In some places, a half-birthday allows you to learn to drive or join the army. But for others, it’s a way to embrace the midpoint of each year of life Six months after Lorraine C Ladish turned 59, she began to get emails – from fashion stores, the supermarket, the opticians – offering her a discount. Her half-birthday was coming up, the emails said. She used one of the offers to buy a magenta leat...
In some places, a half-birthday allows you to learn to drive or join the army. But for others, it’s a way to embrace the midpoint of each year of life Six months after Lorraine C Ladish turned 59, she began to get emails – from fashion stores, the supermarket, the opticians – offering her a discount. Her half-birthday was coming up, the emails said. She used one of the offers to buy a magenta leather jacket and posted her celebration on TikTok. Ladish is a digital content creator who says she makes “a living out of sharing my age online”. But what really appealed to her about marking the midpoint between birthdays was the chance to “squeeze every second, every month, out of my late 50s”. Ladish is not alone. Half-birthdays are having a moment. Or, at least, a fraction of a moment. On TikTok there are half-cake designs, half-birthday banners, half-birthday cards – sometimes, they are whole ones brutally sheared – and half-candles. One French brand even released a comma candle for cake decorators wishing to celebrate a half-birthday decimally. Continue reading...
William Harrison, a US soldier stationed in the region, was convicted and hanged for the murder of Patsy Wylie On the afternoon of 25 September 1944, William Harrison, a US soldier stationed in Northern Ireland , visited the cottage of the Wylie family in Killycolpy, County Tyrone, and offered to buy treats for the children. He had visited before and was, if not a friend, at least known to the fam...
William Harrison, a US soldier stationed in the region, was convicted and hanged for the murder of Patsy Wylie On the afternoon of 25 September 1944, William Harrison, a US soldier stationed in Northern Ireland , visited the cottage of the Wylie family in Killycolpy, County Tyrone, and offered to buy treats for the children. He had visited before and was, if not a friend, at least known to the family. Mary Wylie let him take her seven-year-old daughter, Patricia, better known as Patsy, across the fields to the shops. Continue reading...
The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical concepts This week’s question: Which organisms are most beneficial to humans without us realising? The inside of my jumpers and cardigans never become bobbled, despite the friction that must occur. So why can’t the pieces be sewn togeth...
The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical concepts This week’s question: Which organisms are most beneficial to humans without us realising? The inside of my jumpers and cardigans never become bobbled, despite the friction that must occur. So why can’t the pieces be sewn together inside out? Helen, by email Send new questions to nq@theguardian.com . Continue reading...
Ginevra Bonina wins the 2026 ZEKE award for systemic change for her project Out for Blood, which highlights period poverty in India and the women and girls fighting to reclaim the body ‘as a site of struggle, resistance and liberation’. Ebrahim Alipoor wins the award for documentary photography for his long-term project, Bullets Have No Borders, which showcases the lives of border porters who carr...
Ginevra Bonina wins the 2026 ZEKE award for systemic change for her project Out for Blood, which highlights period poverty in India and the women and girls fighting to reclaim the body ‘as a site of struggle, resistance and liberation’. Ebrahim Alipoor wins the award for documentary photography for his long-term project, Bullets Have No Borders, which showcases the lives of border porters who carry goods across the treacherous Iran-Iraq mountains to support their families Continue reading...
Introduction I'm naturally someone who tries to find the good in any situation, even when it comes to investing during high amounts of volatility. But when a stock is experiencing high volatility, this can be attributed to a number of factors. In the case of Prospect Capital Corporation ( PSEC ), a BDC I've been bearish on for close to a year, their steep discount and double-digit yield look good ...
