Editor's note: Seeking Alpha is proud to welcome ZK Research as a new contributing analyst. You can become one too! Share your best investment idea by submitting your article for review to our editors. Get published, earn money, and unlock exclusive SA Premium access. Click here to find out more » Getty Images Introduction Sandisk ( SNDK ) has soared since its spinoff from Western Digital last yea...
Editor's note: Seeking Alpha is proud to welcome ZK Research as a new contributing analyst. You can become one too! Share your best investment idea by submitting your article for review to our editors. Get published, earn money, and unlock exclusive SA Premium access. Click here to find out more » Getty Images Introduction Sandisk ( SNDK ) has soared since its spinoff from Western Digital last year, climbing as much as 1,851% by March 24th. After a run like that, investors naturally get cautious and start jumping at every piece of concerning news. Throw in a macro crisis and a sensational blog post hyping a shiny new technology, and you've got the perfect recipe for an eye-popping 11% single-day drawdown. Sure, you could say we shouldn't read too much into one day's price action - and you'd be right. Still, after wading through the investor reactions, I felt it was worth stepping back to clarify a few things. Without a solid grasp of the fundamentals and the bigger picture in the memory market, it's easy to draw the wrong conclusions. I rate Sandisk a Strong Buy. The company is exceptionally well-positioned in the NAND flash market at a time when the other dominant NAND Flash producers are deliberately constraining NAND wafer output to prioritize higher-margin HBM capacity. Combined with Sandisk's locked-in, low-cost wafer supply through its extended joint venture with Kioxia, this dynamic should drive both margin expansion and market share gains. Meanwhile, Google's TurboQuant announcement poses zero threat to NAND demand; on the contrary, more efficient AI models are likely to accelerate data generation and storage needs. At current levels, the risk/reward strongly favors the upside. In this article, I'll walk you through the memory market, Sandisk's place in it, and what Google's TurboQuant algorithm might actually mean for memory stocks. Main Product We can divide computer memory into two main segments: primary and secondary memory. Primary memory is used for im...
Drivers refuel their vehicles at a China Petroleum and Chemical Corp. gas station on Wanping Road in Shanghai on the evening of March 23, 2026. Photo: VCG As the Iran war enters its fifth week, the navigation crisis in the Strait of Hormuz remains unresolved. Although three Asian countries have announced agreements with Iran to allow their vessels to pass, traffic through the strait is still runni...
Drivers refuel their vehicles at a China Petroleum and Chemical Corp. gas station on Wanping Road in Shanghai on the evening of March 23, 2026. Photo: VCG As the Iran war enters its fifth week, the navigation crisis in the Strait of Hormuz remains unresolved. Although three Asian countries have announced agreements with Iran to allow their vessels to pass, traffic through the strait is still running far below normal levels. Meanwhile, international oil prices are approaching the $110 a barrel mark. Elevated oil prices are weighing on economic growth worldwide, exerting particularly heavy pressure on small, open economies.
sommart/iStock via Getty Images Commentary as of 12/31/25 The fund posted returns of -1.53% (Institutional shares) and -1.59% (Investor A shares, without sales charge) for the fourth quarter of 2025. The fund outperformed its benchmark, led by positioning in the health care, life science, and billboards sectors. The apartments, manufactured homes, and self-storage sectors hampered relative returns...
sommart/iStock via Getty Images Commentary as of 12/31/25 The fund posted returns of -1.53% (Institutional shares) and -1.59% (Investor A shares, without sales charge) for the fourth quarter of 2025. The fund outperformed its benchmark, led by positioning in the health care, life science, and billboards sectors. The apartments, manufactured homes, and self-storage sectors hampered relative returns. During the quarter, the fund had overweight positions in the office, billboards, and health care sectors, and underweight holdings in the industrials, single tenant, and apartments sectors. Contributors Detractors At a security level, overweight positions in Brookdale Senior Living (+59 basis points) and PACS (+34bps), and an underweight position in Alexandria Real Estate Equities (+38bps) contributed. At a sector level, overweight positions in health care (+75bps) and billboards (+26bps), coupled with an underweight holding in life science (+34bps), were beneficial The main detractors at a security level were an underweight holding in Ventas (-32bps) and overweight exposures to DigitalBridge (-25bps) and Extra Space Storage (-14bps). Underweight positions in the apartments (-25bps) and self-storage (-16bps) sectors, along with an overweight exposure to the manufactured homes (-17bps) sector, were unhelpful. Click to enlarge Further insight We maintain a selective and balanced approach. Valuations for the asset class remain attractive relative to broader equities, with the real estate investment trust enterprise value to earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization multiple sitting two standard deviations below historical averages. Additionally, the prevailing environment of capital scarcity has created continued pressure on supply. As a result, we anticipate an upward impact on rental growth, which should further support the sector's risk-reward dynamics. Average annual total returns (%) as of 12/31/25 4Q25(not annualized) YTD(not annualized) 1 Year 3 ...
