(RTTNews) - Manufacturing activity in the U.S. expanded for the fourth consecutive month in April, according to a report released by the Institute for Supply Management on Friday.
(RTTNews) - Manufacturing activity in the U.S. expanded for the fourth consecutive month in April, according to a report released by the Institute for Supply Management on Friday.
J Studios/DigitalVision via Getty Images Investment Thesis At the heart of the bull thesis on SoFi Technologies ( SOFI ) is the quiet power of an underappreciated force: rising cross-buy intensity. In adopting 43% of available products, SoFi has made its size work to its advantage. Costs of customer acquisition do not go away; instead, they are leveraged through multiple revenue channels per custo...
J Studios/DigitalVision via Getty Images Investment Thesis At the heart of the bull thesis on SoFi Technologies ( SOFI ) is the quiet power of an underappreciated force: rising cross-buy intensity. In adopting 43% of available products, SoFi has made its size work to its advantage. Costs of customer acquisition do not go away; instead, they are leveraged through multiple revenue channels per customer. As customers increasingly use SoFi’s services, the company makes money from lending, interchange, and brokerage without a corresponding marketing expense. Add deposit-funded lending, now generating positive economics, and SoFi’s business begins to tick along smoothly. The bottom line shows the impact, with expanding EBITDA, better economics per customer, and the promise of 12%+ net income margins. Despite a rough year-to-date and weak sentiment with the stock down nearly 40%, SOFI remains a long-term play, not suited for investors chasing short-term momentum. Data by YCharts SoFi’s Flywheel Is Spinning Faster SoFi has an expanding finance ecosystem. As of Q1-FY26, there are 14.7 million members with a 35% YoY expansion, whereas Products hit 22.2 million with a 39% YoY increase. With that, members originated 43% of products, which is expanding from 40% in Q4-FY25 and 36% in Q1-FY25. This means expansion in cross-buying volume. This rising cross-buy rate distributes customer acquisition costs (CACs) across revenue per user. On the expenses side, amortizing marketing expenses over the member life is in line with acquisition outlays with debit interchange and brokerage revenue. SoFi’s accounting capitalizes commissions paid to parties for acquiring (money and invest) members. Now, spreading these costs lowers expenses and boosts EBITDA. As a result, Q1 EBITDA hit $340 million with expanding margins to 31%. Moreover, I believe cross-selling products to a user base accelerates revenue growth without increases in marketing expenditure. I see this in Net revenue that expanded ...
We just covered Here is How Billionaire Philippe Laffont’s Top 10 Picks Crushed The Market. Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ:AVGO) ranks #8 (see the Here is How Billionaire Philippe Laffont’s Top 5 Picks Crushed The Market). YTD Stock Performance: +22% Philippe Laffont’s Stake: $1.90 Billion Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ:AVGO) is up about 22% so far this year amid rising demand […]
We just covered Here is How Billionaire Philippe Laffont’s Top 10 Picks Crushed The Market. Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ:AVGO) ranks #8 (see the Here is How Billionaire Philippe Laffont’s Top 5 Picks Crushed The Market). YTD Stock Performance: +22% Philippe Laffont’s Stake: $1.90 Billion Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ:AVGO) is up about 22% so far this year amid rising demand […]
atakan/iStock via Getty Images Thinking about risk tolerance may be an afterthought for some investors, but it’s a crucial component. The reason: a key part of investing success is ensuring that an individual owns a portfolio that’s appropriate for a given risk tolerance. Identifying a suitable risk tolerance can be tricky because what an investor thinks he can endure in theory may not be realisti...
