Wadi Rum's otherworldly landscape is where Star Wars movies and The Martian were filmed. In late winter, plants emerge in this desert — but some are toxic to camels, so their herders must protect them.
Wadi Rum's otherworldly landscape is where Star Wars movies and The Martian were filmed. In late winter, plants emerge in this desert — but some are toxic to camels, so their herders must protect them.
cmart7327 Following Anthropic's ( ANTHRO ) product event, Wedbush ( IVES ) said that competition risk to software is overblown. Analysts led by Dan Ives said that Anthropic hosted its Enterprise Agent event, where the company provided product updates that make Claude Cowork effective for enterprises. The company showed live demos from senior leadership across enterprises with an increased focus on...
cmart7327 Following Anthropic's ( ANTHRO ) product event, Wedbush ( IVES ) said that competition risk to software is overblown. Analysts led by Dan Ives said that Anthropic hosted its Enterprise Agent event, where the company provided product updates that make Claude Cowork effective for enterprises. The company showed live demos from senior leadership across enterprises with an increased focus on agent-based workflows and enterprise integration. The use cases included Spotify ( SPOT ) for reduced engineering time on complex code migrations, Novo Nordisk ( NVO ) for improved clinical study documentation timelines, and Salesforce ( CRM ) for reduced timelines in Slack. "While these use cases are impressive, the reality is that these new AI tools will not rip and replace existing software ecosystems and data environments with these AI tools only as useful as the data it can reach," said Ives and his team. Wedbush highlighted some key takeaways from the product demo. Foundation Models Do Not Equal Enterprise-Grade Software Platforms The analysts said that the market is conflating foundation model capability with full enterprise software replacement, and the fear that generative AI will 'rewrite legacy systems overnight' ignores enterprise reality. "Anthropic and OpenAI demos showcase raw model intelligence, not workflow orchestration, compliance infrastructure, auditability, security controls, integrations, billing systems, uptime guarantees, or enterprise grade SLAs [Service Level Agreements]," said Ives and his team. The analysts added that companies like Microsoft ( MSFT ), Salesforce ( CRM ), ServiceNow ( NOW ), and Pegasystems ( PEGA ) are deeply embedded workflow systems of record, and replacing them would require ripping out mission-critical infrastructure, not simply layering in a large language model, or LLM. AI Increases Complexity, Complexity Expands Cyber Spend Ives and his team said that AI agents and autonomous workflows dramatically increase the attack s...
The Nasdaq Composite was up 0.8%. President Donald Trump’s State of the Union Address didn’t offer much in terms of new economic policy proposals, as the president focused on blaming Democrats for high prices and touting the economy. “Whether these gains stick through the end of the week could depend on Nvidia’s (NVDA) report after the close,” writes Bespoke Investment Group co-founder Paul Hickey...
The Nasdaq Composite was up 0.8%. President Donald Trump’s State of the Union Address didn’t offer much in terms of new economic policy proposals, as the president focused on blaming Democrats for high prices and touting the economy. “Whether these gains stick through the end of the week could depend on Nvidia’s (NVDA) report after the close,” writes Bespoke Investment Group co-founder Paul Hickey.
Hi, it’s Baiju Kalesh in Mumbai, where I’ve been chatting with Rothschild’s India country head, Aalok Shah, about trends in the market and why he has no regrets about not going into the family business. Elsewhere, an inside look at how a big sporting bet has soured for credit giant Ares. Today’s top stories Stripe expresses interest in payments rival PayPal. Warner Bros. says new Paramount offer m...
Hi, it’s Baiju Kalesh in Mumbai, where I’ve been chatting with Rothschild’s India country head, Aalok Shah, about trends in the market and why he has no regrets about not going into the family business. Elsewhere, an inside look at how a big sporting bet has soured for credit giant Ares. Today’s top stories Stripe expresses interest in payments rival PayPal. Warner Bros. says new Paramount offer may top Netflix . Revolut weighs fresh share sale on pre-IPO demand. Li’s Bolttech in talks to buy Thiel-backed MoneyHero. How a $400 million-plus bet on football turned ugly for Ares. ‘No regrets’ Aalok Shah could have had a career running the family steel components business, but two books he read in ninth grade inspired him toward investment banking. “My decision was influenced by two books: Barbarians at the Gate and Kane and Abel ,” Shah told me during an interview in Mumbai. “I was fascinated by the world of dealmaking, how transactions came together and how companies scaled up through M&As.” Shah was named Rothschild’s India country head last year. In that role, he is looking to drive two new products—IPO advisory and debt syndication—alongside its core M&A business. Rothschild recently won a mandate from the National Stock Exchange of India to oversee the process to select lead bankers, legal counsels and others for its IPO, potentially one of the country’s biggest listings. And the firm is bulking up debt advisory staff numbers for local and cross border acquisitions. Mid-sized Indian companies—listed, unlisted, founder-owned—are increasingly looking to acquire businesses in the US and Europe with deals in the region of $100 million to $500 million, Shah said. On the inbound approach, global private equity firms, sovereign wealth and pension funds should continue to drive deal activity as they sit on large allocations toward India-focused funds, according to Shah. “Everybody wants to know more about what’s happening in India,” he said. “It’ll just continue to grow.”...
