My son is getting married on Friday and another son leaves for a LDS Mission for two year on Sunday
New KEY position = Strangle/Straddle for the June 16-17TH FOMC Meeting
We currently have a OCT 26 $21 Straddle Call/Put
Our Strangle OCT 26 $21 Put with stock ownership
FOMC June Meeting expectations?= Warsh will say too much and spook the markets
June 16-17th Next Wednesday is when we need to have some protection in place
MU decision we’ve made= -$260 and we did nothing
We did nothing because the highest short call strike price is $800 and that is our line in the sand
Why didn’t you do anything? Because Micron is NOT Broadcom
They are booked for the next 18 months where they are selling EVERYTHING they can make. The have backorders for almost two years
MU concern is if they start to report cancellations of orders!!!!
Ray Dalio Warning “Again” = It’s the same song with a different dance partner and UNTIL we have an alternative for the world reserve currency, we don’t have much to worry about. IF we see a fire sale of US Treasuries then we have a problem.
SpaceX and now OpenAI but don’t forget Anthropic = I don’t plan on investing in any of these, especially for the first 6 to 12 months
Earnings –
MU 6/23 est
https://www.briefing.com/the-big-picture
The Big Picture
Last Updated: 05-Jun-26 14:52 ET
Keeping it real with the May employment report
Briefing.com Summary:
*The labor market looks healthy on the surface, but worker purchasing power is deteriorating.
*Consumers have limited and increasingly unattractive options to offset lost purchasing power.
*The economy is still growing above trend, but persistent declines in real earnings could become a future growth risk.
A lot of pundits were singing the praises of the May employment report. We can see why that was the case. Nonfarm payroll growth was much stronger than expected and accompanied by upward revisions for March and April; the civilian noninstitutional population employed increased by 149,000; and the unemployment rate remained at 4.3%, which is just about full employment in the eyes of the Federal Reserve.
What we saw, though, and what many seemingly chose to ignore, was less praiseworthy and potentially quite concerning for the growth outlook.
To be sure, as much as we would like to sing the praises of this headline-beating report, someone also needs to keep it real.
Purchasing Power Fading
To put it bluntly, workers aren’t earning as much as they used to, not after inflation anyway. In fact, real average hourly earnings have been negative the last two months.
In May, average hourly earnings were up 3.4% year-over-year, but when adjusted for inflation, they were down 0.4%. That doesn’t sound like much, but it makes a big difference for a consumer-driven economy if purchasing power is lost in the face of higher costs.
Trade-Offs
When consumers face a decline in purchasing power, they have several choices to make:
- They can spend less, with a focus toward spending on necessities and not discretionary goods/services.
- They can forego premium brands in favor of generic products.
- They can tap into personal savings to maintain their spending.
- They can increase their borrowing (think credit cards, personal loans, home equity, buy-now-pay-later) to cover their needs and/or wants.
- They can save less (if they were in a position to save money with which to begin).
- They can seek additional sources of income by taking on extra work or a second job.
The trade-offs here aren’t enticing.
If consumers spend less, the economy will be challenged to exceed its potential growth rate (~2.0%). That would presumably help ease some of the inflation eroding their purchasing power, but the adverse trade-off is that it could lead to higher rates of unemployment that, in turn, erode/destroy purchasing power by taking away income.
Tapping into savings to keep spending might be a placating option for the consumer and the economy, but it leaves one at risk of not having enough money to cover an emergency expense such as a medical bill, a new HVAC unit, or a car repair, which could then force one to take on debt to cover those expenses.
The latest data from the BEA doesn’t paint a pretty picture of personal savings. At 2.6%, the personal savings rate as a percentage of disposable income is close to a 30-year low.
Taking on debt to maintain spending isn’t a great or recommended solution in most cases either, especially in an environment of high interest rates. With the increased debt comes an increased burden to service the debt, which poses an added problem if real earnings are declining or a person loses their job.
Earning additional money from working more or taking a second job is a commendable undertaking, yet it could invite health risks, from less sleep to more stress, and/or quality of life issues that adversely affect personal relationships.
Given this, one can see the importance of getting inflation under control before the consumer forces an inflection point for an economy that has seen an average 2.6% real GDP growth rate over the past four quarters.
The Atlanta Fed GDPNow model estimate for real GDP in the second quarter stands at 3.0%. It had been 3.7% at the start of the forecast period. To be fair, 3.0% is well above the economy’s growth potential, so despite the worsening trend in real earnings, the economy is not flirting at all with a recession.
That may not be the case, though, if this worsening trend persists and threatens the stock market’s very rosy earnings growth outlook.
This is not a forecast. It is a warning, which we also discussed in this column roughly a month ago.
