ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood is projecting a massive shift in global markets, predicting that post-war Iran and a transition into the “electric vehicle realm” will send oil prices plunging as geopolitical tensions ease. The ‘Coiled Spring’ Of The Middle East In her latest “In The Know” episode, Wood highlighted a 90% drop in Iranian missile and drone activity, suggesting the regime has been signific...
ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood is projecting a massive shift in global markets, predicting that post-war Iran and a transition into the “electric vehicle realm” will send oil prices plunging as geopolitical tensions ease. The ‘Coiled Spring’ Of The Middle East In her latest “In The Know” episode, Wood highlighted a 90% drop in Iranian missile and drone activity, suggesting the regime has been significantly diminished. This cooling of conflagration aligns with President Donald Trump's recent characterization of the conflict as “very complete.” Wood views Iran's young, well-educated population as a “coiled spring” ready to explode into the global tech economy once freed from repressive constraints. “You’ve got a coiled spring in terms of a population just really wanting to join this very exciting world, especially the world of technology and innovation,” Wood stated. Don't Miss: Tesla And The $50 Oil Forecast Central to Wood’s thesis is the collapse of traditional energy dominance. She argues that the Middle East is aggressively diversifying because leaders recognize the impending dominance of autonomous mobility. Wood predicts oil, currently near $90, could drop “below $50 per barrel, and perhaps much lower over the next 5 to 10 years.” This transition is fueled by Tesla Inc. and the scaling of the “electric vehicle realm.” As autonomous electric platforms become less expensive, the structural demand for oil is expected to evaporate, a shift Wood describes as happening “slowly, slowly, then all at once.” Palantir And The AI ‘PC Moment’ Beyond energy, Wood identified Palantir Technologies Inc. as a primary beneficiary of the new productivity era. She compared the current AI breakthrough to the 1980 “PC moment,” noting that frontier models are now disrupting traditional software. Trending: Own the Characters, Not Just the Content: Inside a Fast-Growing Pre-IPO IP Company Wood noted that enterprise platforms like Palantir are helping companies navigate “all-at-once” moments...
imaginima/E+ via Getty Images Commercial crude stocks for the week ended March 6: 443.1 M barrels . Crude inventory change: +3.8 M barrels vs. +3.5M barrel s for the week ended February 27. Consensus estimate: +2.800M. Gasoline inventory change: -3.7M barrels vs. -1.7M barrels for the week ended February 27. Distillates inventory change: -1.3M barrels vs. +0.4M for the week ended February 27. ETFs...
imaginima/E+ via Getty Images Commercial crude stocks for the week ended March 6: 443.1 M barrels . Crude inventory change: +3.8 M barrels vs. +3.5M barrel s for the week ended February 27. Consensus estimate: +2.800M. Gasoline inventory change: -3.7M barrels vs. -1.7M barrels for the week ended February 27. Distillates inventory change: -1.3M barrels vs. +0.4M for the week ended February 27. ETFs: ( USO ), ( UCO ), ( SCO ), ( BNO ), ( DBO ), ( USL ). More on United States Oil Fund LP ETF, ProShares Ultra Bloomberg Crude Oil ETF, etc. Fuel Costs Tax Everyone A Range Like Few Others Oil Shock: Why I Just Bought More Energy Stocks Extended Gulf shutdown could trigger prolonged oil price shock, Kilduff says: CNBC interview U.S. gasoline prices rise to $3.58/gal as Iran tensions lift oil markets
In this article ORCL Follow your favorite stocks CREATE FREE ACCOUNT A trader on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on April 10, 2025. NYSE Oracle shares rose 12% Wednesday after the company posted robust third-quarter earnings and assured analysts that the company does not plan to raise any additional debt in 2026 beyond what was already announced. "Investing in AI infrastructure is capital...
