The question isn’t which is the bigger giant, but which is the slightly less damaged one. The one that’ll keep tossing out dividends when the price of crude decides to take a vacation. A simple enough ask, you’d think. But simplicity is a rare commodity in this business.
The catalyst for this melodrama was none other than ProCap CIO and Bitwise adviser Jeff Park, who, with the flair of a Victorian novelist, unveiled Laurore as the “biggest new entrant into IBIT.” This entity, he proclaimed, is as inscrutable as a sphinx, boasting “no website, no press, no footprint”-a ghost ship sailing the digital seas. The only crumbs left for the hungry sleuths? A name, Zhang Hui, and a Hong Kong address, as revealing as a blank canvas in a modern art gallery.
In the grand circus of crypto, only one asset is juggling profits today, while the rest are tripping over their own digital feet. Aptos (APT), the once-proud performer, has decided to take a nosedive, plummeting 3% like a wizard who’s accidentally cast a levitation spell on himself. Oops.
They call this Nvidia a maker of “chips,” but I reckon it’s more like the engine of this new age. Every one of these AI contraptions, these thinking machines, needs a brain, and Nvidia’s providing a good many of ’em. They’ve got a stranglehold on the market, and while competition’s always a good thing, it hasn’t amounted to much yet. They’re talkin’ about a new chip, the Rubin, and if it does what they say, well, it’ll be like addin’ a whole new horsepower to the machine. The stock’s dipped a bit lately, but a smart man knows a good engine when he sees one, and this one’s still purrin’ like a kitten. They say it’s trading at 25 times earnings, which means if they deliver on the promises, there’s plenty of room for a fella to make a decent return. Seems reasonable enough, considering they’re buildin’ the future, one chip at a time.
This has, naturally, sent the share price of companies like IonQ (IONQ 2.70%) shooting upwards like a rocket. It zoomed up 503% in the last three years! But lately, things have taken a bit of a nose-dive, hasn’t it? Down 9% in the last twelve months. A bit like a particularly plump pigeon losing feathers.
The SEC filing, dated with the bureaucratic precision we have come to expect, reveals this divestment occurred during the final quarter of the preceding year. The fund’s position in KBWB, reduced to $14.1 million, represents a diminution of $9.5 million from the prior period – a subtraction that speaks volumes, even if the market, in its characteristic heedlessness, remains largely deaf. It’s a curious arithmetic, isn’t it? A subtraction from an already diminished sum. A shadow of a shadow, perhaps.
Disappointment, as is often the case, stems from a confluence of realities. The pursuit of electric vehicles is a capital-intensive undertaking, a demanding mistress. Growth in the American market, while present, has been…measured. And the shifting winds of governmental incentives, those fickle patrons of innovation, have withdrawn some of their favor. It is a harsh landscape for a newcomer.
The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq-100 haven’t exactly folded yet, but they’re leaning that way. Fear’s a funny thing. It spreads faster than a rumor in a crowded room. When it hits, you want to be holding something solid. Something that doesn’t turn to dust when the music stops.
They call it “volatility decay.” Sounds…technical. Boring, even. Which is, of course, the point. They want you to glaze over. I call it a slow bleed. A drip, drip, drip of your capital into the pockets of people who understand exactly what they’re doing. And you? You’re just… hoping. It’s pathetic, really. But I get it. Hope is a powerful drug.
But there’s a rumble on the horizon. A whisper of something… different. David Einhorn, a man who understands the sickness of this system, is betting BIG on a different scenario. He’s saying Warsh, the new Fed chair, is going to unleash a torrent of cuts, a desperate attempt to prop up this crumbling edifice. “Substantially more than two,” he says. Substantially. The man has a sense of the DRAMA.