Introduction I'm naturally someone who tries to find the good in any situation, even when it comes to investing during high amounts of volatility. But when a stock is experiencing high volatility, this can be attributed to a number of factors. In the case of Prospect Capital Corporation ( PSEC ), a BDC I've been bearish on for close to a year, their steep discount and double-digit yield look good on the surface. But beneath it, deteriorating fundamentals, declining NAV, and a small dividend cut suggest the pain may not be over. In this article, I discuss Prospect Capital's latest earnings, what caused the post-earnings sell-off, and why investors should expect more underperformance going forward. Previous Thesis I covered Prospect Capital back in September, reiterating them as a sell due to financial deterioration. Despite the 20% dividend yield and deep discount to their net asset value, weak dividend coverage signaled ongoing financial deterioration and the further potential for investors to see capital loss. Since the stock is down close to 5% in comparison to the S&P ( SP500 ), it is up over 10% in the past 8 months. PSEC's portfolio shift towards more defensive loans and robust liquidity were positives. But I believed these to be too little too late, with more dividend cuts and underperformance likely going forward. Seeking Alpha Another PSEC-like Quarter PSEC's Q3 earnings looked similar to previous earnings reports. Often times when I say this, it usually means that the company delivered a solid earnings report . But in the case of PSEC, this meant their Q3 saw more financial deterioration. Net investment income beat estimates by $0.05 but declined from the previous quarter's $0.19. Expectedly, this declined on a total dollar amount as well, down 14.3% from $91 million to $78 million. While BDCs can experience declines on a per-share basis, something I look for to assess potential deterioration in their credit quality is growth on a total dollar amount basis....
On the We Study Billionaires podcast (episode TIP813), Stig Brodersen laid out a bear case that puts Microsoft’s Office cash cow squarely in the crosshairs of generative AI. His framing matters because it targets the one franchise inside Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) that has resisted every prior assault: the per-seat productivity suite that Google could never crack. ... The AI Threat Google Couldn’t Mo...
On the We Study Billionaires podcast (episode TIP813), Stig Brodersen laid out a bear case that puts Microsoft’s Office cash cow squarely in the crosshairs of generative AI. His framing matters because it targets the one franchise inside Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) that has resisted every prior assault: the per-seat productivity suite that Google could never crack. ... The AI Threat Google Couldn’t Mount: Why This Expert Says Microsoft’s $70 Billion Cash Cow Is Vulnerable Now
Over the past year, Alphabet Inc. has gone from an artificial intelligence afterthought to the one firm in the market with dominant positions in nearly every aspect of the technology. Now it’s on the brink of overtaking AI chip giant Nvidia Corp. as the largest company in the world. “Alphabet holds a significant spot in almost every corner of the AI ecosystem, and the combination of everything it ...
Over the past year, Alphabet Inc. has gone from an artificial intelligence afterthought to the one firm in the market with dominant positions in nearly every aspect of the technology. Now it’s on the brink of overtaking AI chip giant Nvidia Corp. as the largest company in the world. “Alphabet holds a significant spot in almost every corner of the AI ecosystem, and the combination of everything it offers puts it in a prime position to be the biggest winner of AI,” said Luke O’Neill , chief investment officer at CooksonPeirce Wealth Management, which owns stakes in Alphabet and Nvidia . Google’s parent closed Friday with a market capitalization of $4.8 trillion. Nvidia was below that level on Tuesday, but a three-day rally into the end of the week pushed it to $5.2 trillion . The gap between the two has narrowed considerably over the past six months, as Alphabet shares have been on a tear, including a 34% gain in April , its best month since 2004. On Oct. 31, Nvidia’s market capitalization was $4.9 trillion and Alphabet’s was less than $3.4 trillion. Since then, Alphabet’s stock price has soared 43% while Nvidia’s is up just 6.3%, trailing the S&P 500 Index and the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 Index . Investors say it’s logical that Alphabet would ultimately seize the title of world’s largest company because its tentacles reach into so many important parts of the technology industry and the AI trade. Nvidia may be the leader in building AI chips, but Alphabet has a rival product that’s gaining favor. It also owns a bunch of massive businesses like Google Search, Google Cloud, YouTube and Waymo. In addition, Alphabet’s Gemini AI model is considered one of the best in the industry, and the company is a significant investor in Anthropic, which has another leading model in Claude. “Nvidia is a great company, but it has the potential to be far more cyclical should AI spending slow down,” O’Neill said. “Alphabet is so diversified that if one business falters, the others can pick u...
(Bloomberg) -- Over the past year, Alphabet Inc. has gone from an artificial intelligence afterthought to the one firm in the market with dominant positions in nearly every aspect of the technology. Now it’s on the brink of overtaking AI chip giant Nvidia Corp. as the largest company in the world.Most Read from BloombergTrump Wants to Make H-1B Workers More Expensive for US EmployersOnline Mob Fue...
