Consumer & Retail
- Starbucks is cutting 900 jobs and closing stores. Most of my writing is done at Starbucks so selfishly I hope my favorite baristas keep working here and my local Starbucks stays open. Starbucks is down 7.65% YTD.
- Alibaba jumped 8% yesterday and is now up 122% year-to-date, trading on the NYSE. Founded by the remarkably talented Jack Ma, Alibaba’s shares have reached their highest level in nearly four years following news of increased AI spending. Bloomberg.
Technology
- Intel is acting like the original godfather of “let’s make a deal” and now rumored to be seeking an investment from Apple after securing investments from the US and from Nvidia. Intel is up 55% YTD.
- Astera Labs, which we own directly, is getting crushed. It fell nearly 11% yesterday and points down today. We largely invest in index funds because we can’t predict what individual stocks will do. It’s falling on concerns re Nvidia and Intel having a closer relationship.
- NVIDIA is investing $100 billion in OpenAI. There is a great story in The Wall Street Journal on how NVIDIA is using its balance sheet and its market power to help backstop tech companies. Sam Altman is the Co founder and CEO of OpenAI.
Nvidia is up 33% YTD. Jensen Huang is the founder and CEO of Nvidia. - Is Oracle Stock a Buy, Sell, or Hold as the Company Names 2 New Co- CEOs? Barchart
- Oracle is up nearly 84% YTD.
- Clay Magouyrk and Mike Sicilia will become co-CEOs of Oracle.
- The firm has had an incredible run under Larry Ellison and Safra Katz.
Auto & Transportation
- Tesla finished up nearly 4% yesterday and is up nearly 10% YTD.
Real Estate & PropTech
- OpenDoor Technologies surged 16% yesterday.
We have started to follow digital real estate company Opendoor Technologies. It is up 343% YTD and well funded by Khosla Ventures and others. It makes most of its money through transaction fees but also buys homes and resells them. It’s not profitable but growing. Kaz Nejatian was recently named the CEO of OpenDoor.
Private Equity
- PE heavyweight KKR fell nearly 5% yesterday. The PE business is hoping for rate cuts to stimulate deals.