings. Meanwhile, Nvidia is expected to grow earnings by 57% this year. For Costco, it’s 11%. 3. Apple’s Big Oversold Signal Apple (AAPL) is the second most oversold stock in the Nasdaq 100/QQQ, based on RSI: That reading is nearing the April 2025 lows after the Liberation Day selloff. Traders are worried about a myriad of issues including a China slowdown, skyrocketing memory costs, and Tim Cook possibly slowing down. There’s always chatter about the company being behind in AI… but how many people are dropping Apple devices over that? I mean, I can use ChatGPT and Gemini and Grok and whatever else on my iPhone. Right? With the stock this oversold and the chatter so negative, perhaps it’s time for a bounce. And the one QQQ stock more oversold than Apple (AAPL)? It’s Netflix (NFLX), which has been beaten down because of the Warner Brothers acquisition drama. 4. PayPal Is Sitting on Major Support PayPay (PYPL) can be one of the most frustrating stocks in the market. It operates in two modes: High-speed uptrend Value trap disaster And now it’s sitting on major support around $57, which is above the 2023 low around $50. Could there be $7 of risk down, and $30 up? At less than 11 times forward earnings, this is one stock we have to watch. 5. OIH Is the ETF to Watch Following President Trump’s presumed takeover of the Venezuela oil industry, the VanEck Oil Services ETF (OIH) is the ETF to watch. Because the companies in the OIH make the equipment and technology that gets oil out of the ground. And you have to think these companies are about to land some big fat contracts. On Monday, OIH made the “Gap of the Year” on the Venezuela news. And that gap held:
Continue Reading -->All Hail the AI King
It’s 2026. So let’s dig into the hot stories we’re watching for the New Year. 1. All Hail the AI King Two weeks ago, I declared memory giant Micron (MU) “the new AI champion” courtesy of its shocking guidance. It’s up almost 20% since then with a big fat gain to start 2026. And of course, I don’t own it. Micron wasn’t the only winner on the memory/storage side of the AI trade today. Sandisk (SNDK), Western Digital (WDC), and Lam Research (LRCX), all big winners last year, also posted huge gains today. Now let’s talk about the the other secondary AI trade. 2. Uranium Is Going Wild, and Nobody’s In It The Global X Uranium ETF (URA) had a monster gain in 2025, and rose over 7% today. The bull market case here is very simple. The world is becoming more nuclear friendly, and AI is driving record demand for electricity. And you can’t have nuclear power without uranium. But the most interesting thing about uranium is how little money appears to be invested in it. The #1 company in the industry, Cameco (CCJ), has a market cap of just $42.9 billion. The URA ETF has just $5.3 billion in assets. And the Sprott Uranium Miners ETF (URNM) has $1.7 billion in assets. For comparison, the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH) has $37.3 billion in assets. 3. You People Love Tesla We recently surveyed the T3 Live community and asked what your favorite stock was. The #1 name across the board was Tesla (TSLA), which had a stinky day after reporting weak delivery numbers. Alphabet (GOOGL) was in second place, but it wasn’t even close. We also asked traders which IPO they were most excited about: OpenAI, SpaceX, or Anthropic. Elon Musk’s SpaceX was the overwhelming favorite at 65.8%. OpenAI was in second at 27.6%. Just 3.9% chose Anthropic. So the Cult of Elon is not going anywhere. And you can count me in that camp because I’m still long Tesla. 4. Traders and Investors Are Bullish Traders are investors to start the New Year. In our own survey, 82.9% of respondents said the S&P 500 will rise in 2026. And AAII’s Sentiment Survey showed that 42.0% of investors are bullish on stocks for the next 6 months: This was the fourth bullish reading in the past 5 weeks. 5. If You Believe in Crypto Miracles… Look at This As we told you two weeks ago, short interest on crypto-related equities like Strategy (MSTR) and Bitmine Immersion Technology (BMNR) is sky-high. All of these names put in big gains today, with Bitmine leading the way. If you are bullish on crypto, you better put these names on the radar because we will see some wild short squeezes. 6. XLE Has Been Waking Up If you watch the energy sector long enough, you’re at risk of falling asleep. But… it’s getting less boring. As you can see in this weekly chart, XLE has been in a slow-motion uptrend since April and it’s about to bang up against resistance around $47: Keep an eye on it. This could be the next big sector to run. 7. Earnings Expectations Are High According to FactSet, Q4 earnings estimates rose 0.4% throughout last quarter. That bucks the typical pattern of estimates declining by 1.6%. Analysts now expect 13.1% earnings growth in Q1. The tech sector has seen the largest increase in estimates, which is no surprise because the big boys like Nvidia (NVDA) and Amazon (AMZN) have dropped one beat after another. So the bar is higher than we’ve seen in recent quarters. And the higher the bar, the harder it is to get those big beats. 8. You Can Get David Prince’s 2026 Game Plan FREE As a bonus for our community, David Prince of the Inner Circle VTF® released his 2026 strategy report to the public. Download it right here.
