Druckenmiller’s Odd Stock Swap

Money Manager

Now, listen closely, because this is about money – mountains of it, really – and the peculiar habits of a fellow named Stanley Druckenmiller. A rather large man, I’m told, with a nose for a good bargain and a habit of shuffling stocks like a mischievous imp shuffles playing cards. Every quarter, these money-men have to spill the beans – tell everyone exactly what they’ve been buying and selling. It’s called a 13F, a terribly dull name for something so… revealing.

Old Buffett’s gone off to count his sweets, so all eyes are on chaps like Druckenmiller. And what a curious quarter he’s had! He’s been dumping perfectly good AI stocks – Meta Platforms, Sandisk, Seagate Technology, and Arm Holdings – as if they’d suddenly sprouted warts. Then, he’s gone and crammed his pockets full of shares in another company – a truly colossal one, you see.

Druckenmiller’s Register Ringing

The man was busy as a bee in a jam factory, selling off bits and bobs here and there. A whopping 16 holdings reduced, and 31 entirely vanished – poof! – as if swallowed by a particularly greedy dragon. He offloaded 76,100 shares of Meta, a monstrous pile of Sandisk (166,235!), a respectable heap of Seagate, and another mountain of Arm. It’s profit-taking, of course. The man likes his coins, and these stocks had been doing rather nicely for themselves, zooming upwards like rockets powered by fizzy lifting drink. Sandisk and Seagate, bless their little circuits, had gone up 1,540% and 318% respectively. Quite the spree!

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But there’s a whiff of something else in the air, you see. A suspicion that Druckenmiller thinks this AI business might be a bit… bubbly. Like a bath full of too much soap. Every newfangled gizmo has its moment, and then… pop. Businesses are still fumbling about trying to figure out how to actually make money from all this cleverness. They’re building the machines, but haven’t quite figured out what the machines should do.

Druckenmiller himself said in May that AI might be a bit overhyped. Sandisk and Seagate, poor things, would feel the pinch if the bubble burst. But Meta and Arm? They’re a bit more… sturdy. Meta has all those adverts, and Arm has all those clever little chips. They’d likely bob along even if the whole thing went a bit wobbly.

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A Trillion-Dollar Sweet Tooth

Now, here’s where it gets interesting. While he was busy selling, Druckenmiller was also buying. He scooped up 28 new stocks and added to 13 existing ones. But the biggest bite he took was of Alphabet – the company that owns Google. He increased his stake by a whopping 277%! It’s like a child discovering a mountain of lollipops.

Alphabet, like Meta, has a nice, solid base of advertising to fall back on. Google is a virtual monopoly when it comes to searching the internet – they control about 90% of all searches. It’s a bit like owning the entire map!

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But the real buzz around Alphabet is its foray into generative AI and large language models – all crammed into Google Cloud. It’s the third-biggest cloud platform, and it’s growing at a tremendous rate – 48% last quarter! It’s becoming Alphabet’s cash cow, you see. And with a forward price-to-earnings ratio of 23, it’s looking rather tempting. It’s the sweetest treat in the Magnificent Seven, at least for now. But remember, even the sweetest treats can give you a tummy ache if you eat too many.

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2026-02-20 11:53