Both funds, you see, aspire to offer a core U.S. fixed income experience. But while VGIT is a study in monastic simplicity – a portfolio exclusively devoted to intermediate-term Treasury bonds – FIGB is a more flamboyant affair, encompassing a wider spectrum of high-grade bonds. It is a question of preference: do you desire the serene predictability of the state, or the slightly more adventurous, though not entirely reckless, path of corporate credit?
They make… things. Precision power equipment. That’s the polite way of saying they keep the lights on, but for really, really important lights. Like, the ones in data centers, and the ones that allow semiconductor factories to, you know, semiconduct. I’m not an engineer. I collect vintage thimbles. But even I understand that if those things go down, everything else kind of wobbles. Apparently, nearly 80% of their income comes from those two sectors. Which feels… concentrated. Like all my eggs in a very high-tech, climate-controlled basket.
In an epistle posted on X yesterday-yes, that same X where cat memes reign supreme-Buterin argued that Ethereum should don the cap of critical infrastructure, steering AI development toward verifiable and decentralized outcomes instead of simply turbocharging model power as if we were filling up a sports car with rocket fuel.
But the answer, as it often does, has revealed itself with a delicious, if understated, clarity. The ascent of artificial intelligence is not merely continuing; it’s gathering a momentum that rather resembles a runaway carousel. Amazon, with a profligacy that would make Croesus blush, intends to disburse two hundred billion dollars this year. Meta Platforms, not to be outdone in this game of digital largesse, contemplates up to one hundred and thirty-five billion. Alphabet, ever the alphabetizer of ambition, joins the fray with one hundred and eighty-five billion, while Microsoft, with a fiscal year ending in June, plans a further one hundred and five billion. A collective expenditure of roughly six hundred and twenty-five billion dollars – a sum that, when one considers its ethereal nature, feels almost…weightless.
Yet, to dismiss Pfizer entirely would be a display of imprudence, a hasty judgment unbecoming a discerning investor. Indeed, a closer examination reveals a situation not wholly without promise, though one requiring a degree of fortitude and a willingness to view beyond the present disquiet.
The S&P 500, still perched precariously near its zenith, bears the air of a grand seigneur, grown accustomed to privilege. Its valuation, inflated by years of easy money and unwavering faith, appears… optimistic, shall we say? And the engine of its recent ascent – a handful of technological behemoths – feels less like a broad-based prosperity and more like a precarious tower built upon shifting sands. Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple… these names resonate with power, yes, but also with a certain fragility. Should their momentum falter, the consequences could be… instructive.
Meta (META 0.53%). They think they’ve found it. They’re betting big on AI glasses. It’s a bold move. A slightly terrifying one, if you ask me. But then again, everything involving billions of dollars is a bit terrifying. They believe this is how we’ll all be interfacing with artificial intelligence. Not through clunky chatbots, but through something… more integrated. More… watching. And if they’re right, well, my portfolio might just thank them.
The quarterly reports, those meticulously crafted documents designed to soothe the anxieties of investors, were, ironically, quite… favorable. Better than anticipated, even. Sales figures swelled, earnings surpassed expectations – a veritable feast of positive numbers. Yet, the market, that capricious beast, seems determined to focus on shadows. A change in the financial guard, you see. Mr. Tate, the former CFO, is taking on a more… advisory role. One pictures him surrounded by stacks of ledgers, murmuring prophecies to the company’s future. A strategic advisor, indeed. As if strategy could truly tame the chaos of the market.
Which brings us, inevitably, to NuScale Power (SMR 9.65%). The question isn’t merely whether this company is a ‘buy,’ but whether it’s a mirage, a shimmer on the otherwise bleak landscape of speculative investment. A rather delicate distinction, admittedly, one easily lost in the din of bullish pronouncements.
The prevailing sentiment, it is true, has shifted. The shadow of past anxieties – tariff pronouncements and market tremors – has receded. But to assume, on this basis alone, that SoundHound AI is now undervalued is to succumb to a dangerous simplification. The market, like a wounded beast, remembers. It recalls the pattern: initial promise, followed by unsustainable expenditure, and ultimately, the inevitable reckoning.