Continue Reading -->Your 2 Favorite Stocks: 1 Cult Name, 1 AI Surprise
T3 Live recently held a community stock market survey to figure out what you think will happen in 2026. While this might not be the most scientific survey in the world, we think the results are interesting. Here’s what we saw: Traders Are Bullish, Especially on Tech The market is coming off its third straight year of big gains, and our audience expects the good times to roll. 82.9% of respondents believe the S&P 500 will rise in 2026. As far as which index will do best, traders are leaning towards the Nasdaq. 32.6% of respondents said the Nasdaq will have the highest percentage gain in 2026, followed by 32.5% favoring the Russell 2000. However, traders do expect at least one pullback. 56.6% said they expect at least one 20% SPX drawdown in 2026. The Stocks People Like for 2026 When asked to name their favorite stocks for next year, Tesla (TSLA) came up by far the most often. Alphabet (GOOGL) came in second place, but it was not even close. So the cult of Elon Musk is as alive as ever, which relates to the IPO everyone is waiting for. (more on this below) We also asked which Mag 7 stock would do best in 2026, and here’s how the distribution played out: Alphabet (GOOGL): 30.3% Tesla (TSLA): 27.6% Amazon (AMZN): 18.4% Nvidia (NVDA): 13.2% Apple (AAPL): 5.3% Microsoft (MSFT): 3.9% Meta Platforms (META): 1.3% Why is GOOGL on top? Two reasons. First, it’s the #1 Mag 7 name this year with a 66% gain: Second, it emerged as a surprise AI powerhouse thanks to its homemade TPU chips. But it’s interesting that so few people like META. Could that be the ultimate contrarian play? It’s by far the cheapest name on a valuation basis: A Look at Sector Preferences We asked which sectors would do best and worst in 2026, and we’ll list the top 5 in each category: We’ll start with the 5 favorites: Tech: 26.7% Energy: 17.3% Gold/Silver: 16.0% Biotech: 9.3% Financials: 8.0% With traders favoring the Nasdaq for 2026, it’s no surprise tech is on top. And gold/silver and biotech have been on fire. So the most interesting finding here is the love for Energy, even though it’s been a major laggard in 2026: And here are the sectors people think will do worst: Housing: 18.2% Real Estate: 15.6% Tech: 14.3% Crypto: 14.3% Gold/Silver: 10.4% The dominance of Housing and Real Estate here implies traders see economic troubles ahead. You likely noticed that Tech and Gold/Silver are on both lists. It makes sense because tech is the biggest part of the market so it always gets attention. Plus, Gold/Silver have gotten tons of attention in 2026, and people tend to have strong opinions on metals. Thoughts on the Fed 59.2% of respondents believe Kevin Hassett will be the next Fed Chair. 19.7% see Christopher Waller taking the spot, and 18.3% went with Kevin Warsh. As far as rates go, 100% expect rate cuts in 2026. 38.7% expect 0.50% in cuts, with 22.7% expecting 0.75%, and 14.7% expecting a full 1.00% in cuts. What Will Move Stocks in 2026? We asked our community to rank these factors based on their expected impact on the US stock market: Fed Policy Inflation US Government Policy Geopolitical Conflicts Corporate Earnings There were no real standouts here. Traders ranked these factors pretty much the same across the board. So it’s hard to point to one single narrative that people are grasping onto. The market is torn on what matters most. Everyone Wants SpaceX We asked traders which IPO they were most excited about: OpenAI, SpaceX, or Anthropic. SpaceX was the overwhelming favorite at 65.8%. OpenAI was in second at 27.6%. Just 3.9% chose Anthropic. To Recap… Here are the biggest takeaways: Traders are bullish, especially on tech Housing and Real Estate are hated The cult of Elon Musk and Tesla (TSLA) is as strong as ever Meta (META) is a contrarian play to watch The market is torn on the biggest drivers of 2026 Happy New Year Folks!
Continue Reading -->This Is the New AI Champion
We’re coming off another week of fun market action marked by a light CPI report, a massive surge for Tesla (TSLA), and a newly crowed King of AI. So let’s dig in to the 10 things you need to know about markets right now. 1. Micron (MU) Is Your New AI Champion Nvidia (NVDA) had its time in the sun. Then Oracle (ORCL) and Alphabet (GOOGL) took the reins. But memory giant Micron (MU) became the new AI champion after reporting strong earnings on Wednesday along with shocking guidance. Earnings estimates went through the roof. Analysts now expect EPS of $19.61 this year, up from $12.77 pre-earnings. That’s an increase of 53%. And since estimates went up so much, its forward P/E is now at 7: Many folks are wondering why it trades at such a cheap valuation. First, single-digit P/E ratios for Micron are nothing new. And second, the memory market is extremely cyclical, so there’s always the question of when peak earnings happen. Because at some point, earnings estimates can contract just as fast. But good luck trying to figure out when, because the AI industry is sucking up memory like nothing we’ve seen before. 2. Oracle Played the Best Possible Card We’ve talked for weeks about Oracle’s (ORCL) meltdown on worries over its debt load and the sustainability of the AI growth cycle. But it surged big-time on Friday on news TikTok would sell its US operations to an Oracle-led joint venture. So for now, the market’s assuming the financial benefits of the TikTok investment offset concerns about the strength of Oracle’s AI business – particularly, the dependence upon OpenAI. This may have been the best possible card to play because of TikTok’s growth potential. 