atakan/iStock via Getty Images Thinking about risk tolerance may be an afterthought for some investors, but it’s a crucial component. The reason: a key part of investing success is ensuring that an individual owns a portfolio that’s appropriate for a given risk tolerance. Identifying a suitable risk tolerance can be tricky because what an investor thinks he can endure in theory may not be realistic in practice. That’s a problem because a mismatch can lead to panic-selling at or near market bottoms. The recent market volatility has been a useful stress test for gauging how someone reacts under pressure - panic, patience, or something in between. Monitoring reactions during market corrections may provide a more accurate read on the capacity to handle downturns compared with questionnaires and other efforts to quantify investor behavior. In other words, market volatility is more than short‑term noise to be endured. It’s also a diagnostic tool that can reveal the degree of emotional resilience and decision-making under stress. Consider the drawdown history of the S&P 500 Index, proxied in the chart below by the SPDR S&P 500 ETF ( SPY ). The latest selloff, following the start of the war with Iran, left the S&P down nearly 9% from its previous high. The drawdown in the spring of 2025, during the tariff-related decline, cut the market even deeper - a 19% peak-to-trough drop at one point. Observing behavior during these events offers an opportunity to determine an investor’s true level of risk tolerance. Market declines can get much worse, as the 2008 crash reminds. During that event, the S&P fell nearly 52% from its previous high. Volatility is a feature, not a bug, of financial markets, which highlights the potential for trouble if investors overestimate their risk tolerance. That’s a non-trivial issue because everyone suffers from various behavioral biases, according to numerous studies over the years. Examples include overconfidence bias (investors overestimate their a...
Funtap/iStock via Getty Images How ETFs are helping reshape fixed income investing Fixed income ETFs are off to a record start to 2026, with U.S. inflows of $150 billion as of March 31, nearly 50% higher than inflows in the same timeframe last year. 1 We believe these flows reflect the evolved role bond ETFs are playing in portfolios and how they’re helping investors navigate the defining trends s...
Funtap/iStock via Getty Images How ETFs are helping reshape fixed income investing Fixed income ETFs are off to a record start to 2026, with U.S. inflows of $150 billion as of March 31, nearly 50% higher than inflows in the same timeframe last year. 1 We believe these flows reflect the evolved role bond ETFs are playing in portfolios and how they’re helping investors navigate the defining trends shaping the market today, as detailed in A durable foundation: How bond ETFs are powering a portfolio revolution . These trends include: Elevated cash balances The demand for income, helping drive the rise of active and systematic fixed income ETF strategies Expanding private market allocations Accelerating digital asset exposure How are elevated cash balances impacting fixed income investing? One of the most visible trends in recent years has been the rise in cash balances, which currently sit at over $18.8 trillion in bank deposits and $7.7 trillion in money market funds. 2 Higher short‑term rates have made cash feel more attractive, especially during periods of uncertainty. But as interest rates moved lower in prior cycles, cash yields tended to reset quickly. 3 For investors looking to put cash to work without taking a large step up in risk, short‑duration bond ETFs can offer potential incremental yield pickup while maintaining daily liquidity and flexibility. Figure 1: Short Duration Bond ETFs to help manage excess cash allocations 30-Day SEC Yields of Select iShares Fixed Income ETFs (%) Chart description: Bar chart showing that yields on short-term bond ETFs are currently higher than those of conventional savings vehicles. Performance data represents past performance and does not guarantee future results. Investment return and principal value will fluctuate with market conditions and may be lower or higher when you sell your shares. Current performance may differ from the performance shown. For standardized performance and most recent month end performance, click on t...
It's been a wild past few months for the market. Indeed, after falling 8% in March alone, the S&P 500 has since rallied more than 12% from that low. While stocks are now teasing the prospect of another big pullback, nobody really knows what's coming next. This sort of volatility, of course, is the very chaos that long-term investors are supposed to be ignoring. The so-called "smart money" remains ...
It's been a wild past few months for the market. Indeed, after falling 8% in March alone, the S&P 500 has since rallied more than 12% from that low. While stocks are now teasing the prospect of another big pullback, nobody really knows what's coming next. This sort of volatility, of course, is the very chaos that long-term investors are supposed to be ignoring. The so-called "smart money" remains focused on individual companies' fundamentals and the bigger economic backdrop. Here's a closer look at three growth names investors might want to consider stepping into in the midst of all the chaos while you can get into all of them at an attractive price. Continue reading
Earnings Call Insights: Arcosa (ACA) Q1 2026 Management View "We kicked off the year with strong results, made meaningful progress on our strategic transformation, and increased our full year guidance for continuing operations," said (President, CEO & Director Antonio Carrillo). "On April 1, we announced the completion of the $450 million barge divestiture, a pivotal step in simplifying our portfo...
