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They’re talking about growth, about net deposits, about Gold subscriptions. Fine. Numbers. Meaningless hieroglyphs until they translate into actual, tangible POWER. But dig a little deeper. Eleven products already kicking out over $100 million a year. ELEVEN. And a credit card about to make it twelve. That’s not a trading app anymore, folks. That’s a goddamn financial ecosystem, slowly, deliberately, building itself into a fortress. A fortress against the inevitable collapse. Or, you know, just a really aggressive fintech company. Whatever.

Since January 2025, it’s been a rally, a proper bull market. Fifteen percent here, sixteen percent there, eighteen for the Nasdaq. It’s enough to make a sensible person consider investing in something…anything. Except, of course, sensible people probably already have. I tried to explain it to my neighbor, Mr. Henderson, a retired taxidermist. He mostly wanted to know if there were any good stocks in the stuffed animal industry. I just nodded and backed away slowly.

Nvidia, of course, is the obvious cautionary tale – or the inspiration, depending on your tolerance for risk. They rode the gaming wave, then discovered the data center goldmine. Intel? They just…stalled. A slow, agonizing fade. A monument to complacency. The question isn’t if these cycles happen, it’s when and who gets flattened. And right now, all eyes are on Boise.

Strategy (MSTR +8.85%), bless their ambitious hearts, were the biggest players. The corporate equivalent of that friend who went all-in on crypto and won’t stop talking about it. They were leveraged, utterly, on the future of Bitcoin, and for a while, it looked…good. Very good. I’ve been studying corporate bubbles for years, and honestly, this one had a particularly shiny veneer.

The Q4 results were…fine. Solid, even. Revenue up 14% to $213 billion. Advertising and cloud computing are doing the heavy lifting, as usual. E-commerce is chugging along. All good. Except… earnings were a bit… shy. And then there’s the small matter of $2.4 billion in one-time charges. Which, okay, happens. But it’s enough to make you wonder what they’re really up to. They say it’s all about the future, about AI. Which is code for “we’re throwing a ridiculous amount of money at something that might pay off.” They’re planning to spend $200 billion on capital expenditures by 2026. Two. Hundred. Billion. I mean, I lose track of what I spent on coffee last week. This is… a different scale.

If you’re looking for companies that might, just might, not completely dissolve into the ether, Ciena, Sandisk, and ServiceNow are worth a glance. Don’t expect miracles. Just… less disaster.

Where will Lucid be in ten years? The question itself presupposes a linear progression of time, which, let’s be honest, is a rather optimistic assumption. But, assuming time continues to…flow (a concept best left to physicists), investors should focus on two rather large, rather important, catalysts.

Recent months have seen a cooling of the initial enthusiasm. Talk of speculative bubbles, decelerating growth, and even circular financial arrangements have cast a shadow over the stock. While the rate of growth has slowed, it is important to note that absolute demand remains robust. This distinction, often lost in the noise of market speculation, is crucial. Some analysts, predictably, have taken note.

They call it ‘macroeconomic uncertainty.’ I call it reality catching up. The K-shaped recovery? It’s a neat term for a widening gulf. Some folks are doing alright. Others are counting pennies for the guacamole. And that, predictably, impacts the bottom line.

Observe, if you will, the rather vulgar disparity in assets under management. BND, with its considerable girth, clearly enjoys the confidence of the multitude. But as I have always maintained, popularity is rarely a sign of superior judgment. Still, the expense ratio of BND is a positively delightful figure – a mere trifle compared to the extravagance demanded by Fidelity. One must ask oneself, is a slightly higher yield truly worth sacrificing such fiscal restraint? The answer, naturally, depends on one’s appetite for unnecessary expenditure.