Briefing.com Analyst Insight
There was reason to cheer the May employment report. It is a good thing to see more people employed. We should be cheering that.
The wrinkle in that is that they are not being paid as much as before. Forget about inflation. That is true on a nominal basis, as the chart below shows, suggesting one of two things: 1) Employers are tightening their budgets, or 2) there is some dynamic hiring activity but in lower-paying jobs.
The strongest hiring activity in May was in the leisure and hospitality industry (70,000). The information (-2,000) and financial (-22,000) industries saw declines in employment levels.
The 172,000 increase in nonfarm payrolls in May makes it clear that there were jobs to be had, but we also spied a jump in the percentage of workers unemployed for 27 weeks or more to 27.5% from 25.3% in April and 20.4% a year ago. Our thinking is that this speaks to some difficulty in finding a new job with comparable compensation to the one that was lost.
Those points got lost in the excitement over the headline nonfarm payrolls number. That was real, but if keeping it real, one cannot dismiss the decline in real earnings. That isn’t mattering as much now, but it will later if it persists.
—Patrick J. O’Hare, Briefing.com
Where will our markets end this week?
LOWER 99.9%
DJIA – Bullish
SPX – Bullish
COMP – Bearish
Where Will the SPX end June 2026?
06-08-2026 -0.00%
06-01-2026 +0.0%
Earnings:
Mon: PLAY.
Tues: KMX, JBL, SWBI,
Wed:
Thur: KR,
Fri:
Econ Reports:
Mon:
Tue: Trade Balance, Existing Home Sales, Wholesale Inventories,
Wed: MBA, CPI, Core CPI, Treasury Budget
Thur: Initial Claims, Continuing Claims, PPI, Core PPI
Fri: Michigan Sentiment.
How am I looking to trade?
Rolled up OTM puts to closer to ATM or slightly OTM
Adding Covered Calls to positions for the summer doldrums
www.myhurleyinvestment.com = Blogsite
info@hurleyinvestments.com = Email
Questions???
Robert Kiyosaki warns of ‘death of US Dollar’ as investor Ray Dalio flags bigger global shift
Robert Kiyosaki and Ray Dalio warn Iran’s yuan oil trade could weaken the US dollar, raising fears over the petrodollar and global financial stability.
Written by FE Trending Desk
May 25, 2026 19:28 IST
“Death of the US Dollar?” Kiyosaki wrote, after pointing to reports that Iran has increasingly been accepting Chinese yuan instead of dollars for oil payments
Famous author and investor Robert Kiyosaki has once again warned on the future of the US dollar, this time linking his concerns directly to the tensions involving Iran and the changing structure of global oil trade.
In a strongly worded post on X, Kiyosaki warned that the ongoing crisis in the Middle East could trigger something “worse than war,” the gradual weakening of the US dollar’s dominance.
“Death of the US Dollar?” Kiyosaki wrote, after pointing to reports that Iran has increasingly been accepting Chinese yuan instead of dollars for oil payments. According to him, the development is not just about geopolitics or sanctions. It shows a major challenge to the financial system that has supported American economic power for decades.
The Petrodollar system under pressure
Kiyosaki urged people to listen to billionaire investor Ray Dalio, who recently discussed the issue in a podcast titled “Iran just killed the petrodollar.”
Dalio explained that the “petrodollar” system, where oil is globally traded in US dollars has long helped preserve the dollar’s strength and reserve currency status. The arrangement, historically tied to agreements between Washington and Saudi Arabia, ensured constant global demand for dollars because countries needed the currency to buy oil. But Dalio believes cracks are beginning to appear.
As countries like Iran and China increasingly use yuan-based settlements for oil trade, it could slowly reduce dependence on the dollar in global commerce. That, in turn, may weaken America’s financial leverage. “This is the biggest news in world financial history and no one is explaining it save for Ray Dalio,” he wrote.
Why Ray Dalio thinks the stakes are bigger than oil
Dalio has also warned that the current conflict in the Strait of Hormuz could become an important moment for American global influence. In a post on X earlier this year, the hedge fund billionaire said that if the United States fails to resolve the Hormuz crisis “from a position of strength,” it could begin eroding global confidence not only in US power but also in the dollar itself.
“When the world’s dominant power that has the world’s reserve currency is overextended financially, watch out for allies and creditors losing confidence,” Dalio wrote.
He added that such periods in history often lead to countries selling debt assets, weakening currencies, and shifting toward hard assets like gold.
Dalio compared the current tensions to historical moments when major powers were tested economically and militarily at the same time. According to him, control over trade routes and energy supply chains has often determined whether empires maintain dominance or begin to decline.