In this article ORCL Follow your favorite stocks CREATE FREE ACCOUNT A trader on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on April 10, 2025. NYSE Oracle shares rose 12% Wednesday after the company posted robust third-quarter earnings and assured analysts that the company does not plan to raise any additional debt in 2026 beyond what was already announced. "Investing in AI infrastructure is capital-intensive, but our operating model is optimized to ensure profitability," CEO Clayton Magouyrk said on the company's earnings call Tuesday. The hyperscaler has drawn skepticism for the financing measures funding its data center construction. Last month, the company said it intends to raise up to $50 billion in 2026 with a combination of debt and equity, with no expectations to issue additional bonds. Magouyrk addressed the company's AI infrastructure growth plans on the analyst call. "We have signed more than $29 billion of contracts since then across multiple customers using that new model," Magouyrk said. "A combination of bring-your-own-hardware and upfront customer payments enables us to continue expanding without any negative cash flow from Oracle." Magouyrk also noted that Oracle delivered 90% of 400 megawatt data centers on or ahead of schedule in the third quarter. Stock Chart Icon Stock chart icon Oracle one-year stock chart. Read more CNBC tech news How the Iran war and rising energy prices are threatening semiconductor demand Kevin Mandia sold his cybersecurity company to Google in 2022. He has a fresh $190 million for a new venture Musk's xAI wants to build a power plant in Mississippi. Regulators planned a key meeting on Election Day, 200 miles away Oracle is building yesterday's data centers with tomorrow's debt Choose CNBC as your preferred source on Google and never miss a moment from the most trusted name in business news.
Midea Group, the owner of industrial robot giant Kuka, is the latest Chinese company to pledge heavy investment in AI and robotics – another 60 billion yuan (US$8.7 billion) over the next three years – as traditional industries embrace futuristic technologies. The planned expenditure on research and development, with a focus on “AI, embodied intelligence and other cutting-edge areas”, matched its ...
Midea Group, the owner of industrial robot giant Kuka, is the latest Chinese company to pledge heavy investment in AI and robotics – another 60 billion yuan (US$8.7 billion) over the next three years – as traditional industries embrace futuristic technologies. The planned expenditure on research and development, with a focus on “AI, embodied intelligence and other cutting-edge areas”, matched its total spending over the past five years, the company announced in Shanghai on Tuesday. The strategic move followed the debut in December of an “ultra” humanoid robot, Miro U, which has six arms and runs on wheels. Advertisement The robot had been deployed at one of the home appliance giant’s washing machine factories in Wuxi, Jiangsu province, where it had improved production-line changeover efficiency by 30 per cent, according to the company website. Midea has accelerated its foray into robotics since the 2017 acquisition of German robotic giant Kuka. Five years later, the Chinese firm established a lab to study high-end heavy-duty robots, the only “state key laboratory” in the robotics sector backed by a company. Advertisement In 2024, Midea launched an innovation centre dedicated to humanoid robots. Midea is not alone among China’s traditional electric appliance makers in pivoting towards robotics and AI.
I was on CNBC yesterday, discussing our top pick from our research on the impact of the energy sector from the Iran war. SLB is the world's largest oilfield services provider. Over the past two weeks, the conflict in Iran sent crude prices briefly surging toward $120 per barrel, yet SLB's stock fell nearly 10% during the same period. That divergence has created what appears to be a rare valuation ...