Earnings Call Insights: Arcosa (ACA) Q1 2026 Management View "We kicked off the year with strong results, made meaningful progress on our strategic transformation, and increased our full year guidance for continuing operations," said (President, CEO & Director Antonio Carrillo). "On April 1, we announced the completion of the $450 million barge divestiture, a pivotal step in simplifying our portfolio," (President, CEO & Director Carrillo) said, adding, "Now with 2 segments, we're fully focused on Construction Products and Engineered Structures" and "We intend to use the net proceeds from the barge sale to reinvest in our growth platforms and manage our debt." "In March, we completed a $60 million acquisition of a natural aggregates operation located in Florida with accretive margins," (President, CEO & Director Carrillo) said, while also noting, "We continue to have an active bolt-on M&A pipeline complemented by a healthy set of high-return organic growth projects." "Segment revenues increased 5% and adjusted segment EBITDA decreased slightly," said (Chief Financial Officer Gail Peck) on Construction Products, while highlighting aggregates strength: "freight-adjusted revenues increased roughly 6%, driven by 2% pricing growth and 4% volume" and "Adjusted cash gross profit margin increased 220 basis points." "Segment revenues increased 4%, led by mid-teen growth in our utility and related structures businesses," (Chief Financial Officer Peck) said on Engineered Structures, adding, "Segment margin increased to a record 21.1%" and "We ended the quarter with record backlog for utility and related structures of $558 million, up 28% from the start of the year." Outlook "At the midpoint of our guidance range, we anticipate revenues of $2.65 billion, up 6% year-over-year and adjusted EBITDA of $565 million, up 11% year-over-year," said (President, CEO & Director Carrillo), adding, "We expect margin to expand to a record 21.3%." "At the midpoint of our guidance range, we expe...
On Thursday, the publicly traded spaceflight company Virgin Galactic shared on social media a new photo of its next-generation spaceship being towed outside of its factory in Mesa, Arizona. You remember Virgin Galactic, right? The space tourism company was founded 22 years ago by Sir Richard Branson to bring spaceflight to the masses. Hundreds of people began buying tickets to space nearly two dec...
On Thursday, the publicly traded spaceflight company Virgin Galactic shared on social media a new photo of its next-generation spaceship being towed outside of its factory in Mesa, Arizona. You remember Virgin Galactic, right? The space tourism company was founded 22 years ago by Sir Richard Branson to bring spaceflight to the masses. Hundreds of people began buying tickets to space nearly two decades ago. And after a long, and at times deadly, development campaign, the company reached outer space (defined, somewhat controversially , as an altitude of 80 km and above) in December 2018. The company began flying passengers in May 2021 with its VSS Unity spacecraft, and impressively completed six spaceflights in 2023. But a few months later, in June 2024 , Virgin Galactic stopped flying VSS Unity to focus on the development of its next-generation vehicle capable of more frequent, lower-cost spaceflights. Read full article Comments
Earnings Call Insights: Vista Gold (VGZ) Q1 2026 Management View “During the first quarter, we completed a public offering for aggregate gross proceeds of $44.85 million and net proceeds of $42 million,” said President, CEO & Director Frederick H. Earnest, adding that 2026 priorities include “all activities leading to permit modification approvals to align the existing permits with the 2025 feasib...