3. OpenAI May Be Worth More Than These Companies This week, we heard a string of news reports saying OpenAI is in talks to raise a whole ton of capital, which it needs to pay off its obligations to Oracle (ORCL). A Wall Street Journal report said this latest funding round could value OpenAI at $830 billion. That would make OpenAI worth more than Oracle itself, along with: Visa (V) Mastercard (MA) Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) ExxonMobil (XOM) Palantir (PLTR) Netflix (NFLX) Bank of America (BAC) Costco (COST) Home Depot (HD) AMD (AMD) And plenty of other household names. At some point, OpenAI will come public. The tough part will be timing because who knows how far it will be in its growth cycle by then? The way things are going, OpenAI could IPO at a multi-trillion dollar valuation! 4. Biotech Is the Quiet Crusher Traders waited for years for Biotech to play catch-up to the major averages. And 2025’s been a banner year for XBI. Over the past 6 months, XBI has risen over 48%, crushing SPY and QQQ: Lower rates certainly helped, as did strong M&A activity and successful clinical trials. There may also be a simple catch-up factor here. If we take the same chart and wind it back 10 years, XBI is miles behind: 5. Coinbase Is Coming for Robinhood This week, crypto exchange Coinbase (COIN) announced it’s beefing up its offerings by adding stock trading and prediction markets to its feature stack. Coinbase wants to be a one-stop financial app, which makes sense given its reliance upon the ever-volatile crypto markets. With Bitcoin and Ethereum well off their October highs, Coinbase stock is down -2.4% year-to-date. More equities-focused competitors like Robinhood (HOOD), Interactive Brokers (IBKR), and Charles Schwab (SCHW) are up huge: Since we’re talking about the crypto mess, let’s take a look at the ETF leaderboard: 6. Bitcoin and Ethereum Are Way Behind I don’t know about you, but I don’t see how these four things can be true at once: The Fed is cutting rates SMH is up 48% YTD XBI is up 37% YTD Bitcoin and Ethereum are down YTD Yet the numbers don’t lie: If you can explain this, I’m all ears. But if crypto is about to make a comeback, it will probably be vicious – especially on the equity side. 7. Crypto Stock Short Interest Is Sky-High Short interest is high across the board on crypto-related equities like Strategy (MSTR) and Bitmine Immersion Technology (BMNR): Now, I’m not interested in playing with this dynamite myself just yet. But if you are bullish on crypto, you have to think we see some epic short squeezes in these names. Who knows? Maybe Tom Lee and Michael Saylor, and their followers, will be rewarded for their bullishness in the end. 8. Tesla’s Comeback Has Been Stunning Tesla (TSLA) hit a record high at $495.28 Wednesday to break its prior record high from last December. That put it up 131% from the April lows to reward the faithful: Tesla’s latest catalyst was Robotaxi hype. And investors once again forgave this company’s unique combo of high valuation and questionable fundamentals. Meanwhile, analysts are still rolling their eyes at the stock. Their average target price is just $395.73: 9. Nike Has Some Bizarre Stats Shoemaker Nike (NKE) got smashed Friday after earnings. But here’s the wild thing about Nike. It’s actually beaten earnings estimates for 10 straight quarters. And the average upside surprise was 37.4%: Of course, the problem is that Nike’s actual earnings are shrinking. So it’s dropping huge earnings beats, but no actual growth. Weird. 10. JR Is Behind Reddit On Wednesday, JR Romero laid out the bull case for Reddit (RDDT). And it’s already started creeping up. See why he likes this stock so much;
Continue Reading -->Joe Rogan and the AI Curse
The AI trade feels cursed. And we can blame Joe Rogan. Just a little bit. 1. Joe Rogan and the Magazine Cover Indicator 2.0 AI stocks act like trash. Exactly when we see Nvidia (NVDA) CEO Jensen Huang appearing on the Joe Rogan Experience: And Time Magazine naming “the Architects of AI” like OpenAI’s Sam Altman Person of the Year: The magazine cover indicator says that major magazine cover stories sometimes mark tops or bottoms. Emphasis on sometimes because this is pure anecdote. The best known example is BusinessWeek’s “Death of Equities” cover back in 1979. Now AI stocks are getting trashed precisely when there’s wide mainstream celebration of industry leaders like Jensen Huang. And yes folks, the Joe Rogan Experience is the #1 podcast on Earth, which makes it mainstream media: 2. Oracle Is a Mess On November 7, I said Oracle has the ugliest chart in the world. It’s getting uglier. The stock gapped down Thursday after a revenue miss. And it came under more pressure Friday on a Bloomberg report that it’s pushing back completion dates for some of its AI data centers to 2028 from 2027. Who are those data centers allegedly for? OpenAI. Which accounts for $300 billion of Oracle’s customer commitments. And which recently declared a “code red” to counter Google’s Gemini 3 AI model. So the market doubts Oracle can service its growing debt load and hit its long-term growth targets. Result: the stock is down 45% from its September high. And Oracle’s not alone in what feels like a cursed sector: 3. Broadcom Got Decimated Broadcom (AVGO) delivered its 23rd straight earnings beat on Thursday. And the stock’s down over 10% Friday because guidance was strong – but not strong enough. Kudos to JR Romero, who screamed sell at $413 on Wednesday: Remember, Nvidia’s (NVDA) November earnings report was impressive, no doubt. But that stock’s been stuck in the mud. So when you add this all up, the AI trade is in Season 1 Tony Soprano mode: “It’s good to be in something from the ground floor. I came too late for that and I know. But lately, I’m getting the feeling that I came in at the end. The best is over.” In AI, the “Fear Of Missing Out” is dead. The dominant theme is now “The Fear I’m the Last Sucker In.” Industry fundamentals appear strong. But the stocks act like things are about to fall apart. 4. This Valuation Statistic Is Hilarious If AI is supposed to be the next big thing… why is Costco (COST) a more expensive stock than Nvidia (NVDA)? Costco is trading at 42.8 times earnings and Nvidia’s at 25.5. Even though Nvidia is growing 6 times faster. The market is treating Costco as a pillar of stability, which makes sense. And it’s treating Nvidia as a risky cyclical. By the way, could AI stocks have bottomed right when I wrote this article? Stranger things have happened. 