For years and years – since 1957, can you believe it? – this index has been growing at a rate of 10.6% a year. Not bad, eh? Though last year it went a bit bonkers, shooting up 17.8% thanks to a new craze called ‘Artificial Intelligence’ – machines pretending to be clever. It’s had a bit of a wobble recently, but it’s still awfully close to its highest ever point. A bit like a wobbly jelly, really.
Two such currents call to us. One, a reborn titan, shedding the weight of its past to embrace the future. The other, a deep earth force, awakened from a long slumber. Let us consider them, not as mere stocks, but as stories unfolding.
But the currents shift, as they always do. The year 2026 finds this trend subtly, almost mournfully, reversing. The relentless march of price increases, even in these ostensibly efficient establishments, has prompted a quiet return to the more traditional dining halls – the Chili’s, under the umbrella of Brinker International (EAT +1.38%). A curious spectacle, this resurgence of the familiar, and a testament to the enduring power of value, or perhaps, simply, habit. Brinker’s stock, one observes, has enjoyed a most respectable ascent – a threefold increase in the past three years – while Chipotle, once so ascendant, finds itself somewhat diminished, a shadow of its former self.
It seems to be the latter, mostly. They reiterated their existing guidance. Which, in financial speak, means ‘we haven’t magically found a way to make things better, so expect more of the same.’ Investors, naturally, weren’t thrilled. It’s like when you’re hoping for a promotion and your boss just says, “Keep doing what you’re doing.” Encouraging, in a deeply underwhelming way.
In the year of Our Lord 2025, Duolingo, with a flourish of digital trumpets, unleashed these AI-powered features. Conversational tools, they called them, woven into the higher tiers of subscription. The product, undeniably, improved. Engagement… strengthened, like a peasant’s grip on a newly acquired samovar. The premium tiers, predictably, began to attract those willing to part with a few kopecks more. But beneath this surface of progress, a more subtle transformation was taking place, a shifting of the economic sands.
On Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026, bitcoin performed a delicate waltz between $67,000 and $69,000, the broader cryptocurrency market clinging to life like a drunkard to a lamppost. A brief flirtation with $69,000 was met with the cold shoulder of selling pressure, which sent the price tumbling to $66,557 before a feeble recovery. Meanwhile, Strategy’s latest BTC binge-2,486 coins for $168.4 million-proved as effective as a umbrella in a hurricane.
These aren’t cheap, mind you. The clever sorts have already sniffed out the potential, like pigs rooting for truffles. But there’s still a chance to jump in before the real cash starts pouring in, like a chocolate waterfall.
The Solana ETFs, those regulated darlings of institutional whimsy, have pulled in a tidy sum, even as the broader market screams, “Abandon ship!” Europe and Canada toss a few lifebuoys, but the U.S. is busy drilling holes in the hull. Still, SOL’s inflows whisper of stubborn optimism-a regulated embrace that promises steady demand, even if the price chart looks more like a drunkard’s walk than a victory march.
The prevailing narrative suggests a catalyst for growth. A naive optimism, readily dismissed. The sheer magnitude of Amazon – a market capitalization exceeding two trillion units of account – operates as a form of statistical camouflage. Any success within this digital empire, however significant in absolute terms, risks being absorbed into the general noise, lost within the labyrinthine corridors of its balance sheet. To seek a discernible impact from this particular venture – an AI content exchange – is akin to searching for a specific grain of sand on a boundless beach.
Rock Springs has, with a prudence not uncommon amongst those entrusted with the funds of others, parted with one hundred and fifty-nine thousand, three hundred and seventy-nine shares of Agios. The transaction, valued at approximately five and a half million dollars, suggests a measured withdrawal rather than a precipitate flight. The fund’s remaining interest, though diminished, still amounts to twenty-one and three-quarter million dollars, a sum not to be entirely disregarded, yet significantly reduced from the prior quarter’s holdings.