But markets, much like weathered fields under relentless sun, have a way of humbling even the proudest shoots. Enthusiasm waned, and the stock faltered. By September, after quarterly earnings were laid bare before the eyes of analysts, Figma’s price drifted back down to earth, settling near $52 per share. A gain, yes, but one shadowed by the ghost of heights unattained.
Meta Platforms (META), a colossus straddling the digital cosmos, commands over 3.4 billion users across its constellation of services: Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and others. These platforms are not mere conduits for connection but vast mirrors reflecting humanity’s ceaseless quest for meaning-and advertisements. Such reflections generate prodigious revenues, which in turn fuel investments in AI infrastructure, creating a recursive cycle of innovation and profit.
The feds had already made up their mind that Alphabet was running the show in internet search like a railroad baron in the old West. A monopoly, they called it. Alphabet sat there, waiting for its fate to be decided by the judge. The bigwigs over at the government had their sights set on breaking up the party by forcing Alphabet to get rid of Google Chrome, the browser that folks have been using to surf the web like fish in a stream. That would’ve dealt a mighty blow to Alphabet’s most profitable venture-advertising-because, you see, Chrome is Alphabet’s trusty sidekick when it comes to collecting data to target ads like a hawk on a rabbit’s tail.
The weight loss drug market, currently valued at $28 billion, is expected to swell to $95 billion by 2030, according to Goldman Sachs Research. Meanwhile, the AI market, already worth billions, could reach $2 trillion by the early 2030s. These figures are not mere projections; they are warnings-or promises-of seismic shifts in how we live and work. To ignore them is to risk being left behind. Let us examine each company in turn.
What folly is this? The company, renowned for its athleisure empire, finds itself entangled in both external tribulations and internal missteps. Tariffs loom like an uninvited guest at a banquet, while fashion trends shift capriciously, leaving leggings-their crown jewel-to gather dust. Yet, amidst these trials, there lingers a peculiar opportunity for those who dare to see beyond the chaos. Let us examine, then, the five acts of this farcical drama.
The foundation of this tale lies not in mere numbers, but in the torment of fundamentals. Durable revenue, expanding profitability, a balance sheet impervious to the storms of speculation-these are the scaffolds upon which a dividend is built. Yet, beneath this edifice, the specter of capital allocation looms, a moral dilemma as old as commerce itself. To reinvest or to return? To grow or to sustain? Alphabet, like all great enterprises, dances on this precipice.
The Global X Artificial Intelligence and Technology ETF (AIQ) was the first of these, a caravan of 90 companies traversing continents and sectors. It carried the names of titans-Nvidia, Microsoft, Alphabet-alongside lesser-known merchants of the algorithmic bazaar. Its expense ratio of 0.68% was a tax on the future, paid in coins minted from the dust of patience. Over three years, it had grown by 117%, outpacing the S&P 500 as if the market itself had nodded in reluctant homage to the alchemy of AI.
Just as Bitcoin’s price now lounges above the $100,000 mark with the nonchalance of a Bright Young Thing at a country house party, the network’s computational prowess has been strutting about the 1 zettahash per second (ZH/s) threshold. Metrics, those tedious but necessary beasts, reveal a peak of 1,027 EH/s, according to the seven-day simple moving average (SMA) tracked by Luxor’s hashrateindex.com. A triumph, no doubt, for the digital proletariat.
How will they do this marvelous labor? Not with oxen or plows, nor even with the sweat of the brow, but by a device so arcane that only learned folk dare discuss it over tea: the smart contract. Under the benevolent gaze of Hong Kong’s Cyberport program-presumably named because someone believed cyber-things must port somewhere-Chainlink’s code shall scurry to and fro, streamlining investor orders and tending to funds as a Russian grandmother sweeps her porch.
ExxonMobil, that titan of the black gold, does not merely trade in shares but in the very sinews of civilization. Its current slump is but a shadow cast by the sun’s temporary retreat; the company’s growth strategy-a mosaic of capital projects and shareholder returns-hints at a future where the oil giant’s fortunes might yet outpace the cynics’ murmurs. To dismiss it as a relic of the past is to forget that empires, like oil wells, are judged not by their transient flows but by the depth of their foundations.