원문 보기
Wall Street is losing the battle for narrative, and a wide variety of stocks could suffer as a result. God knows this market already has a lot of problems due to the endless rise in long-term bond yields. Today's real surprise is that the price of oil has actually fallen. The situation on the stock market was quite bad, but the drop in oil helped us move away from the lows.
The Dow closed down 132 points, down 1.7%. The Nasdaq fell only 0.09% . The rate on the 30-year Treasury bond is the highest in 24 years. Quite a serious competitor for shares. Although bond prices have recovered from the daily lows, I think buyers are starting to think that weaker data is in store.
Maybe we are ready for a quick rate cut. The stocks needed it. Did you know that over 50% of S&P 500 stocks are trading below their 200-day moving average? The worst market performance since March. More S&P 500 stocks have hit 52-week lows than highs for nine straight days. Only 1% of S&P stocks are at their 52-week highs.
204 stocks fell 20% from their 52- week highs. In other words, over 40% of S&P stocks are in a bear market. There is also the extraordinary story of the cancellation of the IPO of Oura, the popular smart ring that was oversubscribed four times . This was not enough for the management, and they decided to wait for a better moment.
They blame everything on market conditions. But the Nasdaq 100 index is only 1.3% below its all-time high. Could there be better market conditions? Okay, we're seeing slowdowns in the strangest places. I enjoy reading these Federal Reserve reports on certain key regions. Today, the Dallas Fed released a report titled "Growth in Texas' Service Sector Activity Has Stalled." It further states: “The income index, a key indicator of the state’s service sector, fell eight points to minus 0.9, with a reading close to zero indicating no change in activity from the previous month .” If things are this bad in Texas, one can only guess what the situation is in the other 49 states.
Consumer confidence figures were released today, and they are the worst in over a decade . However, rates continue to rise . Now I think that could change if oil prices stay low or fall further , but I understand that people have been wrongly claiming this since the bond sell-off began. When I say we are losing the narrative war, I mean that something has changed in the approach to AI and data centers, the major growth story of our era.
The market has been holding onto these topics for what seems like an eternity. But now, looking at the seating chart at today's lunch with the president, which includes Jensen Huang from the world's largest company, Elon Musk, the world's richest man, Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, and many other wealthy people, I'm thinking, "Oh no." That is, who, well, who would dare to say: " What kind of a bunch of big-money people are feasting at the expense of those who lost their jobs because of AI?" Or: "These oligarchs are killing us for higher earnings per share." A year ago, I would have thought that these are people who represent the best that we have.
Now the critics, not me, but the critics are saying, quote, "These are the people who want to sacrifice your jobs for higher profits." End of quote. 18 months ago, people could have said that these executives were employing tens of thousands of people by building data centers. And now we're thinking: how much did they raise electricity prices?
How much water did they spoil? How many people in the cities were simply scammed? Oh, and of course, the worst possible narrative shift occurred. Two of America's most exciting companies, Anthropic and OpenAI, are now openly admitting that their products are dangerous to society. We hear that the document that Anthropic is preparing for a potential IPO is full of dire warnings, such as that Anthropic could cause mass death or the extinction of humanity.
The company could pose, I quote, " existential threats or fundamental destabilization of global systems." End of quote. Wow, I can't wait to buy shares in this company. Uh, 80 pages out of a 261- page document are dedicated to risks. Meanwhile, OpenAI is looking to raise $30 billion at a $ 1.4 trillion valuation—$ 600 billion more than in the previous round, despite holding back on the new iteration, ChatGPT 6 or 6.1, because of the risks it poses, yes, to society.
How is this possible? Everything is simple. The culture turned against these people and their products, and supporters were unprepared for such a reaction. They don't know what to say. While there is no empirical evidence that jobs are being lost specifically because of AI, it has never demonstrated an increase in productivity.
We know that many leaders are now saying that stopping an existential threat is a task that can be solved by engineering methods . Extremely smart people like Jensen Huang, George Kurtz from CrowdStrike, Nikesh Arora from Palo Alto Networks, who is with the president today. Todd McKinnon from Okta. They all proposed serious solutions, which , however, are being drowned out by those who predict an apocalypse through AI.