5. IWM’s Comeback Has Been Amazing Small caps lagged for years… but they’re catching up. As the Fed’s cut rates and became more dovish, IWM has almost caught up to SPY. They’re just about neck and neck in 2025: Now let’s turn the clock back 10 years. IWM has a TON of room to play catch-up if this trend is to continue. SPY has outperformed it by almost double: 6. The Rate Cut Picture Since the Fed just cut rates by a quarter point on Wednesday, let’s take a look at the next FOMC meeting in January. The market is pricing in a mere 22% chance of a rate cut in January: The market is pricing in two rate cuts in 2026, while the Fed itself expects one. The deciding factor may be who President Trump names as Fed Chair and Vice Chair next year. The President has been vocal in calling for lower rates, so odds are he’s looking for the biggest dove possible. Note that even if Jerome Powell exits the chairman’s throne, he may remain a governor on the Board. 7. Investors Are Bullish The AAII Sentiment Survey shows that 44.6% of investors are bullish: This is the second straight week of above-average bullishness. And it makes sense considering how fast we came off the November 21 lows. Meanwhile, the VIX remains at historically low levels, which is normal for a tight bull market like the current one. 8. Crypto Is The Worst Sector of 2025 We took a look at our handy dandy ETF tracker: It’s quite odd that Bitcoin and Ethereum are down while rates are falling, and while risky stock sectors like semiconductors and biotech are up like mad. And interestingly, the falloff only happened after the crypto peak in October: Could this be a dark harbinger for risk assets? Time will tell. 9. The Slop Bowl Stocks Are Back We’ve talked quite a bit about the “Slop Bowl Bear Market.” But these stocks are rocking December: Sweetgreen (SG) is up 40.8% this month and Chipotle (CMG) and Cava (CAVA) are coming back fast. These could be classic January effect plays, rallying in anticipation of the end of tax loss selling. Could Starbucks (SBUX) be next to go? It’s kinda sorta in the same family of “basic luxury” stocks. 10. One Bull’s Case JR Romero remains bullish on the market and predicts the SPX will hit 7200 before year-end. Here’s a look back from two weeks ago, when he reminded us there was no real bear case:
Continue Reading -->The New Ugliest Chart in the World (Sorry Oracle)
We closed out another fun week in the markets so it’s time to look ahead with the 10 things you need to know, starting with… 1. Oracle May No Longer Have the Ugliest Chart in the World Last week, I said “Oracle Has the Ugliest Chart in the World” and it got uglier this week before a Friday stick-save. As of Frida morning, Oracle had dropped 39% from its post-earnings high: BUT… Oracle staged a powerful rally on Friday to end the day green. Trend change? Who knows. But for now, Oracle no longer has the ugliest chart in the world. Full disclosure: I went long Oracle (ORCL) calls Thursday and got out the same day for a loss. So I completely missed the Friday rebound. My bottom-fishing grade for the week is an F-. 2. But Oracle Has Competition… The major indices are just a few percentage points off their all-time highs, thanks to stability in the banks plus a few select index superheavyweights like Apple (AAPL). But below the surface, things are quite nasty, especially for super-speculative growth stocks. We’ve extensively covered the boom in low revenue, high valuation stocks like Oklo (OKLO) and IonQ (IONQ). They are no longer flying high. Many of these names have fallen more than 50% from their highs, like: Bitmine Immersion Technologies (BMNR): -78% Trump Media & Technology Group (DJT): -73% Rigetti Computing (RGTI): -59% D-Wave Quantum (QBTS): -53% Oklo (OKLO): -49% Pony AI (PONY): -47% IONQ (IONQ): -47% So based on these numbers… BMNR is the ugliest of them all: 3. Expect an Assault on Tom Lee, Owner of the Ugliest Chart in the World The media loves to build up heroes and then tear them down. It happened from 2000 to 2022 with Ark Invest’s Cathie Wood, who heads up the iconic ARKK ETF. The knives are about to come out for Fundstrat’s Tom Lee, who has been the biggest public face of this equity and crypto bull market. Lee is Chairman of crypto treasury name Bitmine Immersion Technologies (BMNR), which is cratering: If this bull market is indeed done, Tom Lee will be the #1 scapegoat for people taking too much risk. 4. Remember Microstrategy Crypto currencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum have also been taken to the woodshed. One of the biggest stories of the week was Bitcoin breaking the $100,000 mark with authority. And as you’d expect, related equities got smashed. We took a 3-year lookback at Bitcoin vs. the artist formerly known as MicroStrategy – Michael Saylor’s Strategy (MSTR): MicroStrategy, I mean Strategy, used to trade at a massive premium to its underlying Bitcoin holdings. And as such, Strategy has been playing massive downside catch-up to Bitcoin itself. No mas. The love story is over. 5. Fed, Schmed When Fed Chair Jerome Powell said a December rate cut is not guaranteed, the dovish mood soured fast. Now the CME’s FedWatch tool is pricing in a mere 43.6% chance of a December rate cut. That’s down from 66.9% last week, and 94.4% a month ago. So if you’ve wondered why rate-sensitive speculative stocks have been slapped around, this is it. 6. Biotech and Health Care Have RULED Biotech and Health Care have lagged the major indices for years. As traders and investors rotated out of tech and high-growth names, biotech and health care have shined in Q4: Biotech (XBI) is up 16% while Health Care (XLV) popped 12%. While SPY is barely green. So Jim Cramer was right. There really is always a bull market somewhere. 