Rising debt and bond market stress
The debate over the future of the dollar comes at a time when concerns around US debt are already mounting. Long-term Treasury yields have surged in recent months, with the 30-year Treasury yield crossing 5% — levels not seen since the period leading up to the 2008 financial crisis. The latest warning is consistent with Kiyosaki’s investment philosophy over the last decade. The “Rich Dad Poor Dad” author has repeatedly encouraged followers to move away from cash holdings and toward what he calls “real assets.”
Along with gold and silver, Kiyosaki has increasingly backed Bitcoin as protection against inflation, currency devaluation and financial instability. He argues that while much of the world is focused on military escalation in the Middle East, a larger financial transformation is happening underneath.
Disclaimer: The content in this article is based on a viral social media discussion and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The financial figures and strategies mentioned are personal to the user and have not been independently verified. This story does not constitute financial advice or an endorsement of any specific investment strategy. Readers are advised to consult a SEBI-registered investment advisor before making financial decisions.
https://fortune.com/2026/03/14/ray-dalio-big-cycle-debt-crisis-political-disorder-world-order/
Ray Dalio: I’ve studied 500 years of history and fear we’re entering the most dangerous phase of the ‘Big Cycle’
By
March 14, 2026, 6:30 AM ET
A global macro investor for more than 50 years, Ray Dalio founded Bridgewater Associates out of his two-bedroom apartment in NYC and ran it for most of its 50 years, building it into the largest hedge fund in the world under his leadership. He is now in a stage of life in which he wants to pass along and help people learn about principles that have helped him, especially in markets and the economy. He is a long-running New York Times bestselling author of Principles: Life and Work, Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order, How Countries Go Broke: The Big Cycle, and Principles for Navigating Big Debt Crises. He graduated with a B.S. in Finance from C.W. Post College in 1971 and received an MBA degree from Harvard Business School in 1973. He has been married to his wife, Barbara, for 46 years and has three grown sons and eight grandchildren. He is an active philanthropist.
As a global macro investor for over 50 years, I’ve had to study the cause-and-effect relationships that drive history in order to place my bets. What I found is that all monetary orders, political orders, and geopolitical orders rise, evolve, and collapse in a repeating pattern I call “the Big Cycle”—typically lasting about 75 years, give or take about 30.
I believe that the times ahead will be radically different from what most people have gotten used to—that they will be more like the tumultuous pre-1945 era than what we have experienced since the end of World War II.
We are now in Stage 5
In my book Principles for Dealing With the Changing World Order, I described six stages of the Big Cycle. Stage 6 is the breakdown—the period of great disorder. Stage 5 is what immediately precedes it. That is where we are now.
I find that how I see things now is much different from how most other people see things because of our different perspectives. My perspective has been shaped by being a global macro investor who has to bet on what the future will be like. In pursuit of doing that well, I have found it invaluable to study the cause/effect relationships that repeatedly drove global macro events over the last 500 years.
With that perspective, watching what is happening now is like watching a movie that I have seen many times before because events are transpiring in the same ways as I have seen them transpire many times before. This perspective has been invaluable for me in placing my bets, so, at this stage in my life, I want to pass it along in the hope that it can help others prepare for what’s ahead.
In contrast to my perspective, it seems to me that most people are surprised by what’s happening because nothing like it has happened in their lifetimes and because they are paying more attention to the events of the day than to how monetary orders, domestic political orders, and international geopolitical orders evolve over time.
This is not new—it just feels that way
In my exploration of history, I saw that all monetary orders, domestic political orders, and international political orders began, evolved, and broke down in a Big Cycle progression. For example, I saw how the monetary, political, and geopolitical orders broke down in the 1929-1945 period of great disorder, how new orders were created in 1945, and how these new orders evolved to bring them and circumstances to where they now are which is similar to where they were in the 1929-39 period. I also saw how big acts of nature (droughts, floods, and pandemics) and the inventions of powerful new technologies had big impacts on the monetary orders, political orders, and geopolitical orders to influence the Big Cycle, and vice versa.
The evolutions of these orders through their Big Cycles were almost all driven by essentially the same cause/effect dynamics. For example, throughout this 500-year period and across countries, I repeatedly saw how big debt/monetary cycles were driven by how debts and debt service payments rose relative to incomes. This squeezed out spending until that caused debt service problems and spending constraints.
I saw that when this happened at the same time there were large amounts of debt assets (bonds) and debt liabilities (debt) outstanding, as well as large budget deficits that required larger debt asset sales (i.e., bond sales) than there was demand for, the resulting supply/demand imbalance led the value of the debt and/or currency to fall.
I also saw how periods of great domestic and international conflicts—particularly, pre-war periods—led to creditors fearing that the debtor reserve currency country would devalue or default on its debts, and I saw how that led these creditors and central banks to shift some of their bond holdings to gold to protect themselves against these debts being paid with devalued money or not being paid at all because of capital wars. What is now happening in the markets and with the monetary system is consistent with that template.