It doesn't matter, because when the CEO of the most valuable private company, Anthropic, clearly says that his business could destroy us all, it's hard to fix. Listen, I'm not a panicker. You know, I'm constructive about AI, but companies need to start telling better stories. Tonight we have Dina Powell McCormick.
She is the president of Meta, she came to show the positive side, and for me it was a real breath of fresh air. Maybe it will work for you too. Meta is committed to reducing electricity tariffs where it hosts its data centers. She works with small businesses, helping them grow. She offers bonuses to teachers, big bonuses.
She has videos to back up these claims. She challenges all other hyperscalers to do the same. But will they do it? Muse by Meta is probably the best new small business scaling tool I've heard of in years. We'll invite a farmer to share how his business is growing thanks to Meta's Muse product. Will anyone listen?
How about the big final question: that we'll all die if we fully fund Anthropic and their agents get out of control? I admit there are risks here, but why not add a little moderation? Why not say, "Okay, listen, quote the scene in the Lincoln Tunnel from Stephen King's The Stand." "But also say that they are slowing things down so that the product doesn't backfire, and that there are real cybersecurity solutions that could stop a major Hugging Face hack." I...I mean that Hugging Face incident.
The same one that Jim Cramer was talking about , where I think he said it wouldn't happen. This wouldn't have happened if it were up to him . Now we have a president who says, "To hell with restrictions, full speed ahead." He believes that self-regulation is enough, although the history of self-regulation in private industry is not all that brilliant.
Think tobacco, opioids, cars, fossil fuels. The president's main contribution today: he renamed artificial intelligence to superintelligence. AI becomes SI, morally binding. For some reason I don't think the alarmists will join in on this now . Can you imagine what will happen after the midterm elections in November, which look promising for the Democrats?
If the Democrats take the House of Representatives , you better get used to the idea that the time of the SI oligarchs is over. We may even see congressional " witch hunts," which could begin with tonight's dinner guest list. Listen, we've done this before in this country. We can always do it again.
Can this narrative still be saved ? You can draw your own conclusions by listening to Melissa Lee and Paul McCormack, and ponder what would happen if the rest of the industry followed their example. If we lose the initiative and the war continues, October could prove to be a very difficult month. And a Democratic victory will not improve the situation with AI, sorry, with SI.
That's the point. Everything could have been different. This shouldn't have turned into a nightmare where the super-rich take theirs at any cost. But this is the new agenda now, and it will be difficult to change it even if rates stop rising, as new economic data finally shows a slowdown. Micron stock is probably the stock of the day .
The company again beat earnings expectations and provided a strong outlook. You're probably wondering why stocks are falling. Maybe this is a mistake. Data center revenue has increased 11-fold, but that's not the main story. We'll find out what went wrong last night, because I think it's a mistake to think it was a failure.
Join us for an exclusive CNBC interview with Micron Chairman and CEO Sanjay Mehrotra. First of all, I want to congratulate you, Sanjay, and thank you for coming to the show. Thanks Jim, it's great to be on your show again. Thank you. I want to ask about the gross margin: it was extraordinary, and anyone who has followed your company for years knows that Andy Grove, perhaps the greatest semiconductor executive of all time, would say that it was impossible.
Your figures are impossible. But Wall Street seems to have remained unsatisfied. The more I delve into this, the more I understand: since 1994, the only case of shortages was when too many companies started producing chips. It wasn't a shortage. It was your decision to pay the employees more money. It's literally a share of the profits.
Can you explain to people the difference between the so- called drop in profits because you decided to pay people a little more, and the flood of new chips that usually destroys margins and profitability? Jim, we delivered an exceptional quarter and an exceptional year: $133 billion in revenue, growth of over 250% year- over-year, 87% gross margin in fiscal Q4 , and we are forecasting about 86.25% gross margin for our first fiscal quarter, the current quarter.
So the Micron team really delivered exceptional performance, and of course, consistent with our record quarter, we also rewarded our team members in a record way with bonus payments, which impacted operating expenses in our fiscal fourth quarter . As incentive payments to production personnel for the fourth fiscal quarter impact the cost of goods sold in the first quarter, this impacts our gross margin.