7. Sentiment Has Shifted Bearish The latest AAII Sentiment Survey shows that 31.6% of investors are bullish on stocks for the next 6 months. This is well below the long-term average of 37.5%. Meanwhile, bearish sentiment is at 49.1%. Investors have not been this bearish since September 10. And it makes sense, with all the meltdowns we’re seeing. If things stay weak, sentiment still has plenty of room to deteriorate further. 8. The VIX Is Nowhere Near Extreme The VIX is up in reaction to the rise in volatility. But it’s nowhere near extreme, like in April when we had the big post-Liberation Day tariff meltdown. And the VIX isn’t even close to the peak in mid-October, when regional bank worries were at the forefront: 9. Apple Is Made of Steel As noted above, Apple’s (AAPL) shocking stability has helped keep the indices elevated. It’s the only Mag 7 stock that’s positive in November: But why? Well, we’re past what was a pretty strong earnings report. And AI names have been getting trashed. So Apple’s supposed failure in AI is now a benefit. By the way, Apple is an AI superpower. Because people can download apps onto their Apple devices. And voilà! Meanwhile, try telling your kids they have to switch to Android. And see how fast they cry. 10. If Your Account Is Small, Try Options If your account is on the small side and you’re looking to build up to a bigger stake, it’s time to consider options. David Prince of the Inner Circle VTF® explains why:
Continue Reading -->The Ugliest Chart in the World
We closed out another fun week in the markets so it’s time to look ahead with the 10 things you need to know, starting with… 1. Oracle Has the Ugliest Chart in the World Oracle (ORCL) did all the right stuff. They had big earnings. Raised guidance. Announced a massive deal with OpenAI. But after all that positivity, the stock put in a slow-motion “sell the news” decline that erased that massive September earnings gap: The stock is now 32% off the highs, make this the ugliest chart in the world right now. Meanwhile, CDS just hit 2-year highs. Why? The market is starting to wonder how OpenAI can spend hundreds of billions of dollars on infrastructure. Speaking of ugly 2. SPX Breaks the 50 Day Today, the S&P 500 Index fell below the 50 day moving average for the first time since April. Why? Well, aside from normal profit-taking after a monster rally, we’ve got a shut down government, falling odds of a December rate cut (more on this below), weak consumer sentiment, and real questions about the sustainability of the AI boom. The party can’t go on forever. 3. No 100% Rate Cut Guarantee for You Fed Chair Powell said a December rate cut is not guaranteed. And now the CME’s FedWatch Tool is pricing in a 72.2% probability of another easing: This is down from 82% a month ago. The result: pressure on rate sensitive sectors like speculative small caps and homebuilders. 4. Earnings Season Has Been Pretty Good This earnings season has had its fair share of messes (we’ll get to this in a minute), but the numbers look good overall. According to FactSet, 83% of S&P 500 companies have beaten earnings estimates, and 79% have beaten revenue estimates. And overall earnings growth is tracking at 10.7%, beating the 7.9% expected back on September 30. Sector-wise, the financials have been the biggest contributor to increase in growth, with big boys like Morgan Stanley (MS) and Capital One (COF) dropping huge beats. 5. The Collapse in Basic Luxury DoorDash (DASH) was a monster stock until it tanked on Wednesday after an earnings miss. And this fits a notable trend in weak earnings for consumer stocks offering “basic luxuries” like: Starbucks (SBUX) – expensive fancy coffee Lululemon (LULU) – expensive yoga pants Chipotle (CMG) & Cava (CAVA) & SweetGreen (SG) – expensive slop bowls This ain’t pretty: 6. Sentiment Is Mixed Up The AAII Sentiment Survey shows that 38.0% of investors are bullish. This is down from 44.0% last week. And it’s basically in-line with the long-term average of 38.5%. On balance, this is positive. Because with the market feeling like it’s on right on the edge of falling, it’s good to see doubt. And on a related note, the CNN Fear & Greed Index is at 14, reading Extreme Fear. That’s more a product of how F&G is calculated, and doesn’t necessarily mean the market is freaked out. We can all agree people are cautious at best. 7. Sydney Sweeney Is Still Winning American Eagle Outfitters (AEO) got a monster boost from its “Great Jeans” ad campaign in August. The obvious question to ask was “will this last?” And so far, the answer is YES. AEO popped when the campaign was released, then had a monster short squeeze after earnings. It looked like it was filling the gap, but it’s since rebounded. AEO stock is now up 57% from when it announced the campaign. Hopefully, Ms. Sweeney was paid in stock! 8. Cracker Barrel Is Still Losing Since we’re on the topic of culture wars, let’s take a fresh look at restaurant chain Cracker Barrel (CBRL), which enraged its customers by unveiling a new menu and logo in August. The company reversed course and brought back the old stuff, but that hasn’t helped: This might be uglier than Oracle! 9. Apple Is the King Safety Play Remember when Apple (AAPL) was viewed as a tech laggard because it was behind in AI? Well, as I might remind you, you can download any number of AI apps like ChatGPT, Grok, Perplexity, etc. to your Apple devices. BOOM! You have AI on your iPhone. And again, I suggest telling your kids “Apple is behind in AI, so we’re taking away your iPhone and giving you an Android phone.” See how fast you get slapped in the face. And if you look at the past 3 months, Apple has been crushing the QQQ’s: And yes, it’s good that Apple is working with Google to bring AI features to Siri. But what matters for Apple is that the average person has no reason to leave the ecosystem. And no matter how many negative news stories get planted, iPhones just keep on selling. That makes Apple the King Safety Play. 10. How to Trade Like a Red-Blooded American JR Romero came to America with nothing. Then he made and lost MILLIONS of dollars in the dot-com crash. Now he’s a full-time pro trader who also runs 2 amazing trading rooms. This is your chance to learn the secrets and mindset behind his success. Want all his ideas AND 3 months of Koyfin software? GO HERE. But first, watch the interview:
Continue Reading -->2 Biggest Days Ever + 9 Other Things You Need to Know Right Now
We closed out another big week in markets with the SPX and QQQ hitting record highs after the light CPI report. So it’s time to look ahead with the 10 things you need to know: 1. The Rate Cuts Are Coming Thanks to the government shutdown, we’ve been waiting forever for a CPI report. We finally got one Friday, and the numbers were lighter-than-expected. The headline number grew by 3.0%. That’s not low, but at least it was below the consensus estimate. Now, traders are pricing in a 97% chance of a 25 bp rate cut on Wednesday, October 29, according to the CME’s Fedwatch tool. And 94% of traders expect a total of 50 bp in cuts by year-end. Speaking of next Wednesday… 2. The Tech Megapowers Report Earnings Here’s a partial list of the companies reporting on Wednesday and Thursday: Wednesday: Microsoft (MSFT), Alphabet (GOOGL), Meta (META) Thursday: Apple (AAPL), Amazon (AMZN) That’s 5 of the Mag 7, and they represent 22.5% of the S&P 500 index. So far, Q3 earnings season has been stronger than expected (even with rising earnings estimates), and these names could seal the deal on how things turn out overall. So between the Fed and all these earnings reports (plus ones we haven’t mentioned like CAT/LLY/MA), this looks like 2 of the biggest trading days of all time! And oh yeah… we also get the PCE Price Index, plus Japan and Canada’s rate decisions, and Eurozone CPI. Here’s the full calendar: 3. It Could Be Make or Break Time for Nvidia All those big tech earnings reports will have a big impact on Nvidia (NVDA). AI powerhouses like OpenAI, Microsoft (MSFT), Meta (META), and CoreWeave (CRWV) have been sucking down AI chips like crazy. And Nvidia longs want confirmation that the spending spree will continue. Especially since it looks like AMD (AMD) and Broadcom (AVGO) may be taking bigger pieces of the pie. So Nvidia will move big based on the capex forecasts of these tech giants. It’s the biggest potential catalyst until earnings on November 19. 4. Tony Robbins Is Your New AI Guy I am an AI skeptic, because I question the real-world financial value of all the big AI investments we see. Now, I see that the nation’s #1 Life and Business Strategist (his words, not mine) Tony Robbins is hosting an “AI Advantage Summit:”Now, I have nothing against Tony Robbins. I agree with a lot of what he says. But isn’t this the type of thing you see closer to a top than a bottom? It makes me worry. 5. Sentiment Is… MEH The AAII Sentiment Survey shows that 36.9% of investors are bullish. This is more-or-less neutral, and up slightly from last week. And it makes sense because market participants are in a state of confusion because of: An earnings season that feels all over the place, at least in terms of reactions Minimal economic data because of the government shutdown The nonstop news flow out of the White House And speaking of sentiment… 6. CNN’s Fear & Greed Index Is Not Broken As of early Friday afternoon, CNN’s Fear & Greed Index was at 34, indicating Fear. Is it broken as many market participants think? With markets at record things, sentiment should at least be neutral, like AAII is. Right? Remember, it’s normal for sentiment to be neutral when market is going up amid a confusing news flow. Also, Fear & Greed is not determined by a survey, but 7 market indicators including things like Junk Bond Demand: Maybe you don’t find it useful, but it’s not broken. It’s just spitting out what the recipe says. And speaking of sentiment one more time, trader JC Parets posted a poignant Tweet on Wednesday: 7. Do Books About the 1929 Crash Come Out at the Top? Andrew Ross Sorkin’s new book “1929” hit the New York Times best-seller list. And JC had the most interesting reaction: Reading this new book about the 1929 crash has me wondering… do books like this usually come out right before a market crash, or when bull markets still have plenty of gas left? https://t.co/M1BqbSZlZi — J.C. Parets (@JC_ParetsX) October 22, 2025 So if most traditional indicators are reading neutral, and we have a best-selling book about 1929 out, and the market’s at record highs we can conclude that… Nobody knows where sentiment is right now. It’s a mess. 8. Extended Hours Options Trading May Be Coming Soon I recently suggested that option tradings hours should be extended, because it would be a huge convenience during earnings season: While I can’t confirm it for sure, I will assume the CBOE saw the video (it does have a whopping 125 views), because they filed a proposal with the SEC to extend hours for equity options trading. According to the filing, the CBOE would add a morning session from 7:30 to 9:25 am ET, plus an afternoon session from 4 to 4:15 pm ET. I guess it’s fair to give options traders a 5-minute potty break at 9:25, right? Now if only Apple (AAPL) and Nvidia (NVDA) would report earnings before 4:15 pm ET so their options could fit into that afternoon window… 9. Biotech Has Been on Fire One of the biggest beneficiaries of the Fed’s dovish leaning has been biotech. The SPDR S&P Biotech ETF (XBI) is the #1 major ETF in October, and it’s now up almost 21% year-to-date. But if you want to see the really hot stuff, look at heavily-shorted small and mid-cap biotechs. We used Koyfin to screen for biotechs with a market cap of $500 million to $5 billion, and short interest above 10%. Many are up 30%+ this month alone: 10. You Too Can Be a Sultan of Swing Trading! JR Romero recently unveiled his swing trading secrets in this exclusive webinar. Want all his ideas AND 3 months of Koyfin software? GO HERE.