(Bloomberg) -- Over the past year, Alphabet Inc. has gone from an artificial intelligence afterthought to the one firm in the market with dominant positions in nearly every aspect of the technology. Now it’s on the brink of overtaking AI chip giant Nvidia Corp. as the largest company in the world.Most Read from BloombergTrump Wants to Make H-1B Workers More Expensive for US EmployersOnline Mob Fuels 6,000% Stock Rally in Obscure SpaceX RivalBillionaire Duke of Westminster to Sell £700 Million of
Chinese officials have signalled privately a growing willingness to retaliate against the United States, buoyed by confidence in their economic leverage as US President Donald Trump prepares to visit Beijing this week. Sources told the South China Morning Post that officials in Beijing had grown bolder since playing its rare earths card in October and were now less worried about tariffs. The sourc...
Chinese officials have signalled privately a growing willingness to retaliate against the United States, buoyed by confidence in their economic leverage as US President Donald Trump prepares to visit Beijing this week. Sources told the South China Morning Post that officials in Beijing had grown bolder since playing its rare earths card in October and were now less worried about tariffs. The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to comment publicly, said...
In this article DIS NFLX GOOGL Follow your favorite stocks CREATE FREE ACCOUNT watch now VIDEO 5:17 05:17 The YouTube gurus who made careers out of viral videos Media When wildlife TV personality Forrest Galante sat down for his monthly call with YouTube consultant Paddy Galloway, he received some bad news. No more turtles. Galante has 2.5 million YouTube subscribers . He's been producing wildlife...
In this article DIS NFLX GOOGL Follow your favorite stocks CREATE FREE ACCOUNT watch now VIDEO 5:17 05:17 The YouTube gurus who made careers out of viral videos Media When wildlife TV personality Forrest Galante sat down for his monthly call with YouTube consultant Paddy Galloway, he received some bad news. No more turtles. Galante has 2.5 million YouTube subscribers . He's been producing wildlife programming for more than a decade, including a docuseries on Animal Planet and a show on the History Channel. He owns his own production company. Generally speaking, Galante's got a good feel for what his audience wants. But it was Galloway, something of a guru in the still-burgeoning YouTube creator economy, who identified that whenever Galante showed turtles in his videos, viewer engagement dropped. It was consistent and significant. "Maybe it's just turtles are more commonplace and they're kind of slow and they don't really do much," Galloway said in an interview. "We noticed three or four videos in a row, when Forrest was showing turtles, the viewers were just kind of disengaged, and they were leaving." This is the kind of insight that many of the most popular YouTube creators, including Jimmy Donaldson, known to the world as MrBeast , and sports creator Jesse Riedel, also known as Jesser , have paid Galloway to provide. As YouTube creatorship cracks open millions, or potentially even billions, of dollars for the most-watched personalities, Galloway has made a name for himself as one of the best of a growing class of YouTube consultants — a bona fide YouTube whisperer. "I think he's an absolute genius," said Galante. "Super smart guy," Riedel told CNBC. "I don't want to say Paddy has changed my life completely," said Humphrey Yang, a former financial advisor whose YouTube channel has more than 2 million subscribers. "But he's definitely helped a lot." YouTube's media dominance YouTube will showcase many of its top creators on Wednesday in New York City's Lincoln Cente...
The Netflix logo on one of the company's buildings in the Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles, Jan. 20, 2026. Daniel Cole | Reuters Streaming companies are discovering that their most valuable customers may not be the ones paying the most. Instead, it's increasingly the viewers who watch the most. The change is being driven by a move away from a subscription-only model to one that combines subsc...