Nothing is predestined—but I’m not optimistic
In Principles for Dealing With the Changing World Order, I described how these cycles transpired and broke down. The big breakdowns occur in what I call Stage 6 of the cycle, which is a period of great disorder. The last major Stage 6 period began in 1929 and ended in 1945 after World War II, when there were clear winners, most importantly the United States, which determined how the new orders would work. That led to the establishment of the United States-led monetary, political, and geopolitical orders. We are now in a new Stage 5, the stage that immediately precedes the breakdowns. The key markers of Stage 5 as it progresses toward Stage 6 are:
- Large and rapidly rising government debts and geopolitical conflicts that lead to concerns about the value of and security of money, especially of the reserve currency, which drives a movement out of fiat currencies and into gold.
- Large income, wealth, and values gaps within countries that lead to the rise of populism of the right and populism of the left and irreconcilable differences that can’t be resolved with compromises and rule of law.
- The movement from a world order with a dominant power and relative peace to a world order that reflects a great powers conflict.
Throughout history, these conditions have typically led to financial problems and conflicts rather than rule following. They were particularly challenging for democracies because democracies are based on the rights to have disagreements and the following of rules, so when the disagreements are great and there is not a broad-based belief in the rule-following system, democracies experience disorder and autocratic leaders gain power. For example, in the 1930s, four major democracies (Germany, Japan, Italy, and Spain) became autocracies.
When these conditions were combined with big wealth and values gaps and bad economic conditions, they typically brought about disorder, conflict, and sometimes civil wars. There is nothing new about this dynamic. Plato wrote about it in The Republic in 375 BC.
Today, we are now seeing:
* large debts, deficits, and debasements of fiat currencies led by the dollar and the rise in the gold price,
* growing political and ideological polarity and populism within countries (now termed MAGA and WOKE in the U.S.), arising from large and growing wealth and values differences that are manifest in pre-civil war type developments, such as the president’s deployments of troops to cities and the related conflicts, such as those in Minneapolis, and the questioning of whether elections will be allowed to proceed as normal,
* the breaking down of the post-1945 multilateral, rules-based, international order and alliances such as NATO and the rise of a new type of world order that is more like many pre-1945 world orders in which there were great powers conflicts and gunboat diplomacy-type geopolitical moves such as what we have been seeing with Greenland, Venezuela, Iran and its allies, and China and Russia and their allies.
When I look at these historical and contemporary dynamics, I think that it is indisputably clear that what is happening now is more analogous to pre-1945 times than the post-1945 times that we have gotten used to, which misleads most people’s expectations and causes them be shocked about what’s happening. At the same time, nothing is predestined. There is some chance our leaders individually and collectively will not fight and will draw people together to do the difficult, smart things necessary to handle these challenges well enough to beat the odds. Human nature being what it is, I’m not optimistic.
Since we all have to bet on the future in some ways, I hope this Big Cycle perspective helps you as it has helped me.
The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.
Israel and Iran renew direct hostilities, testing Trump claim that US ‘calls the shots’
Story by Miranda Jeyaretnam
A man checks a fallen rocket half-buried in the ground following Iranian and Houthi strikes on the outskirts of Jericho, West Bank, on June 8, 2026. —Ahmad Gharabli—AFP/Getty Images
Israel and Iran have exchanged strikes for the first time since the weekslong U.S.-Iran cease-fire took effect, potentially jeopardizing talks aimed at putting an end to the war.
On Monday morning, Iranian state media said that Iran had launched a new wave of missiles towards Israel. Earlier on Monday, Israel bombed Iranian cities—with explosions heard in Tehran, Tabriz, and Isfahan—as well as an Iranian petrochemical plant in Bandar-e Mahshar after intercepting a wave of ballistic missiles from Iran on Sunday night. Iran had claimed that the missiles were a warning to Israel to halt its attacks on Lebanon, which have continued despite a cease-fire that took effect last week.
So far, neither Israel nor Iran have reported casualties from the latest attacks.
Israel’s decision to retaliate against Iran may have contradicted the advice of President Donald Trump, who had reportedly told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to hold off on an attack in hopes of reaching a U.S.-Iran deal.
The strikes mark the biggest escalation in direct hostilities since the cease-fire began on April 8. Iran closed airspace in Tehran and some western areas after Israel’s attacks. The conflict appeared also to widen, with the Iran-backed Houthi rebels claiming responsibility for missiles fired at Israel from Yemen, which were intercepted. The Houthis declared on Monday a “complete and total ban on Israeli maritime navigation in the Red Sea.” The Houthis had targeted commercial ships in the Red Sea in late 2023 and 2024 in retaliation for Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. If the Houthis resume attacks in the waterway, it could mean even more disruptions to global shipping, exacerbating already higher prices of energy and other commodities due to the war.