Earnings Call Insights: Vista Gold (VGZ) Q1 2026 Management View “During the first quarter, we completed a public offering for aggregate gross proceeds of $44.85 million and net proceeds of $42 million,” said President, CEO & Director Frederick H. Earnest, adding that 2026 priorities include “all activities leading to permit modification approvals to align the existing permits with the 2025 feasibility study designs,” “completing predevelopment optimizations,” “building an Australian-based team to lead project development,” and “advancing project execution planning.” “We ended the first quarter with a strong balance sheet,” said Chief Financial Officer Douglas Tobler, specifying “cash on hand of $52.7 million compared to a cash balance of $13.6 million at year-end 2025,” and adding, “we also continue to have a clean balance sheet with no debt at March 31, 2026.” “In January, we appointed Dr. Francis Kuranchie as our approvals manager based in Darwin,” said CEO Earnest, describing a multi-step approvals path that includes “approval is expected early in Q3” for certain approvals under review, while “the final or last authorization, under the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act [is] expected sometime in the middle or latter part of 2027.” Outlook “The results that we're achieving are being completed efficiently and support our target of commencing detailed engineering and design in 2027,” said CFO Tobler. “Completing this work along with the permit modifications are important prerequisites to initiating detailed engineering design, which we expect to begin in 2027,” said CEO Earnest, who also tied the decision point to permitting, stating the company is working “to manage the approvals process to achieve final results in the most expedient manner possible.” Compared with the prior quarter’s framing, management again emphasized a 2027 engineering start, with CEO Earnest previously stating, “Completing this work is an important prerequisite to init...
Greg Jackson argues against costly investments in UK’s power grid that are adding to household bills The boss of the UK’s biggest energy supplier has suggested that some households would accept an occasional electricity blackout in exchange for much lower energy bills. A year on from Europe’s largest power outage – which left tens of millions of people in Spain and Portugal without trains, metros,...
Greg Jackson argues against costly investments in UK’s power grid that are adding to household bills The boss of the UK’s biggest energy supplier has suggested that some households would accept an occasional electricity blackout in exchange for much lower energy bills. A year on from Europe’s largest power outage – which left tens of millions of people in Spain and Portugal without trains, metros, traffic lights, ATMs, phone connections and internet access – the chief executive of Octopus Energy argued against costly investments in the UK’s power grid that are adding to household bills. Continue reading...
Win McNamee/Getty Images News Fannie Mae ( FNMA ) was downgraded at Wedbush Securities after first-quarter earnings , with no mention or news on IPO plans. The residential mortgage financier's Q1 net interest income fell short of analyst expectations, but revenue surpassed consensus. "FNMA reported Q1 earnings results that were modestly below our expectations, with the headline story being expense...
Win McNamee/Getty Images News Fannie Mae ( FNMA ) was downgraded at Wedbush Securities after first-quarter earnings , with no mention or news on IPO plans. The residential mortgage financier's Q1 net interest income fell short of analyst expectations, but revenue surpassed consensus. "FNMA reported Q1 earnings results that were modestly below our expectations, with the headline story being expense discipline, where the administrative expense ratio declined to 10.2% from 14.0% just four quarters ago, reflecting aggressive workforce and real estate footprint reductions," said analysts Michael Piccolo and Henry Coffey. "Single-family was the standout segment on the highest acquisition volume since 2022, driven by a refi surge, and multifamily was the key risk as delinquencies rose, which marks five consecutive quarters of deterioration," said the analysts in a research note. "While the political momentum towards an IPO or recap & release has arguably stalled, in our view, until after the midterms, the company is making favorable progress at improving efficiency and building capital," said the note. "Again, there was no mention or news on IPO plans or recap & release. Given shares of FNMA are now trading above our $8 per share price target, we are downgrading our rating to Neutral (from Outperform) on valuation," added the research note. Wedbush's rating aligns with Seeking Alpha authors as well as the Quant rating of Hold. Meanwhile, the Wall Street analysts grade the stock as Buy. More on Federal National Mortgage Association Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA) Q1 2026 Earnings Call Prepared Remarks Transcript Federal National Mortgage Association 2026 Q1 - Results - Earnings Call Presentation Tracking Bill Ackman's Pershing Square 13F Portfolio - Q4 2025 Update Fannie Mae outlines VantageScore 4.0 adoption as Q1 net income reaches $3.7B Fannie Mae's Q1 net interest income trails consensus, revenue beats
Three Fed Officials Explain Why They Dissented, Blasting Fed's "Easing Bias" This morning, three Fed officials said they dissented over this week’s policy statement because it was no longer appropriate to signal the Fed’s next move was still likely to be an interest-rate cut. “I believe the FOMC should offer a policy outlook that signals that the next rate change could be either a cut or a hike, d...