The Netflix logo on one of the company's buildings in the Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles, Jan. 20, 2026. Daniel Cole | Reuters Streaming companies are discovering that their most valuable customers may not be the ones paying the most. Instead, it's increasingly the viewers who watch the most. The change is being driven by a move away from a subscription-only model to one that combines subscription fees with advertising. Because ads are sold based on viewership, the more time a subscriber spends watching, the more revenue that viewer generates. In March, Netflix raised prices for the second time in just over a year, pushing its standard ad-free plan to around $20 a month , versus an ad-supported tier at $9, signaling that how much a subscriber watches may matter as much if not more than what they pay upfront. "It's a double payday," said Kevin Krim, president and CEO of EDO, a company that measures the impact of advertising across streaming and linear TV. "As long as the ad-tier subscriber is engaged with the content and the ads, they will be at least as valuable or more than ad-free subscribers," Krim said. After years of resisting advertising, Netflix is now leaning heavily into that model , rapidly building out its advertising business alongside subscriptions. "We're making good progress, and the opportunity ahead of us is massive," Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters said after the company's latest earnings report. Disney's Hulu has long combined subscription and advertising revenue, and Paramount , Warner Bros. Discovery and Comcast have pushed similar strategies across their streaming platforms. Netflix's advantage, however, comes from both its scale and how much its audience watches. According to the company's Q4 2025 shareholder update , it has over 325 million subscribers globally, and viewers collectively watched more than 95 billion hours of content in the first half of 2025 alone, providing far more opportunity than competitors to generate advertising reven...
Erik Isakson/DigitalVision via Getty Images In my last article on Riot Platforms ( RIOT ), I placed too much weight on the company as a Bitcoin miner. The company's shift to building digital infrastructure became a major catalyst for the stock so far in 2026. Riot has been focusing its efforts on building data centers, which are in demand to support AI, 5G, and cloud technology. Investors have bee...
Erik Isakson/DigitalVision via Getty Images In my last article on Riot Platforms ( RIOT ), I placed too much weight on the company as a Bitcoin miner. The company's shift to building digital infrastructure became a major catalyst for the stock so far in 2026. Riot has been focusing its efforts on building data centers, which are in demand to support AI, 5G, and cloud technology. Investors have been awarding Riot for this strategy shift as the stock increased 90% year-to-date in 2026. I admit I was wrong to think that Riot would be significantly harmed by Bitcoin's bear market. That theory was based on Riot's legacy business of mining Bitcoin and the stock's previous strong correlation to crypto. I still think there is a good probability for Bitcoin to experience another leg down as the cryptocurrency is still technically in a bear market. The bear market would be over for Bitcoin if the price sustains a move above $98k. Bitcoin's price is still in a bear flag formation on the weekly chart. Plus, Bitcoin's bear markets have typically lasted for about one year from the price peak to the bottom in each cycle. This suggests that Bitcoin's bear market could last into September 2026. Bitcoin (BTC-USD) Weekly Chart w/ RSI & MACD (TradingView) I do think RIOT would have some exposure to another leg down for Bitcoin. However, conditions are different this time with RIOT's move towards digital infrastructure. So, the downside risk in relation to Bitcoin will most likely not be as drastic as in past cycles. We have observed Riot's stock resilience in this current cycle as investors place more weight in the potential growth for the company's digital infrastructure business. Positive Developments in Digital Infrastructure RIOT's strategy to focus on its digital infrastructure business is likely to provide the company with multiple years of strong above-average growth. The global data center market size is expected to grow at about 11% per year to reach $902 billion by 2033 . Tha...
Tim Robberts/DigitalVision via Getty Images Real Estate Weekly Outlook U.S. equity markets extended their record-setting rally this week, while oil prices retreated from recent highs, as investors balanced tentative progress toward U.S.-Iran peace against a resilient domestic growth backdrop and a surprisingly upbeat corporate earnings season. Reports that U.S. and Iranian officials were working o...
Tim Robberts/DigitalVision via Getty Images Real Estate Weekly Outlook U.S. equity markets extended their record-setting rally this week, while oil prices retreated from recent highs, as investors balanced tentative progress toward U.S.-Iran peace against a resilient domestic growth backdrop and a surprisingly upbeat corporate earnings season. Reports that U.S. and Iranian officials were working on a potential peace framework helped ease some of the most acute energy-shock concerns, even as clashes near the Strait of Hormuz underscored the fragility of the monthlong ceasefire. Markets instead focused on signs that the U.S. economy continues to weather the disruption better than feared, underscored by payroll data showing back-to-back monthly job gains for the first time in nearly a year. Earnings momentum also remained a major tailwind, with first-quarter profit growth tracking well ahead of early-season expectations and on pace for its strongest expansion since 2021. Hoya Capital The S&P 500 advanced 2.4% on the week, notching its sixth straight weekly gain and touching another series of fresh record highs. Mega-cap outperformance was the dominant theme across equity markets this week: the Nasdaq 100 surged 5.5% - enough to move back ahead of small-caps on a year-to-date basis for the first time this year - as the AI trade roared back to life, highlighted by a nearly 30% advance from the trio of Micron, Intel, and AMD. The Small-Cap 600 gained a more modest 0.7%, reflecting a renewed reversal of the early-year value rotation. Growth stocks have now outpaced their value counterparts for the fifth time in six weeks. At the sector level, Technology, Materials, and Consumer Cyclicals posted sizable gains this week, while Energy and Utilities stocks were major laggards. Real estate equities were mostly higher as a very strong REIT earnings season wrapped up with notable upside from billboard, hotel, cold storage, and medical office REITs. The Equity REIT Index gained 0....