Continue Reading -->President Trump Ruins the Party
The government is shut down so key economic data remain missing in action. Is that a problem? No way! The S&P 500, Nasdaq 100, and Russell 2000 all made record highs this week. So let’s look at the 10 things you need to know right now! 1) President Trump Ruined the Party I’m just sitting here cranking out this article in peace… and President Trump just dropped this bomb on Truth Social: So China’s getting tougher when it comes to exports of rare earth materials, and Trump is considering fighting back with a bunch of tariffs. This gave traders an excuse to do some profit taking after a powerful start to Q4. The question is – was Friday’s dip just another buying opportunity? Or a prelude to a slopfest like we had in April? Now whether you like Trump or not, we all have to admit markets are more interesting with him around. Real world effects notwithstanding… We’ll talk about The Ultimate Trump Trade soon, but isn’t it odd that… 2) Bullish Sentiment Hit a 10-Month High The latest AAII Sentiment Survey shows that 45.9% of investors are bullish. This is the fourth straight week of above-average bullishness. And it’s the highest bullish reading since December 5, 2024. So yes, higher stock prices pushed sentiment to a 10-month high right before President Trump kicked us in the shin. 3) Earnings Season Is About to Kick Off HARD Next week’s economic calendar is jammed with key data like CPI, PPI, Jobless Claims, NFP, and Retail Sales. But we may get none of these numbers if the shutdown continues. The good thing is we’re about to get assaulted with earnings reports from heavyweights in two key sectors: Banks: JP Morgan (JPM), Goldman Sachs (GS), Wells Fargo (WFC), Citigroup (C), Bank of America (BAC) and others. Semiconductors: ASML Holding (ASML) & Taiwan Semi (TSM) So we’ll get key insights on housing, consumer strength, and AI. The problem is that earnings estimates have been rising ahead of earnings season – not falling like in recent quarters. So the bar is high. But back on the economic numbers, don’t forget that… Related: 7 Things I HATE About Earnings Season: 4) Interactive Brokers Will Update Us on The Ultimate Trump Trade Leading brokerage Interactive Brokers (IBKR) is one of my biggest long-term stock investments, so take what I say with a grain of salt. They report earnings Thursday and could give us an update on “The Ultimate Trump Trade” – the basket of financial stocks that benefit from a combination of market volatility and rising stock/crypto prices, including Robinhood (HOOD), Coinbase (COIN), and Webull (BULL). Interactive Brokers should give us insights on what trading volumes could look like in October. That could mean dip buying opportunities in this basket of stocks, so keep an eye out. 5) Fed Chair Powell Speaks on Tuesday Even with the economic data mystery, the market is still banking on a rate cut later this month. The CME’s FedWatch Tool shows a 95% probability of an October rate cut. So the market assumes the missing data supports the Fed’s dovish course. On Tuesday, Fed Chair Powell will give a speech on Economic Outlook and Monetary Policy at the National Association for Business Economics (NABE) annual meeting in Philadelphia. On October 9, Powell was unable to make his appearance at the Fed Community Bank conferences, so the stakes may be higher for this Tuesday. 6) 2025 Is the Year of Heavy Metal Yep, SPY is up 15% and Bitcoin is up 28%. Pretty impressive. But have you seen the metals complex? We sampled some of the more popular metals ETFs and the numbers are shocking, with gold miners (GDX) up 125%: Silver, copper, palladium, and uranium are also putting up massive numbers. It’s been a perfect storm because of trends like the falling US dollar, lower rates, flight to safety, central bank buying, institutional demand, and plain old supply-demand constraints. 7. Jamie Dimon Made Me Question AI Earlier this week, JP Morgan (JPM) CEO Jamie Dimon said the company spends $2 billion a year on AI. And it’s now saving that much money a year as a result. Now, spending $2 billion to save $2 billion doesn’t sound like anything great. But those savings should snowball over time because $2 billion spent this year should save at least $2 billion this year, and also provide savings next year. And I’m a JP Morgan shareholder, so I’m glad to see this. My concern is why aren’t more companies making announcements like this? Are they keeping things quiet to avoid freaking out employees fearful of being replace by ChatGPT? An MIT report showed that most AI programs have “little to no measurable impact on P&L.” So it’s exciting to see all these mega deals like the AMD (AMD)/OpenAI link-up. But where’s the beef? More companies should be saying “we saved $XYZ or increased sales by XYZ% through the use of AI.” Right? 8. Ray Dalio Warns of Danger Ahead Super investor Ray Dalio, founder of Bridgewater Associates, is comparing the current climate to pre-World War 2. In a Bloomberg interview, Dalio warned about skyrocketing US government debt, saying “it’s like plaque in the arteries that then begins to squeeze out the spending.” But good luck explaining that to a politician. He also said “civil war of some sort” is developing in the US and other parts of the world. Let’s hope he’s wrong. 9. Utilities Might Heat Up We might be entering a perfect environment for the typically sleepy utilities. We have economic uncertainty, rising power demand, a friendlier regulatory environment, and falling interest rates. The market’s not blind to this, with the Utilities SPDR ETF (XLU) up 22% YTD, and up 4% in October: Plus, many XLU components like Constellation Energy (CEG) offer exposure to the booming nuclear power trend. FYI – I have a small XLU position. 10) This Market Cycle Expert Predicts SPX 7100 Jeff Hirsch, Editor-in-Chief of The Stock
Continue Reading -->No Government, No Problem: Life Is Good!
