Went through the FOMC and the two MAG7 earnings reports. My initial takes:
1/ Warsh came off “just talking without action". This press conference was a nightmare.
2s10s steepened because the bond market is pricing a loss of inflation control and potentially more hikes later. Fed credibility is now being questioned. wider breakevens + more long-end inflation premium and the credibility risk should be bullish for gold.
2/ The sharp move higher in the long end is a major headwind for anything relying on multiple expansion or profitless growth or high-PE semis, such as TSLA/SPCX.
The regime is getting reinforced: reward FCF, punish capex unless the revenue/EPS payoff is immediate.
3/ Microsoft delivered a perfect quarter. Cloud growth was extremely strong without a massive capex guide-up.
Combined with the FOMC, this should continue to favor hyperscalers as hyperscalers can self-fund the buildout.
4/ Neoclouds are mixed. Many still need debt, equity or customer prepayments to fund capex without hyperscaler-level recurring FCF. This is not great under the current macro regime.
$NBIS is the exception, as this earnings may prove that it belongs to the $MSFT group, the EBITDA would start inflecting hard.
5/ For semis, I think the real divergence is starting. Anything depending on multiple expansion or carrying a high P/E will face pressure from long-duration yields.
$NVDA is the obvious cash-flow monster and clear safe heaven.
6/ For memories, I’m cautious on DRAM/NAND after the run if stocks need both EPS revisions(capped by the more reasonable capex growth) and multiple expansion.
Within storage, I still think $WDC and $STX have the clearest long setups: higher margins, low competetion risk, zero concerns of capex exapnsion or production expansion. Unfortunately, they may continue to get dragged down by the broader memory sector.
I have a feeling that this week could be the final showdown between the bulls and the bears.
This Week’s Global Equity + Commodity Rotation Playbook As always, the pre-market roadmap is in the comments. Thank you!
Will be back to the US next week.
Talked to a few PMs during my trip in the last two weeks. I’d like to share some interesting findings:
Sentiment: Overall very panicked and confused.
Positioning:
1. Shanghai HFs are extremely long on memory names, partly due to the TRS restriction I mentioned a few weeks ago. They are quickly selling CN semis across the board and buying DRAM ETFs to lower margin pressure.
2. HK HFs are mixed and divided; bulls and bears are balanced.
3. US LOs are waiting—not about stock prices but still don’t believe LTAs can turn memory names from cyclical to growth valuations.
4. Macro HFs sold all of their memory/semi positions.
Interesting points from both sides:
Bulls:
1. Supply chain checks suggest prices and margins will remain higher for longer.
2. AI capex in 27/28 will grow much higher than most expected.
3. OAI/ATH’s ARR shows no signs of plateauing. Codex’s WAU is growing crazily right now.
4. Kimi K3’s tech report literally suggests every semi component is a bottleneck 😂
5. No macro risks; CPI/PPI much cooler.
6. Even if memory spot prices can’t go higher, these memory companies can do large buybacks or dividends to support the stock price.
7. OAI/ATH is hiring a large team of solution engineers to quickly build vertical solutions (finance/healthcare/legal) to find the next S-curve beyond coding.
8. Even if memory names fade, the entire semi sector will remain intact.
Bears:
1. Higher memory prices are not sustainable and will be demand destructive. Clients will push back on further price hikes, and even the government may step in to force massive production expansion.
2. Memory prices will peak in Q4.
3. No doubt on 27 capex, but 28 capex budgets are clouded.
4. Even if fundamentals are solid, the position is extremely crowded and Korean retailers’ leverage is a huge concern.
5. Even though CSPs’ capex planning is aggressive for 27, a large portion of deliveries will be delayed due to power supply constraints.
6. No intermediate story of fast AI application adoption like AI coding.
7. Higher prices and more LTAs during the upcycle can’t prove memory names aren’t cyclical anymore. We need to see resilience during the downcycle to prove that, like memory names keeping the lower bound of margins in a downturn.
8. Memory is the core of AI: if traded memory dies, then everything dies.
9. Memory has no difference vs. other commodities such as silver, oil, or lithium carbonate. When they peak, their narrative and fundamentals all look fucking good 😄