Getty Images Fund performance Institutional Class shares of Columbia Strategic Municipal Income Fund returned 1.49% for the three months ending December 31, 2025. The fund's benchmark, the Bloomberg Municipal Bond Index, returned 1.56% for the same period. The fund modestly underperformed its benchmark, with security selection and an overweight to non-rated bonds the primary detractors, while yiel...
Getty Images Fund performance Institutional Class shares of Columbia Strategic Municipal Income Fund returned 1.49% for the three months ending December 31, 2025. The fund's benchmark, the Bloomberg Municipal Bond Index, returned 1.56% for the same period. The fund modestly underperformed its benchmark, with security selection and an overweight to non-rated bonds the primary detractors, while yield-curve positioning and positive yield carry provided positive contributions. Market overview Elevated political uncertainty was front and center during the quarter, with the end of the longest-ever federal government shutdown. The shutdown disrupted economic data flow and added uncertainty to interest-rate expectations and risk markets. In addition, concerns about U.S. Federal Reserve independence escalated, due to political criticism of Chair Powell and speculation about his successor, and contributed to long-end interest-rate instability. Elevated tariffs and a weakening employment picture continued to pressure inflation and complicate the Fed's policy path. The Fed continued its rate-cutting cycle with two reductions of 25 basis points (bps) in the federal funds rate during the quarter. (A basis point is 1/100 of one percent.) The 175 bps in cuts since September 2024 left the rate in the 3.50%–3.75% range at year-end. Returns were meaningfully positive across all asset classes during the quarter, with the S&P 500 Index returning 2.66%, the Russell 2000 Index rising 2.19%, the MSCI ACWI (ex US) Index up 5.05%, the Bloomberg US Treasury Index returning 0.90% and the Bloomberg Municipal Bond Index up 1.56%. Treasury yields were mixed during the quarter: lower by 14 bps in the 2-year space, flat in 5- and 10-year bonds and higher by 11 bps in 30-year issues, with the 10-year yield ending the quarter at 4.18%. The municipal yield curve flattened during the quarter, as yields increased on the short end, declined in the intermediate space and were relatively flat beyond 20 yea...
Attackers stole a long-lived npm access token belonging to the lead maintainer of axios , the most popular HTTP client library in JavaScript, and used it to publish two poisoned versions that install a cross-platform remote access trojan. The malicious releases target macOS, Windows, and Linux. They were live on the npm registry for roughly three hours before removal. Axios gets more than 100 mill...
Attackers stole a long-lived npm access token belonging to the lead maintainer of axios , the most popular HTTP client library in JavaScript, and used it to publish two poisoned versions that install a cross-platform remote access trojan. The malicious releases target macOS, Windows, and Linux. They were live on the npm registry for roughly three hours before removal. Axios gets more than 100 million downloads per week. Wiz reports it sits in approximately 80% of cloud and code environments, touching everything from React front-ends to CI/CD pipelines to serverless functions. Huntress detected the first infections 89 seconds after the malicious package went live and confirmed at least 135 compromised systems among its customers during the exposure window. This is the third major npm supply chain compromise in seven months. Every one exploited maintainer credentials. This time, the target had adopted every defense the security community recommended. One credential, two branches, 39 minutes The attacker took over the npm account of @jasonsaayman, a lead axios maintainer, changed the account email to an anonymous ProtonMail address, and published the poisoned packages through npm ’s command-line interface. That bypassed the project’s GitHub Actions CI/CD pipeline entirely. The attacker never touched the Axios source code. Instead, both release branches received a single new dependency: plain-crypto-js@4.2.1 . No part of the codebase imports it. The package exists solely to run a postinstall script that drops a cross-platform RAT onto the developer's machine. The staging was precise. Eighteen hours before the axios releases, the attacker published a clean version of plain-crypto-js under a separate npm account to build publishing history and dodge new-package scanner alerts. Then came the weaponized 4.2.1. Both release branches hit within 39 minutes. Three platform-specific payloads were pre-built. The malware erases itself after execution and swaps in a clean package.j...
Chipmakers drove a rebound in South Korean stocks as hopes that the Iran war may be nearing an end revived risk appetite. The Kospi Index advanced as much as 6.8%, with Samsung Electronics Co. and SK Hynix Inc. extending gains to more than 10% and 9%, respectively. A surge in futures briefly triggered a halt in program trading by the exchange. The rally follows a four-day slide that had pushed the...