The government shut down, but the bulls are open for business, sending stocks to all-time highs. Life is GOOD on Wall Street! So let’s talk about the 10 things you need to know right now, starting with… 1. Small Caps Are Rocking HARD Yes, the big caps are off to a great start this quarter, with 45 SPX stocks making record highs in the past 3 days. But the real story is the small caps rocking hard, with IWM outperforming SPY and QQQ by a decent margin. We’re also seeing strength in other rate sensitive groups like utilities and biotech. Why? Because the market’s still banking on rate cuts, which are good for small caps (at least according to conventional wisdom). The CME’s Fedwatch Tool shows a 97% chance of a quarter-point rate cut in October: Now, this begs an obvious question: could the October rate cut create a massive sell-the-news reaction? The answer is yes. Of course. But if everyone’s expecting a sell-the-news… maybe we just keep on rocking? 2. Next Friday Is Now Important Unfortunately, the October 3 Nonfarm Payrolls report has been delayed to the 10th, so we have to wait for one more week to confirm what we know – the job market stinks. And judging by the action in the small caps, the market is behaving like we got an awful jobs number that gives the Fed more room to cut. Or maybe the bulls are taking the attitude that “if the bad economic data isn’t coming out, the economy is actually good.” Who knows? But let’s look at my new #1 economic indicator: 3. The Slop Bowl Recession Is real Yes yes, I know the stock market is not the same as the economy. But if people can’t afford slop bowls, we have a problem. (a slop bowl is a mash-up of food from a fast casual restaurant, usually served in a bowl) Chipotle (CMG), Cava (CAVA), and Sweetgreen (SG) have been destroyed this year for various reasons including slowing sales and rising costs. And I’m calling this chart my “Slop Bowl Indicator:” If people can’t afford burrito bowls, what can they afford? 4. Bitcoin Is Going WILD Bitcoin hit a new record high above $123,000 on Friday as the market embraces an anti-establishment theme in the wake of the government shutdown. Ethereum and Solana also posted solid gains, though they are still below their own all-time highs. Will we see catch-up trades? Maybe – so put ’em on the radar. But do you know who’s still the boss in terms of performance? THIS: 5. Gold Is Still Dominating For all the talk about Bitcoin and Ethereum domination and crypto treasury companies, did you notice that gold is still kicking butt? It’s outperforming both the flagship cryptos with a 47% gain this year. And the VanEck Gold Miners ETF (GDX) is up a crazy 127%: What can we say? It’s been an amazing time for gold bugs, who waited for this type of action forever. 6. The Ultimate Trump Trade RAGES On It’s been a while since we checked in on the “Ultimate Trump Trade” a.k.a. the basket of stocks that benefit from financial market volatility and rising stock/crypto prices, including: Robinhood (HOOD) Interactive Brokers (IBKR) Coinbase (COIN) Charles Schwab (SCHW) Webull (BULL) They are having an amazing year, topped off by Robinhood’s 301% gain: By the way, did you know that Robinhood is the #1 performing S&P 500 stock of 2025? And just a few years ago, it was left for dead. Congrats to those who held on. 7. The Earnings Are Coming Aside from next week’s economic data (namely Powell speaking Thursday & NFP on Friday), the next big thing for the market is Q3 earnings season. The fireworks start Tuesday October 14 with JP Morgan (JPM), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Wells Fargo (WFC), Goldman Sachs (GS), BlackRock (BLK), and Citigroup (C) all hitting in the morning. According to FactSet, Q3 earnings for S&P 500 companies are estimated to grow by 8.0%, up from 7.3% on June 30. So estimates have gone up. In recent quarters, estimates were crazy low, making it easy for companies to beat forecasts. And S&P 500 earnings crushed expectations overall. Now we have the opposite situation. I don’t like this. Not one bit. 8. Cathie Wood Is Having a Heck of a Year Fundstrat’s Tom Lee is the hot strategist of the moment, which is well-deserved because of his amazing calls. But Cathie Wood, hero of the post-pandemic bull market is killing it. The ARK Innovation ETF (ARKK) is up 57% year-to-date: Tesla (TSLA), which is down year-to-date, is almost 12% of the ETF. So it was a boat anchor hanging from ARKK’s neck in terms of performance. And ARKK still killed it. Why? Because of big bets on winners like Coinbase (COIN), Robinhood (HOOD), Shopify (SHOP), and Palantir (PLTR). Well done! 9. It’s a Great Year for Garbage One of our favorite screens to run in Koyfin is for companies with these attributes: $2.5 billion or higher market cap $100 million in sales or less In other words, companies that don’t even have sales, let alone profits – that are highly valued in the stock market. We came up with 34 stocks and these are how they are doing in 2025: 28 are up and just 6 are down The average return is +95% (this includes the losers) Tom Lee’s Bitmine Immersion Technologies Inc. (BMNR) is in #1 with a 630% gain, while the President’s Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. (DJT) is in last place with a 49% loss. Here’s the full table: 10. Options Traders Need to Stop Doing THIS Scott Bauer of Prosper Trading recently sat down on the T3 Alpha Show to discuss what he learned as a trader for Goldman Sachs and on the CBOE Floor. If you want to stop losing big money in options, you must listen to Scott:
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