Konoplytska/iStock Editorial via Getty Images Investing in EPOL to Gain Exposure to Poland's Growth in 2026 Polish equities have had stellar performance recently, as Poland has stood out as one of the strongest economies in the region in recent years. Polish equities have outperformed emerging markets by over 100 percentage points over the past five years and have also significantly outperformed o...
Konoplytska/iStock Editorial via Getty Images Investing in EPOL to Gain Exposure to Poland's Growth in 2026 Polish equities have had stellar performance recently, as Poland has stood out as one of the strongest economies in the region in recent years. Polish equities have outperformed emerging markets by over 100 percentage points over the past five years and have also significantly outperformed other European markets. Data by YCharts Poland's stock market had record performance in 2025, in line with other emerging markets, but the market's valuation is still reasonably valued on a forward earnings basis . Data by YCharts Economic growth projections for 2026 are very favorable, and economic sentiment should continue to support the stock market in 2026. Poland stands out in the region due to its superior growth, lower debt, strong FX reserves, and reasonable inflation levels. While returns will certainly not be as strong as they were in 2025, Poland still appears positioned to continue outperforming emerging markets in 2026. The iShares MSCI Poland ETF ( EPOL ) is an appropriate vehicle to gain exposure to the market, especially since ADR listings are limited and have much lower liquidity. EPOL should return over 10% in the next 12 months, driven by broader emerging market performance and country-specific catalysts. Poland's Economic Outlook Poland's economy has had strong momentum in recent years, and its outlook for 2026 also appears very favorable. Poland's economy expanded by 3.6% in 2025 , compared to only 3% in 2024. Poland's growth has been driven by a healthy balance of new investments and domestic consumption. It has also been able to hold its ground despite the slight dip in exports. Poland's economy has still had healthy growth even after exports declined in 2024 and 2025. ING Poland's economy has outpaced many European peers in terms of its post-pandemic growth. The country is still on track to continue outperforming the Central and Eastern European avera...
Chinmayi Shroff/iStock via Getty Images Commentary as of 12/31/25 The fund posted a return of 5.80% (Class I shares) for the fourth quarter of 2025. The largest contributor to relative performance was stock selection in the financials, information technology (IT), and consumer staples sectors. The largest detractors were investment decisions in the communication services, health care, and utilitie...
Chinmayi Shroff/iStock via Getty Images Commentary as of 12/31/25 The fund posted a return of 5.80% (Class I shares) for the fourth quarter of 2025. The largest contributor to relative performance was stock selection in the financials, information technology (IT), and consumer staples sectors. The largest detractors were investment decisions in the communication services, health care, and utilities sectors. The largest exposures were in the financials, industrials, and health care sectors. During the quarter, the fund increased its allocations to the industrials and real estate sectors, and reduced its exposures to the consumer discretionary and communication services sectors. Contributors Stock selection in the financials sector was the largest contributor to relative performance, specifically in the banks industry. Security selection in the IT sector, especially in the technology hardware, storage & peripherals industry, was beneficial. Investment decisions in the consumer staples sector, notably in the consumer staples distribution & retail industry, also had a positive impact. Detractors The largest detractor was investment decisions in the communication services sector, particularly in the interactive media & services industry. Security selection in the health care sector, especially in the health care equipment & supplies industry, weighed on relative performance. Stock selection in the utilities sector, notably in the multi-utilities industry, also had a negative impact. Further insight After a standout year for U.S. equities in 2025, we enter 2026 constructive but more cautious. Exuberance driven by artificial intelligence (AI) and narrow leadership raise questions about durability, and we think investor enthusiasm may be overlooking attractive opportunities beyond AI. At the same time, we see upside risks to inflation from sticky services, tight labor markets, potential energy and commodity volatility, tariff and reshoring pressures, and large-scale AI-rela...