I was on CNBC yesterday, discussing our top pick from our research on the impact of the energy sector from the Iran war. SLB is the world's largest oilfield services provider. Over the past two weeks, the conflict in Iran sent crude prices briefly surging toward $120 per barrel, yet SLB's stock fell nearly 10% during the same period. That divergence has created what appears to be a rare valuation disconnect. The global leader in oilfield services trading as if energy demand were collapsing, despite one of the most volatile oil supply environments in decades. In reality, geopolitical disruptions tend to benefit companies like SLB over time. When global oil prices rise while supply becomes uncertain, producers typically respond by accelerating offshore development and long-cycle projects exactly the areas where SLB dominates. Trade timing & outlook SLB recently pulled back toward the $45 support level, which previously acted as resistance during the stock's breakout earlier this year. The stock successfully bounced off the $45 level, suggesting buyers are stepping in following the recent sell-off. Upside potential: If SLB stabilizes above support, the stock could recover towards $52, where it traded prior to the recent market turbulence. Technically, the recent pullback appears more consistent with macro-driven selling pressure than a deterioration in company fundamentals. Fundamentals Despite its dominant position in the oilfield services industry, SLB currently trades at a meaningful discount to its peers. Forward P/E: ~16x vs. Industry ~19.6x Expected revenue growth: ~4.5% vs. Industry ~5.3% Expected EPS growth: ~9.3% vs. Industry ~19% Net margins: ~9.5% vs. Industry ~5.1% While growth expectations are modest relative to some peers, SLB's profitability remains significantly higher than the industry average, reflecting its technology leadership and global footprint. The company also generated more than $4 billion in free cash flow in 2025 and continues returning cap...
szakalikus/iStock via Getty Images Introduction Last month, I moved Sandoz ( SDZNY ) to a ‘hold’ rating as the share price has performed exceptionally well in the past few quarters. The company has now published its full-year results which always is a good reason for an update. And perhaps even more important was the announcement earlier this week confirming Sandoz plans to take advantage of the e...
szakalikus/iStock via Getty Images Introduction Last month, I moved Sandoz ( SDZNY ) to a ‘hold’ rating as the share price has performed exceptionally well in the past few quarters. The company has now published its full-year results which always is a good reason for an update. And perhaps even more important was the announcement earlier this week confirming Sandoz plans to take advantage of the expiring patents in the pharmaceutical sector. As one of the world’s largest companies in the generics and biosomilar medicine industry, Sandoz is in an excellent position to bring generic versions of medicine to the market. Yahoo Finance Sandoz has a primary listing in Switzerland, where the stock is trading with SDZ as its ticker symbol . The average daily volume is approximately 780,000 shares, which means the Swiss listing is most definitely the most liquid listing to trade in Sandoz stock. Robust cash flows, but the share price already anticipated this During 2025, Sandoz reported a total revenue of approximately $11.1B , an increase of approximately 7% compared to the preceding year . Unfortunately this came hand in hand with a higher COGS, resulting in a similar 7% increase in the reported gross profit. Fortunately the other operating expenses increased at a lower pace while the net other expenses decreased dramatically (the 2024 ‘other expenses’ included expenses related to litigation costs and provisions related to liability issues on its products, and also included restructuring provisions). This resulted in the operating income almost quintupling and while that sounds great, it isn’t fair to compare the FY 2025 results with a more difficult 2024 where non-recurring items played an important role. Sandoz Investor Relations The bottom line result indicated a net income of $914M, representing $2.12 per share . This represents 1.65 CHF. Looking at the cash flow statement, Sandoz reported an operating cash flow of 1.59B USD, but this includes a $70M lower tax-related c...
Google is investing in an artificial intelligence content studio focused on making videos for children on YouTube, part of an effort to seed the platform with high quality viewing for the site’s youngest users. Google’s AI Futures Fund invested $1 million into Animaj, an AI animation studio that makes videos for kids and drew more than 22 billion views to its channels last year, according to co-fo...
Google is investing in an artificial intelligence content studio focused on making videos for children on YouTube, part of an effort to seed the platform with high quality viewing for the site’s youngest users. Google’s AI Futures Fund invested $1 million into Animaj, an AI animation studio that makes videos for kids and drew more than 22 billion views to its channels last year, according to co-founder Sixte de Vauplane. Google is also giving Animaj early access to new versions of its Veo, Gemini and Imagen AI models that are not available to the public, plus support from the Google DeepMind and Google Labs teams to help the company tailor its AI tools and scale. YouTube has become popular with creators interested in making AI videos for kids and babies , a cohort that is spending more and more time in front of a screen. But some parents and child safety experts worry about exposing small children to what is commonly referred to as “AI slop,” or AI-generated videos without meaningful substance or educational value. While the funding is small compared to most rounds — even Animaj’s prior fundraising — the deal is symbolic of the bet that YouTube is making on AI companies using the technology to improve children’s programming as the world becomes more deeply focused on AI-generated content, Vauplane said. “Google knows the problem and the issue of AI slop that is happening right now on YouTube,” he said. “They know that right now, you don’t have a lot of people and a lot of players in the kids media industry that have really proven their ability to use AI in a very good way. I think we are one of the few.” Jonathan Silber, director of Google’s AI Futures Fund, called Animaj “a real blueprint for the future” of kids and family entertainment. “Getting this right for the next generation is a huge priority,” he said in a LinkedIn post announcing Google’s backing of the startup. The generative AI boom has created a flood of low-quality, spammy images and videos online — a ...