Three Fed Officials Explain Why They Dissented, Blasting Fed's "Easing Bias" This morning, three Fed officials said they dissented over this week’s policy statement because it was no longer appropriate to signal the Fed’s next move was still likely to be an interest-rate cut. “I believe the FOMC should offer a policy outlook that signals that the next rate change could be either a cut or a hike, depending on how the economy evolves ,” Minneapolis Fed president Neel Kashkari said in an essay released on Friday morning. “This could tighten financial conditions somewhat today, pushing back against a high-inflation scenario that could require an even stronger monetary policy response in the future.” This week’s move marked the fifth dissent for Kashkari, formerly a vocal dove , who is currently one of the longest serving reserve bank president among the 12 regional leaders. His last vote against the majority of the committee was in 2020, when he opposed statement language that he saw as leaning too much toward rate hikes. In 2017, he dissented against each of the three interest rate increases that year. In his essay, Kashkari laid out two scenarios in which the Middle East conflict could play out. If the Straight of Hormuz were to reopen fairly quickly, underlying inflation would likely be around 3% for a third straight year, pressuring consumers and perhaps the labor market as well. That would likely require the Fed to stay on hold for an extended period before lowering rates gradually, he said. If the conflict were to drag on, though, it would drive up both inflation and unemployment in the US. Given that inflation has been above the Fed’s target for five years, that could unmoor long-term inflation expectations and lead the Fed to raise interest rates in a bid to reverse that, he said. “Rate increases, potentially a series of them, could be warranted, even at the risk of further weakness to the labor market,” Kashkari said of that scenario. Cleveland Fed president Be...
Apple reported excellent fiscal second-quarter results on Thursday, boding well for several technology stocks with exposure to the "Magnificent Seven" name, according to two shops on the Street. In a pair of analyst notes, Stifel and KeyBanc said that semiconductor stocks Cirrus Logic , Qorvo and Ceva and wireless networking services provider Skyworks Solutions are likely to benefit from the iPhon...
Apple reported excellent fiscal second-quarter results on Thursday, boding well for several technology stocks with exposure to the "Magnificent Seven" name, according to two shops on the Street. In a pair of analyst notes, Stifel and KeyBanc said that semiconductor stocks Cirrus Logic , Qorvo and Ceva and wireless networking services provider Skyworks Solutions are likely to benefit from the iPhone maker's growth in the latest period. The company's growth has been partially fueled by robust demand for its iPhones, which is especially likely to boost the group of pick-and-shovel plays, according to Stifel. "CRUS sees incremental upside from overall iPhone strength given its > 90% revenue exposure, with more content in Pros. Strong iPhone demand and modem shifts benefit SITM and CEVA, while iPhone demand supports revenue targets for SWKS and QRVO despite looming socket loss threats," Stifel analyst Tore Svanberg said Thursday in a note to clients. Apple clocked $57 billion in iPhone sales during the quarter, a strong showing even though it was slightly short of the $57.2 billion expected by analysts polled by LSEG due to advanced node capacity constraints. Stifel expects smartphone sales to pick up in the June quarter as supply chain issues improve. KeyBanc estimates Apple will sell 58.3 million iPhones in its fiscal third quarter, implying revenue of $55.5 billion, which is 20% above the consensus on a year-over-year basis. Later this year, Apple is also expected to roll out the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max, which could stoke a surge in smartphone sales. While Apple shares were up more than 4% in trading Friday, all of the derivate plays were trading in the red. Cirrus and Ceva were down more than 1%, while Qorvo and Skyworks were down about 3% each.