However, we are targeting a very high gross margin of 86.25%. It is very pleasant and we are proud that we can motivate our employees in line with our record results. It is important for us to remain competitive . It is important for us to attract, retain and motivate our talent so that we can maintain our pace of development.
Jim, memory is a key factor in the age of AI or superintelligence. It is this memory that provides intelligence. It amplifies intelligence, and Micron has a full portfolio of technology products, manufacturing capabilities, and we continue to capitalize on rapidly growing opportunities. OK. So, Sanjay, I visited you on August 20th in Boise, you had 26 strategic customer deals.
Since then you had… you had 16. You just said 26. Where did … how did you get 10 new deals after August 20th? Jim, not only do we have more customers looking to enter into long-term agreements, but those customers with whom we already have strategic agreements are offering us increased demand. In fact, we cannot meet all the demand of our customers.
Customers extend these agreements even until 2031. We have concluded both extensions and new agreements valid until 2031. This gives us tremendous visibility and certainty in demand, which helps us plan our investments in production capacity with confidence . Of course, this provides a guarantee of supplies for our customers and the opportunity to confidently develop their business.
This only underscores the importance of memory in the age of AI. Memory is critical to scaling AI, delivering value to end users, and of course, delivering a quality experience, as memory enhances the value proposition of computing platforms that are being deployed and rapidly evolving in the AI era.
There are three stories about Nvidia today, and together they tell the whole story of where this company is now. It is outpacing Apple in shareholder payouts, charging more for the same chips due to endless demand, and is now literally involved in writing AI safety rules in the White House. Let's break this down in detail.
First, Nvidia is close to overtaking Apple as the largest payer of stock buybacks and dividends in the market. Last quarter, Apple spent $25.9 billion on share buybacks and $4 billion on dividends. Nvidia spent $19.7 billion on share buybacks and $6 billion on dividends, already surpassing Apple in this indicator.
A year ago, Nvidia's total share buybacks and dividends were about $10 per quarter. Now this amount has more than doubled. Nvidia has committed to returning at least half of its free cash flow to shareholders, and its board of directors just approved a record $ 150 billion in share buybacks . This is important not only for showing off the results.
Evercore analysts believe that such a return of capital could cause the company to revalue, as it did with Apple, transforming Nvidia from a purely growth stock into an instrument attractive to income-seeking investors as well. Second, Nebius just raised Nvidia GPU rental prices by 21% starting this week, and Coreweave and IREN also supported the news.
The B300, Nvidia's newest chip, has seen the biggest price increase, with the price increasing from $ 7.85 to $9.50 per hour. This is the second price increase by Nebius in just 3 months. That's why this detail matters. Older chips, such as the H100 , have also risen in price by 17%, and demand for previous- generation hardware usually doesn't increase if there simply isn't enough of the new product for everyone.
The CEO of Nebius directly stated that the company could sell all of its capacity for 2027 today at the new tariffs. When your supplier raises prices and your stock rises on this news, it is the best signal of real unmet demand that can be in the market. Thirdly, and this is the most important thing.
Nvidia, Meta, Google, OpenAI, Anthropic, and XAI signed the White House Superintelligence Accord this week, agreeing to a four-tier system of internal controls and external audits of their most advanced AI models. Trump called it morally binding and said he would create a 10-member board to oversee AI safety.
But here is a nuance that is worth paying attention to. This is a completely voluntary initiative with no enforcement mechanisms if the company does not comply with the rules. And the story of this deal is very Nvidia-like. It all reportedly started with Mark Zuckerberg and Nvidia's Jensen Huang personally designing the security framework before presenting it to the White House.
This completely aligns with everything Huang has been saying for weeks. He argued against new mandatory rules, in favor of self-regulation within existing norms, and for AI companies to be able to say, "We govern ourselves." This agreement is essentially the same philosophy embodied in a signed document with his signature.
So, today Nvidia is going to overtake Apple in shareholder payouts . Its chips are so scarce that partners raise prices and get rewarded for it. And its CEO just helped write the industry's own safety rulebook , instead of waiting for Washington to write it. That's a huge amount of influence concentrated in one company right now. Let me know what you would like to talk about in more detail.
Comments 0