In Brief Lucid Motors will ship a software update to North American owners of its Gravity SUV on Thursday that will enable Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, the company announced Wednesday morning. Owners in Europe and the Middle East will receive the update in “late March.” The phone-mirroring features have previously been available on Lucid Motors’ sedan, the Lucid Air. But the company has spent t...
In Brief Lucid Motors will ship a software update to North American owners of its Gravity SUV on Thursday that will enable Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, the company announced Wednesday morning. Owners in Europe and the Middle East will receive the update in “late March.” The phone-mirroring features have previously been available on Lucid Motors’ sedan, the Lucid Air. But the company has spent the early months of the newer Gravity SUV ironing out a number of software issues, which became a significant enough crisis that Lucid Motors’ interim CEO apologized to owners. The company recently let a number of its top software leaders go, and last month it moved to lay off 12% of its workforce, as TechCrunch first reported. The new software update comes on the same day that Lucid Motors is set to hold an investor day in New York City, where the company plans to talk about its upcoming mid-size EV platform, its path to profitability, and the launch of its luxury robotaxi service with Uber and Nuro.
When the global economy was still in the grip of the devastating 1970s oil crises, exposing the chokehold exerted by a few important oil states, the International Energy Agency (IEA) was created, in the hope of limiting future shocks. Almost half a century on, the IEA’s 32 members have drawn up plans to hit the emergency button, for only the fifth time in its history. On Wednesday, the IEA said th...
When the global economy was still in the grip of the devastating 1970s oil crises, exposing the chokehold exerted by a few important oil states, the International Energy Agency (IEA) was created, in the hope of limiting future shocks. Almost half a century on, the IEA’s 32 members have drawn up plans to hit the emergency button, for only the fifth time in its history. On Wednesday, the IEA said that 400m barrels of emergency crude, a third of the group’s total government stockpiles, would be released to help calm the oil price shock triggered by the US-Israel war on Iran. It is the biggest release of oil reserves in its history. The cost of a barrel of crude oil quadrupled between October 1973 and January 1974, after members of the Opec cartel cut production; then fell back, before nearly trebling again in 1979, after the Iranian revolution. Since then, economic production has become far less reliant on fossil fuels, and new energy producers mean more diverse sources of supply. Yet the Iranian response to Donald Trump’s Operation Epic Fury, effectively closing the important strait of Hormuz, has underlined how vulnerable the world remains to the oil price. As a condition of IEA membership, countries sign up to ensure they hold emergency oil reserves, equivalent to 90 days of net imports. In total, these amount to about 1.2bn barrels – with about a third of this in the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve (which it continues to hold, despite skirting the IEA requirement, since the shale gas boom made the US a net exporter). In moments of great supply disruption in the energy markets, these stocks can then be released – offered for sale, in other words – to ease the flow of oil to where it is needed. There have only ever been four other coordinated releases of strategic supplies since the IEA’s founding in 1974, underlining the seriousness of the current crisis. These were: in 1991, after Operation Desert Storm, President George H W Bush’s military campaign against Iraq; in...
