usdaed

Coca-Cola. P&G. They’re basically the beige of the stock market, and I say that as a compliment. Coca-Cola, as you may know, makes everything from the actual Coke to…well, a surprising number of things you didn’t realize Coke owned. P&G? They’re the reason your bathroom cabinet isn’t just a pile of empty tubes and bottles. But here’s the kicker: both of these companies are “Dividend Kings.” It’s a fancy title, awarded to companies that have increased their dividend payments every year for at least 50 years. Fifty years! That’s longer than most of our careers, and frankly, a little intimidating. It means they’re not just making money, they’re making money consistently, even when everyone else is panicking. It’s like they have a secret pact with the universe to avoid major financial disasters.

His recent letter to shareholders confirmed this. No wild swings, no sudden urges to invest in artisanal pickle companies. Instead, a commitment to the existing holdings, including the likes of American Express and Coca-Cola. And that brings us to a few other stocks, the ones Buffett favored, and which, if you squint a bit, still look…reasonable. Chevron (CVX 0.08%), Domino’s Pizza (DPZ +1.91%), and DaVita (DVA 1.61%). Let’s have a look, shall we?

Over the last six months, Bitcoin has shed 37% of its luster, while Solana has performed a rather more dramatic plunge, losing 61%. A bargain hunter, naturally, rubs his hands at such discounts. But discerning which offers the greater potential requires a degree of calculation, and perhaps, a touch of cynicism. The question isn’t simply which is cheaper, but which is likely to hold its value when the music stops – or, in this case, when the servers inevitably hiccup.

Following this judicious divestment, the aforementioned Nuveen fund now constitutes a mere 0.17% of RiverNorth’s reported assets. A trifle, one might say, a rounding error in the grand ledger of their holdings. Yet, even the smallest coin can reveal the character of the collector. Consider their remaining treasures:

Now, there are a number of hopefuls in this field, dabbling in the arcane arts of superposition and entanglement. But two, for reasons that are currently baffling even the most seasoned observers of the Guild of Alchemists and Venture Capitalists¹, have caught my eye: IonQ (IONQ +0.09%) and D-Wave Quantum (QBTS 1.46%). They’re small, admittedly. More akin to promising apprentices than fully-fledged masters. But if they manage to pull it off – if they actually manage to build something that doesn’t just emit impressive sparks and vaguely threatening hums – the returns could be… substantial. Enough to fund a rather impressive collection of garden gnomes, at the very least.

The fourth quarter bore witness to a revenue increase of eight percent, reaching $123.5 million. Yet, a disquieting detail lurks within this figure: $5.8 million is attributable not to organic growth, but to the addition of a single operating week. A lengthening of the chain, as it were, rather than a strengthening. The system-wide comparable sales, a metric of revenue from establishments open for at least fifteen months, registered a modest 2.1 percent increase. A trickle, scarcely enough to quench the thirst of ambition.

It’s a curious thing, this business of rare-earth metals. You’d think, given the name, they’d be plentiful. They aren’t. For years, China has held a rather dominant position in their supply—something like 60% of the global market, give or take a few metric tons. This presents a bit of a geopolitical pickle, as it means other nations are, shall we say, reliant. And reliance, as any historian will tell you, is rarely a comfortable position to be in. It’s like being perpetually short of biscuits when your neighbor owns the bakery.

Nvidia, you see, isn’t just selling chips; it’s peddling potential. A potential born from the relentless demand for artificial intelligence, a force that’s reshaping the world, one calculation at a time. The numbers are, admittedly, impressive. The company has been climbing, a steady ascent in a market often given to sudden gusts and collapses. But it’s the why of that climb that matters. And the why, as near as I can tell, is a simple thing: they’ve built something people need, and they’re building more.

I present, therefore, three companies whose yields offer a degree of comfort, a small bulwark against the encroaching tide of economic uncertainty. Consider them not as investments, precisely, but as a means of maintaining a civilized existence.