While the U.S. and Iran have exchanged low-level attacks since the cease-fire, both sides have continued to participate in negotiations toward ending the war and finding a consensus around Iran’s nuclear program. Israel’s attacks on Iran, however, are a significant test for Trump, who has sought for weeks to wind down U.S. engagement in the war.
In an interview with the Financial Times late on Sunday, after Iran had fired missiles at Israel, Trump said that Israel will have no choice but to accept any deal that the U.S. negotiates with Iran.
“He won’t have any choice,” the U.S. President told the FT, referring to Netanyahu. “I call the shots. I call all the shots. He doesn’t call the shots,” Trump insisted—a claim challenged, however, by the latest attacks as well as Israel’s criticisms of U.S.-Iran diplomacy.
Netanyahu tests Trump
Experts previously told TIME that the U.S. may be concerned about the longevity of any deal under the potential threat of new attacks from Israel. Israel has said that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon, while Iran has maintained that its nuclear program is only for civilian purposes.
Experts previously told TIME that there is precedent for Israel attacking Iran if it feels dissatisfied by U.S.-Iran negotiations. Last June, Israel attacked Iran in the midst of U.S.-Iran nuclear negotiations, eventually drawing the U.S. into a bombing campaign on Iranian nuclear facilities before reaching a Trump-brokered cease-fire. The U.S.-Israel strikes on Feb. 28 that launched the war had again interrupted ongoing U.S.-Iran nuclear talks. In early March, Secretary of State Marco Rubio suggested that Israel may have pushed the U.S. into the war with Iran, though Rubio and Trump later rejected that.
Trump appears to have taken steps toward making a possible deal more palatable to Israel. Last month, he told the leaders of several Arab and Muslim nations that he expected them to sign the Abraham Accords, a set of agreements establishing formal diplomatic relations with Israel, as part of any U.S. deal with Iran. So far, it does not appear that any of the countries that were not already signatories of the accords have accepted the request.
William Figueroa, an assistant professor of international relations at the University of Groningen, previously told TIME that in seeking to attach the Abraham Accords to a U.S.-Iran peace deal, Trump may have hoped that “the prospect of wider normalized relations and economic investment” would discourage Israel from restarting hostilities with Iran.
Israel’s continued fighting with Hezbollah in Lebanon has also threatened to derail progress towards a U.S.-Iran deal.
The U.S. has brokered multiple cease-fires between Israel and Lebanon, but Israel has continued to carry out near-daily strikes, including on civilian areas, killing more than 3,500 people since early March according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry. Iran has repeatedly objected to Israel’s fighting with Hezbollah and said that a permanent cessation of Israeli attacks across the region is a precondition for any U.S.-Iran deal.
After Israel escalated its offensive in Lebanon, Trump reportedly erupted at Netanyahu over a call last week, “You’re f-cking crazy. … Everybody hates Israel because of this.” Trump confirmed the call had taken place, and said he had been “a little bit perturbed at [Netanyahu’s] constantly fighting with Lebanon.”
Still, Trump has insisted that talks with Iran are progressing in spite of its fighting with Israel. The U.S. President told the FT on Sunday that Iran’s strikes were “not going to have any impact on the deal.”
The strikes “were attacks that did not kick at all. It’s one of those things that’s been going for 3,000 years, or 47 years, depending on how you count,” Trump said.
U.S. officials had for weeks suggested that a U.S.-Iran deal is imminent, but both sides appear unwilling to budge on certain key points, including a moratorium on Iran’s nuclear program and its handing over of its uranium stockpile. Iran has also repeatedly said it intends to continue managing transit through the Strait of Hormuz, which it militarized at the start of the war, including a possible arrangement with Oman to charge ships fees to sail through its waters. The U.S. has strongly opposed such an arrangement.
“I think the deal is going on,” Trump told the FT. “We’ll see what happens.”
Rally in chip stocks becomes the most hated in history. Here’s the data
Published Thu, May 28 20266:47 AM EDT
The rally in semiconductor stocks is so incredible, traders can’t help but bet against it.
Open interest in put contracts on the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH) have surged the past two months to just under 1.7 million, the most ever, according to Bloomberg data going back to the fund’s launch in 2011. By comparison, there are just over 500,000 outstanding call contracts.
At the same time, implied volatility in the SMH is rising, nearing 55% Tuesday, near the highest in more than a year. That’s a sign that the puts are mostly being bought, according to Zed Francis, chief investment officer at Chicago-based Convexitas.