Microsoft MSFT has long commanded a premium valuation among technology stocks, but as shares enter 2026 against a backdrop of record cloud milestones and rising capital expenditure concerns, the investment calculus has grown considerably more nuanced. Trading at a forward 12-month Price/Sales ratio of 8.38X compared with the Zacks Computer – Software industry’s 7.02X, and carrying a Value Score of...
Microsoft MSFT has long commanded a premium valuation among technology stocks, but as shares enter 2026 against a backdrop of record cloud milestones and rising capital expenditure concerns, the investment calculus has grown considerably more nuanced. Trading at a forward 12-month Price/Sales ratio of 8.38X compared with the Zacks Computer – Software industry’s 7.02X, and carrying a Value Score of D, MSFT presents a case where the growth story remains intact, but the risk-reward at current prices is less compelling for new investors. MSFT's Valuation Zacks Investment Research Image Source: Zacks Investment Research Azure Growth Draws Scrutiny Despite Strong Results Microsoft delivered an impressive second-quarter fiscal 2026 performance, reporting revenues of $81.3 billion, up 17% year over year, exceeding the consensus estimate. Microsoft Cloud revenues surpassed the $50 billion threshold for the first time, reaching $51.5 billion, up 26% in constant currency. The Intelligent Cloud segment generated $32.9 billion in revenues, up 29% year over year, while Azure and other cloud services grew 39% year over year, or 38% in constant currency. Non-GAAP diluted earnings per share came in at $4.14, up 24% year over year, and operating income rose 21% to $38.3 billion, reflecting an operating margin of 47%. The company also returned $12.7 billion to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases during the fiscal second quarter. Despite these results, the stock dropped sharply following the earnings release. Azure growth had decelerated from prior quarters, and capital expenditures surged 66% year over year to $37.5 billion, prompting investors to question the return timeline on that investment. Management acknowledged that customer demand continues to outpace available supply capacity, a constraint that management expects to persist through at least the end of fiscal 2026. Forward Guidance Points to Continued Momentum For the third quarter of fiscal 2026, management ...
Nvidia (NVDA +0.35%) is the most valuable company in the world, and there's little wonder why that is when you see its financials. Demand for its artificial intelligence (AI) chips is through the roof, and those chips are expensive, enabling the company to grow its business at a high rate while also generating fantastic profit margins along the way. According to analysts at Grand View Research, th...
Nvidia (NVDA +0.35%) is the most valuable company in the world, and there's little wonder why that is when you see its financials. Demand for its artificial intelligence (AI) chips is through the roof, and those chips are expensive, enabling the company to grow its business at a high rate while also generating fantastic profit margins along the way. According to analysts at Grand View Research, the AI market will continue to grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 30.6% until 2033, as businesses continue to invest heavily into all things AI-related. It puts Nvidia in an excellent position to continue growing at a fast rate. Nvidia already became the first company to reach a $5 trillion valuation when it did so last year. Could it also be the first one to reach $10 trillion, perhaps, by the end of the decade? Nvidia still has much more growth ahead A big reason to stay bullish on Nvidia is that the growth opportunities in AI remain plentiful. And as long as that's the case, the need for cutting-edge chips will be significant, inevitably leading customers back to Nvidia and to purchasing its top-end chips. What's remarkable about the business is that since its business took off due to the emergence of ChatGPT a few years ago and the ramp-up in AI spending, its lowest quarterly growth rate has been just under 56%. While most companies would be thrilled with growth of around 50%, for Nvidia, it could send investors into panic mode. Expand NASDAQ : NVDA Nvidia Today's Change ( 0.35 %) $ 0.65 Current Price $ 185.41 Key Data Points Market Cap $4.5T Day's Range $ 184.84 - $ 187.62 52wk Range $ 86.62 - $ 212.19 Volume 2.5M Avg Vol 177M Gross Margin 71.07 % Dividend Yield 0.02 % Is a $10 trillion valuation realistic for Nvidia? Nvidia's valuation sits at around $4.4 trillion, which means that if it were to get to $10 trillion, it would need to more than double, and rise by close to 130%. To get there by around 2030, or four years from now, that would mean the stock would n...