Investors are caught on a tightrope — watching a very narrow band of tech stocks lift the stock market to fresh record highs, while looking down below for signs of trouble.
Investors are caught on a tightrope — watching a very narrow band of tech stocks lift the stock market to fresh record highs, while looking down below for signs of trouble.
As you approach age 65, you need to think about Medicare and what choices you will make when you enroll in the health insurance program. You can sign up for Medicare during a certain seven-month period: the month in which you turn 65, and the three months before and after it. Don't be late, because the penalty for missing the deadline can be severe . I'm occasionally asked what I plan to do when I...
As you approach age 65, you need to think about Medicare and what choices you will make when you enroll in the health insurance program. You can sign up for Medicare during a certain seven-month period: the month in which you turn 65, and the three months before and after it. Don't be late, because the penalty for missing the deadline can be severe . I'm occasionally asked what I plan to do when I enroll in Medicare -- and my answer has actually changed over time. Image source: Getty Images. Continue reading
Hong Kong police have arrested two drivers linked to a viral video depicting two trucks cutting lanes and allegedly racing each other, the South China Morning Post has learned. A source familiar with the matter confirmed to the SCMP on Sunday that two drivers had been arrested for suspected dangerous driving after the footage was widely circulated on social media over the weekend. The compilation ...
Hong Kong police have arrested two drivers linked to a viral video depicting two trucks cutting lanes and allegedly racing each other, the South China Morning Post has learned. A source familiar with the matter confirmed to the SCMP on Sunday that two drivers had been arrested for suspected dangerous driving after the footage was widely circulated on social media over the weekend. The compilation of dashcam footage was recorded last Friday at around 5.20pm. It showed the interior of a tunnel...
Sundry Photography/iStock Editorial via Getty Images Investment Thesis Keysight Technologies ( KEYS ) is certainly not the first name that comes to mind when investors think about artificial intelligence. And that is what makes it so interesting. I am going to be completely honest; I first found out about it from a speaker at a conference. He presented his fund's top ten holdings, and Keysight was...
Sundry Photography/iStock Editorial via Getty Images Investment Thesis Keysight Technologies ( KEYS ) is certainly not the first name that comes to mind when investors think about artificial intelligence. And that is what makes it so interesting. I am going to be completely honest; I first found out about it from a speaker at a conference. He presented his fund's top ten holdings, and Keysight was number nine. That was the reason I decided to do some research on the company. I bought shares of Keysight stock in December 2025, and thus far, I have been extremely satisfied. As I mentioned previously, the investment is related to AI; however, it is not how we normally associate it. Keysight does not create chips, GPUs, cloud services, data centers, energy sources, or servers. Every significant technology cycle has its more mundane, technical, and often duller side. In my opinion, those types of companies hold some of the best investment opportunities. Additionally, AI exists beyond just chip manufacturing. It is also present in cables, signal transmission, optical interconnects, network systems, testing, simulation, and validation. A huge amount of work is occurring behind the scenes to revamp and transform many things. One must validate that each component will communicate properly before installing an AI infrastructure. This is exactly what Keysight does. Furthermore, Keysight is exposed to several major cycles at the same time: AI infrastructure, data center networking, semiconductors, defense, space, advanced wireless, and next-generation connectivity architectures. Overall, I love the business model. I love the position Keysight is in. I love that Keysight represents a relatively "behind the scenes," yet very tangible, AI play. Investors have recognized this opportunity, and Keysight shares are not cheap by any means. However, I believe Keysight should be viewed differently: not simply as a cyclical test and measurement company, but as a structural enabler of the ...