“People are hedging the move rather than leaning to it,” said Francis, who runs a semiconductor options trading strategy on behalf of clients. “We’ve had this jump-move in the space but it’s resulting in hedging activity rather than a chase. So this might be more sustainable than a boom and bust.“
Outright bearish speculation may not tell the entire story for the buildup in puts in the sector ETF: the appeal of SMH puts might also be tied to how manic — and expensive — options trading has gotten in single stocks.
Similar to how implied volatility in the chip sector is high compared to the broader S&P 500′s 16% vol, implied volatility in single stocks is even higher. That means there may be situations in which traders find it advantageous to use the sector ETF instead of trading in single stocks like Micron, where implied volatility is 105%.
“If you start trading stuff when it’s 100 to 120 percent vol with inverted skews, what kind of strategies can you use,” Don Kaufman, co-founder of TheoTrade, said in a phone call after the bell. “Implied volatility was just a fever pitch in Micron, so I took the other side in SMH.“
Kaufman bought the 535/525-strike put spread in SMH expiring in late August.
“I’m taking a far out-of-the-money shot on it, a 30-delta spread looking for the ultimate pullback,” he said. “The squeeze has got to be ending soon. Who in their right mind would want to spend this much on jaw-dropping crap?”
The stock market just did something eerily similar to the dot-com bubble top in 2000
Published Mon, Jun 1 20267:45 AM EDTUpdated Mon, Jun 1 202610:14 AM EDT
Key Points
- Just 20 of the S&P 500 members joined the index at a record close on Friday.
- Bank of America points out just 20 stocks hit new highs at the very top of the internet bubble in March 2000.
- The firm’s investment strategist, Michael Hartnett, gave investors a post-bubble road map with a market top nearing.
The S&P 500 closed at a record on the last trading day of May, but only a handful of stocks — focused mostly in the AI area — hit their own all-time highs.
This strange occurrence echoes what happened at the top of dot-com bubble 26 years ago.
On Friday, just 20 of the index members hit a record. Of those 20, just seven were not directly related to artificial intelligence.
Michael Hartnett at Bank of America pointed out in a note to end last week that it was just 20 stocks that hit new highs at the very top of the internet bubble in March 2000.
While the widely followed strategist said the “speculative price action” is likely not over yet, this occurrence is the latest sign that it is nearing. Hartnett believes central banks and rising interest rates will ultimately spell the end, giving clients a “post-bubble” road map.
The May stock boom was driven largely by semiconductors, specifically memory chip makers like Micron Technology, Advanced Micro Devices, SK Hynix and Samsung, which are all valued at or near a trillion dollars. AMD soared 46% on the month, Micron jumped 88%, Samsung 44% and SK Hynix 81%.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite jumped 25% in April and May, its best two-month stretch in more than two decades.
Narrow bull
A growing number of strategists and investors are concerned that if this bull market doesn’t start to broaden out, it will ultimately be its undoing.
Advance-decline lines, which show the number of stocks rising compared with the number falling, have exhibited a similar trend, surging at the end of March and then falling back in a bearish sign since the middle of April.
“Internals have lagged since the initial April surge,” Ari Wald wrote in a May 23 technical analysis for Oppenheimer.
Only about 55% of S&P 500 constituents were trading above their 200-day moving average as of May 20, according to BCA Research.
“Even though the U.S. and [emerging market] equity indexes have reached new highs, their advances have been extremely narrow. Poor breadth is often a sign of underlying stock market vulnerability,” BCA strategists led by Arthur Budaghyan said in a May 20 report.
Hartnett is advising clients to flip soon to a defensive posture.
“Post-bubble investor roadmap since 1929 is long bonds, and long combo of defensives and/or sectors which dramatically underperformed in the last months of the bubble,” he wrote.
Correction: AMD soared 46% on the month, Micron jumped 88% and Samsung 44%. An earlier version misstated the percentages.
Alphabet’s $80 billion stock sale leaves Wall Street in ‘unprecedented territory,’ says Goldman’s Gutman
Published Wed, Jun 3 20263:42 AM EDTUpdated Wed, Jun 3 20269:25 AM EDT
Key Points
- Goldman Sachs International co-chief executive conducted an exclusive interview with CNBC on Wednesday.
- He said “we are in unprecedented territory” after Alphabet announced $80 billion of stock sales on Monday.
- Record year for capital markets, with a flurry of mega-IPOs in the pipeline.
Goldman’s Gutman on AI: We’re in an industrial revolution
Alphabet’s plan to sell $80 billion in shares to fund its artificial intelligence commitments leaves markets in “unprecedented territory,” Anthony Gutman, co-chief executive officer at Goldman Sachs International, told CNBC in an exclusive interview on Wednesday.
The Google parent company said in a statement on Monday that its equity offerings will include an allocation of $10 billion to Greg Abel’s Berkshire Hathaway to “fund investments in its world-class AI compute infrastructure to meet its unprecedented customer demand.”
Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley are acting as joint book-running managers for the underwritten offerings. Goldman is also acting as the placement agent for the private placement.
“Let’s start by saying this is unprecedented territory, so we all enter it with a degree of humility and caution, and the right balance of focus,” Gutman told CNBC’s Carolin Roth on “Europe Early Edition” on Wednesday morning. “The Alphabet issuance yesterday augurs well for the pipeline. That was just a record level of issuance on any level.”
Gutman said there is “a lot of demand out there” for significant equity issuance and that, as a percentage of the total equity market capitalization, it looks “very manageable”.
It comes as capital markets look set for a record year, with a flurry of mega-IPOs in the pipeline.
SpaceX’s hotly anticipated flotation, expected on June 12, could mark the largest initial public offering in history. Elon Musk’s firm is targeting a valuation of $1.75 trillion on the Nasdaq.
Meanwhile, OpenAI and Anthropic have also announced their intentions to go public later this year.
“We’re excited about it. These are exceptional companies, so they should be able to raise this capital if they navigate the path appropriately,” Gutman added.
SpaceX is worth less than half of its $1.75 trillion IPO target, Morningstar says
Published Wed, Jun 3 20265:19 AM EDTUpdated Fri, Jun 5 20264:40 AM EDT
Key Points
- Morningstar analysts believe SpaceX is “significantly overvalued” ahead of its blockbuster IPO.
- The analysts say xAI poses a “material threat of value destruction” to the company, with its “economic moat indeterminate.”
- Morningstar values SpaceX at $780 billion, which is roughly 48% below its private market valuation of $1.5 trillion.
SpaceX is expected to start trading on the Nasdaq in just over two weeks, but Morningstar analysts have warned that Elon Musk’s tech behemoth is “significantly overvalued.”
The hotly-anticipated debut is expected to be the largest ever initial public offering, with SpaceX reportedly targeting a $75 billion fundraise and a valuation of $1.75 trillion.
“We think the company has been significantly overvalued and investors will have opportunities to buy the stock at more attractive levels after the IPO,” Morningstar analysts wrote in a note published Monday.
The analysts see a wide range of possibilities for the potential profitability of SpaceX’s xAI and find its “economic moat indeterminate.” They view the unit as posing a “material threat of value destruction” to the company.
As such, Morningstar’s discounted cash flow valuation of SpaceX is $780 billion, which is roughly 48% below its private market valuation of $1.5 trillion.
Morningstar said the upcoming IPO does not offer the best entry point for retail investors. However, long-term investors eager to participate in the company’s potential future success will have more opportunities later down the line, with “a greater margin of safety” than at the time of flotation, the analysts added.
“With a small initial float boosted by almost every investment bank on the planet, buoyant investor appetite for AI infrastructure bids, and an unprecedented path to inclusion in the Nasdaq 100 Index just 15 trading days after the IPO, we expect SpaceX’s share price will likely survive separation and may even ascend, at least for a time,” Morningstar said.
Is SpaceX’s $1.8 trillion valuation justified?
SpaceX recorded a net loss in the latest quarter of $4.28 billion after losing $4.94 billion in 2025.
Its Starlink arm generated $3.26 billion in revenue in the latest quarter, accounting for 69% of the total. Its space business lost $619 million on an operating basis, while its AI unit lost $2.5 billion — meaning connectivity is the only profitable part of the company.
Crucially, SpaceX wrote in its S-1 filing that it has “a history of net losses and may not achieve profitability in the future.”
Much of its value relies on success in developing various technologies that are “novel and untested”, and SpaceX expects to “incur significant capital expenditures over a period of years” before its AI products and services become profitable, according to the document.
Dan Coatsworth, head of markets at AJ Bell, said “little is known” about SpaceX’s financials due to its status as a private company, with Elon Musk controlling 85% of the voting rights. Coatsworth flagged the potential for an eye-watering valuation as a potential risk to further upside.
“A $1.75 trillion valuation would put SpaceX on 67 times sales, three times as much as Nvidia’s rating based on its past financial year and latest share price,” he added. “It implies SpaceX’s valuation could be richer than a plate of dauphinoise potatoes.”
Meanwhile, chatter about whether Musk could merge SpaceX with Tesla has resurfaced.
A sell-off like Friday’s is ‘rarely the top’ of a rally, says Wharton’s Jeremy Siegel
Published Fri, Jun 5 20264:50 PM EDT
Esteemed finance professor Jeremy Siegel called Friday’s sell-off in the technology sector a common reaction to a parabolic rise in stock prices. But he was also optimistic that such a pullback usually doesn’t signal the beginning of a prolonged correction.