Chipmakers drove a rebound in South Korean stocks as hopes that the Iran war may be nearing an end revived risk appetite. The Kospi Index advanced as much as 6.8%, with Samsung Electronics Co. and SK Hynix Inc. extending gains to more than 10% and 9%, respectively. A surge in futures briefly triggered a halt in program trading by the exchange. The rally follows a four-day slide that had pushed the equity benchmark to the tip of a bear market . A sense of relief swept across global markets after President Donald Trump said that he foresaw the US ending the war on Iran within two to three weeks. His speech on an update about the war is scheduled for Wednesday 9 p.m. Washington time. Korean stocks are rallying due to a “global risk-on shift driven by the rebound in US equities, with a tech-led bounce lifting the Korean market,” said Ha SeokKeun , chief investment officer at Eugene Asset Management. Also in play is a technical rebound from short-term oversold conditions, triggering short covering and bargain buying, he said. The Iran war triggered sharp volatility in Korean equities, which swung from being the world’s top performers through February to the worst-performing market in March.
Shares of enterprise software giant Oracle (NYSE:ORCL) jumped 5% in the afternoon session after the company initiated layoffs as part of a strategic shift to focus on artificial intelligence and cloud services, a move investors viewed positively.
Shares of enterprise software giant Oracle (NYSE:ORCL) jumped 5% in the afternoon session after the company initiated layoffs as part of a strategic shift to focus on artificial intelligence and cloud services, a move investors viewed positively.
Morsa Images/DigitalVision via Getty Images Investment Action I had a buy rating for NIQ Global Intelligence plc ( NIQ ) previously, as I thought the growth outlook was clear and there was a solid path to margins expanding as AI helps to lower the cost base. I remain bullish on NIQ. Margin is expanding faster than I thought, and more importantly, the growth profile is better than I thought. AI is ...
Morsa Images/DigitalVision via Getty Images Investment Action I had a buy rating for NIQ Global Intelligence plc ( NIQ ) previously, as I thought the growth outlook was clear and there was a solid path to margins expanding as AI helps to lower the cost base. I remain bullish on NIQ. Margin is expanding faster than I thought, and more importantly, the growth profile is better than I thought. AI is also proving to be a positive thing for NIQ. The Margin Story Has Turned More Tangible NIQ's ability to expand margin has been a key anchor to my bullish view, and the 25.4% adj. EBITDA margin in Q4 2025 was extremely encouraging. My thesis was that AI would lower processing costs and lift NIQ's margins over time, but it was debatable back then since it was still a "show me story." That has changed today. As noted, the Q4 margin expanded above 25% (which was my FY28 target, by the way), and NIQ delivered 30.2% adj. EBITDA growth in Q4. Let me note that was not due to a one-off tailwind. The margin expansion was due to operating leverage and AI-led productivity gains, both of which I expected. There are great examples to support this. For instance, in Germany, agentic AI is helping to code tens of thousands of products in hours instead of days. It has also helped to cut data costs by ~70% and helped accelerate product launches into new markets. In sales, AI helped sellers to speed up faster access to materials and reduced proposal time and admin work by 40%. And for the most common area that AI can improve, customer support, NIQ also saw manual workload decline by 17%, while self-serve usage went up to 81% through the NIQ service suite. These are significant improvements that translate to huge cost savings, and the benefits, as you can see, are showing up. Core Intelligence segment I also think my view that NIQ is a GDP+ growth story may not be accurate. Looking at the most recent numbers, clearly, NIQ is growing much faster. In Q4, annualized intelligence subscription reven...
Anthropic PBC inadvertently released source code for its popular Claude AI agent, raising questions about its operational security and sending developers on a search for clues about the startup’s plans. “Earlier today, a Claude Code release included some internal source code. No sensitive customer data or credentials were involved or exposed,” an Anthropic spokesperson said in an emailed statement...
Anthropic PBC inadvertently released source code for its popular Claude AI agent, raising questions about its operational security and sending developers on a search for clues about the startup’s plans. “Earlier today, a Claude Code release included some internal source code. No sensitive customer data or credentials were involved or exposed,” an Anthropic spokesperson said in an emailed statement. “This was a release packaging issue caused by human error, not a security breach. We’re rolling out measures to prevent this from happening again.” The leak of basic source code — the second slip-up in just a week — triggered a discussion in the community around new revelations of how Anthropic’s popular coding agent works. Developers said on X they were poring through the details to try and figure out how the startup intended to evolve the platform. Several experts also raised concerns about potential security vulnerabilities in light of the unintended exposure. The leak comes days after Fortune reported that the company accidentally made thousands of files publicly available, including a draft blog post that detailed a powerful upcoming model known internally as both “Mythos” and “Capybara” that presents cybersecurity risks.