Palo Alto Networks, Booking Holdings, and Walmart are, at present, the objects of considerable speculation. Whether this is founded upon genuine prospect or merely the collective delusion of investors remains to be seen. A closer inspection, naturally, is in order.
The big guys have gone on a selling spree big enough to make a farmer’s market look quiet. U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs have been slashing exposure like a bad haircut, which sends ripples through the other coins. It’s the classic ‘when the big ones trade, everybody else drops a beat’ drama.
The architecture of this financial construct is, shall we say, peculiar. It begins with a vast universe of American equities, then meticulously excises those lacking a decade or more of annual dividend increases – a commendable, if somewhat pedantic, exercise in historical scrutiny. REITs, those purveyors of real estate revenue, are summarily dismissed, and the top quartile of yields are deemed… insufficiently dignified. This pruning, naturally, results in a current yield of 1.55% – a figure that, while not exorbitant, possesses a certain understated respectability. It’s a yield that whispers, rather than shouts.
The share price, presently around one hundred and eighty-three, has settled into a quietude. A flatness, if you will. It lags, one observes, behind the broader semiconductor sector. A curious detail. It prompts the question, doesn’t it? Has the momentum truly exhausted itself? Or is this merely a pause, a gathering of strength before another advance?
And here it is, whispering in the background like a slightly embarrassing secret: the market is…optimistic. Perhaps excessively so. It’s all very well enjoying the free champagne, but someone needs to check the lifeboat drills.
They’ve bought 125,270 shares, which, if you’re not an accountant (and frankly, who is?), is a lot. It’s 1.89% of their US equity assets, which sounds…significant. It’s enough to make me feel vaguely inadequate about my own portfolio. Which consists primarily of a small stake in a coffee shop and a rapidly depreciating collection of vintage scarves.
The claim that Palantir’s system acts as an ‘AI operating system’ is particularly delightful in its audacity. It gathers data, yes, and connects it to ‘real-world assets’ – a phrase that sounds suspiciously like a euphemism for things someone, somewhere, is trying to control. This ‘orchestration,’ as they term it, is meant to reduce errors and make insights ‘actionable.’ One imagines those insights are primarily actionable for Palantir’s bottom line. The company’s current valuation, a hefty 42 times forward price-to-sales, suggests the market is remarkably susceptible to beautifully packaged illusions.
On a silver beam of on-chain data, CryptoQuant plays a game of hide-seek with COMP assets. Picture a market where the Netflow chart has taken a nose dive into the negative- a starship mooning out of Binance like a bored tourist dropping a mug of juicy numbers.
Now, this whale wasn’t always floundering in the shallows. Back in the halcyon days of 2018, when Bitcoin (BTC) was cheaper than a pint of dwarfish ale, our aquatic friend amassed a hoard of over 100,000 BTC. It sat on this treasure like a dragon on its gold for seven long years, a true hodler of the deep. At one point, this stash was worth a staggering $11.14 billion. But then, in a move that would make even the most seasoned sailor scratch their head, the whale decided to swap some of its Bitcoin for Ethereum in 2025. Why? Well, Ethereum was looking as promising as a double rainbow over the Ramtops, and our whale fancied a bit of diversity.
Things I’ve realised today: 1. The car industry is… mature. That’s a polite way of saying it’s not exactly brimming with explosive growth. In January 2026, they sold 15.4 million vehicles. Which is… the same number as in 1988. 1988! I was wearing leg warmers and believing everything on MTV. It doesn’t bode well. It’s like trying to squeeze extra life out of a tube of toothpaste. You can do it, but it’s a bit sad, really.