“One of the oldest sayings in Wall Street is up the staircase, down the elevator, and that’s exactly what happened,” Siegel, professor emeritus of finance at University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business and WisdomTree chief economist, said on CNBC’s “Closing Bell” on Friday afternoon.
“When you have these super moves like we’ve seen in the chip stocks, the memory stocks, the trend followers, the momentum players … whenever it goes off the trend, they’re out because they’re just riding that train, and that’s what we see today,” he said.
All three major averages logged losses this week, with Nasdaq’s 4.7% decline, its worst weekly showing since April 4, 2025. Still, even with this pullback, the Nasdaq has tallied a 10.6% gain in 2026.
As Siegel mentioned, semiconductor stocks have been a big winner this year, with the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH) rising 58% year to date, but it suffered a nearly 5% drop this week. Friday’s 9.2% drop was its worst one-day move since Jan. 27, 2025. The iShares Semiconductor ETF (SOXX) on Friday saw its worst day since March 16, 2020. Year to date, SOXX is up more than 79%.
But Siegel said such big moves aren’t out of the ordinary.
“Now, that’s rarely the top,” he said. “It could be the top, but usually it’s a very short-term top. Goes down and then tries to build up, and that’s the point where you kind of break the previous high. If it doesn’t, then that could be a start of a more major downturn, but this is a very, very common reaction to … the parabolic move.”
According to Siegel, the market’s artificial intelligence-driven gains are different from previous market bubbles because of the potential productivity growth these technological changes could create. The professor likened these possible societal impacts to the Industrial Revolution.
“Again, we all emphasize that this is a very different situation, and this AI revolution and the ‘Mag Seven’ is a situation we just never have seen before,” he said.
The catalyst for the chip sell-off on Friday was unclear. Sentiment had soured after Broadcom didn’t raise its AI chip forecast Wednesday, but the intensity of Friday’s selling was worse than what occurred in the immediate wake of that news.
Siegel also cautioned that these parabolic price rises only make sense if companies can also permanently keep their earnings inflated.
“Remember, you can only double your price if your earnings stay up, doubled forever. If this is a three- or four-year burst, and then they go back down, you way overplayed your hands here in these chip stocks,” he said. “Be careful about temporary surges in profitability … chips historically have cyclicality.”
Investor Joe Terranova buys these AI plays with ‘strong momentum, strong fundamentals’
Published Tue, Jun 2 20263:42 PM EDTUpdated Tue, Jun 2 20265:06 PM EDT
Joe Terranova said he sees an opportunity in both Twilio and Generac as the artificial intelligence trade continues to take over the market.
Terranova said on CNBC’s “Halftime Report” on Tuesday afternoon that he recently reallocated funds to these two stocks.
“The two names that I purchased are Twilio — software name that has worked remarkably well, benefiting from agentic AI, touching messaging and voice — and then Generac,” the chief market strategist for Virtus Investment Partners said. “Generac, which is now participating in the AI power story as backup power to the AI data center. Both of those names — strong momentum, strong fundamentals.”
Twilio shares have gained about 60% year to date, while Generac stock has more than doubled over the same period.
Terranova also highlighted Starbucks as a trade he currently likes from a technical perspective.
“You have a nice pullback here into the support of moving averages; you’re using 200 days, you stop at $91,” he said.
While Starbucks shares have gained almost 14% year to date, the stock is down nearly 10% over the past month.
Starbucks stock year to date
During the show, investor Brian Belski also shared that he had recently bought Dick’s Sporting Goods and Academy Sports and Outdoors.
Belski called Dick’s Sporting Goods a “fantastic retailer” that has “done a really great job,” with the integration of Foot Locker serving as a catalyst. Smaller-cap Academy Sports, on the other hand, offers exposure to the “leisure camp,” and Belski believes that the company has earnings power.
Both retail stocks have underperformed the S&P 500 year to date. Dick’s stock is up nearly 9% in 2026, while Academy has added 3%.
Dick’s Sporting Goods shares year to date
In the travel sector, Belski bought shares of American Airlines, which was a strategy to take some gains from a move higher in United Airlines and diversify the portfolio. The investor also recently bought shares of Hyatt Hotels.
“Hyatt’s been a massive performer within the hotel space. I think it’s actually under-owned by institutions, but from a perspective of where travelers are going, Hyatt makes a lot of sense,” he said.
As his final trade of the show, Belski highlighted Eversource Energy, another power play on AI that offers an almost 5% dividend yield, he said.
During the same segment, investor Stephanie Link also touted Alcoa as a strong buy. The stock has already gained more than 58% year to date.
“It’s a fairly new position for me. I think aluminum demand growth is going to be 40% between now and 2030. These guys are the winners,” said Link, the chief investment strategist at Hightower Advisors.
