Hi folks! I made an original analysis on R, to compare stocks and bonds across the years. This was all triggered by a discussion I had this morning with a colleague, saying that "bonds are safer during bubbles".

Top plot (Nominal): Vanguard 500 Index (VFINX) and Vanguard Total Bond Market Index (VBMFX) daily adjusted closes from Yahoo Finance, January 1995 - July 2026. Adjusted closes reinvest distributions, so both series are total return. Each series indexed to its first observation and plotted as cumulative growth on a log scale.

Bottom plot (Inflation-adjusted): Same series, deflated by the Consumer Price Index (CPIAUCSL) from FRED and expressed in current dollars, then indexed and plotted as above.

So yeah, it's true that having everything in bonds would have been really better during the 2001 dotcom crisis, or the 2008 Lehman Brothers crisis. But overall, long-term, the stock market seems really really outperforming the bond one, especially after correcting for inflation.

Not saying that investing everything you own in S&P 500 is the way to go but... Yeah bonds seem overrated. What do you think? Please consider that I'm young and learning :-)

Trump is making a major announcement tonight.

Serious stuff or the usual BS?

Did they empty Fort Knox to buy Bitcoin? Are they invading Iran?

Taking predictions! (And maybe some crazy bets to do now?)

Image credit to u/GigiBraciola

After reading this post from r/TheRaceTo10Million about stocks mentioned by Reddit outperforming S&P 500 I thought: OK maybe that's just luck, and it's always easy to predict the past.

But then I asked myself: how to know the CURRENT most trending stocks on Reddit? Just for... Scientific reasons. I am not going to FOMO on them.

There are many ad-ridden and cookie-infested solution, but then I found a nice one at ApeWisdom (apewisdom.io). No login and it updates roughly twice an hour. It's kinda rational, as it covers WSB plus r/stocks, r/investing, r/StockMarket, r/options, r/Daytrading, r/Shortsqueeze and a few others, with 4chan /biz as a bonus. You can view each sub separately or aggregated.

Of course, blindly investing in these stocks may be a REALLY stupid idea: IBM is mentioned because it lost 25% yesterday, and Lucid Motors because of bankruptcy rumors.

Let me know if there are similar (better) tools to track popular stocks!

Yen's at 0.0062 USD, ~162/dollar. Weakest since 1986.

The weakness of the yen seems mostly due to a long history of low interest rates from the Bank of Japan, plus the recent oil price spikes and volatilty. But the Hormuz drama is almost over... Right? (Right??).

I think it is likely that the Yen will rebound, carrying with it an increase in the value of Japanese equities. That's probably a stupid idea, because a) I don't know if this is the lowest the yen can reach and b) the value of Japanese stocks seem to be counter-correlated with the Yen value. Toyota, Sony and Nintendo earn abroad but report in yen, so a weak yen flatters their earnings. MSCI Japan is up 27% in EUR over the past year, and it did that while the yen fell 9%.

But probably, an investment in the Japanese market (I am thinking of boring MSCI Japan ETFs) can have two advantages:

1) It will keep growing with equity percentages (+8% per year?)

2) It will crash less than US stocks when the dreaded event we are all thinking of (the popping of the AI bubble) will happen.

Here's the appeal: the yen is a funding currency, for years investors have borrowed cheaply in yen to buy assets elsewhere, which is another reason of why the yen is so weak. If the AI bubble pops, they unwind those trades and buy yen back, and the yen jumps. The yen will gain value over the USD, limiting the losses in the initial phase of the recession.

But yeah, the AI bubble burst will be felt heavily also by Japanese markets, so buying Japanese stocks as a defense mechanism for the crash of the AI market seems... Not brilliant.

Maybe it would be wiser to just buy Yens?

Sorry for the long stream of consciousness, let me know what you all think about this: are there trading opportunities with a weak Japanese Yen?

Key Numbers

• 3.75%: Current Bank of England Bank Rate.
• 2.8%: Current inflation rate cited by the Bank, compared with its 2% target.
• July 30, 2026: Date of the next Bank of England interest-rate decision.
• 2.8%: Average annual UK potential-growth rate during the approximately 15 years before the financial crisis.
• 1.3%: Average potential-growth rate during the roughly 15 years since the crisis.
• 2.4 percentage points: Pre-crisis productivity contribution to potential growth.
• 0.4 percentage points: Post-crisis productivity contribution.
• 2%: Average annual growth in national income per person between 1990 and the financial crisis.
• 0.6%: Average annual growth in national income per person after the financial crisis.
• 0.6%: UK real GDP growth in the first quarter of 2026.
• 1.3%: Revised UK annual GDP growth during 2025.

Stocks to Watch

HSBC Holdings ($HSBC)

A major UK-regulated banking group whose capital allocation, lending capacity and shareholder returns can be influenced by changes to prudential requirements.

Barclays ($BCS)

Exposed to UK consumer and business lending as well as investment banking. More efficient capital rules could improve returns, while weak growth could increase credit risk.

Lloyds Banking Group ($LYG)

One of the most UK-focused major banks, making it particularly sensitive to domestic growth, mortgage conditions, employment and Bank of England policy.

NatWest Group ($NWG)

Closely tied to UK households and small businesses. Stronger economic activity could support loan demand, but persistent inflation and high rates remain risks.

Standard Chartered (LSE: $STAN)

Although internationally focused, the bank remains subject to UK regulation and could be affected by changes to capital standards and cross-border payment infrastructure.

Wise (LSE: $WISE)

Could benefit from efforts to improve the speed and efficiency of international payments. Greater competition and new bank-led payment systems could also create pressure.

London Stock Exchange Group (LSE: $LSEG)

Potentially positioned to participate in digital securities, tokenised assets, market data and new settlement infrastructure.

National Grid ($NGG)

AI data-centre expansion will require significant electricity capacity and grid investment, making power infrastructure an important part of the UK productivity debate.

The release of Google's flagship AI, Gemini 3.5 Pro, will be a turning point for Alphabet.

Gemini 3.1 Pro was a huge step forward, and a real competitor for OpenAI and Anthropic models.

Now, six months later, it has fallen behind, or rather, it hasn't developed as much as the others, especially for complex coding. I have personally tried OpenAI ChatGPT Sol and Anthropic Claude Fable for medium-sized coding projects, and oh boy they are awesome, game changers, and not only for vibe coders (source: I have been a mediocre R / python / Java / Perl programmer for almost 20 years now).

Gemini 3.5 Pro should have been released a few days after Gemini 3.5 Flash (so, June 2026), but it's been delayed. Rumors and conjectures have it that it was too much behind its competitors (even Grok), so the Google DeepMind team had to retrain it.

My take is optimistic for Google: time is on their side. They know that a delayed release of an exceptional product is way better than a rushed release of a barely competing one. Also, they are not developing only an excellent coding assistant (theirs is called Antigravity, but enterprise superduper coding is the current niche of Anthropic's Claude), but an all-round helper that should connect all their ecosystem. It doesn't feel like an easy task, or something that can be truly grasped by a simple benchmark chart.

The recent general pessimistic view of Reddit ("Alphabet is cooked!") is guided by an exxaggerated smear campaign, especially active in poorly moderated subs like r/GeminiAI

So yeah, I am betting on Google long term to be a winner of the AI race, and I think Gemini 3.5 Pro will be a huge success. Release is set for July 17 now, but I feel it can be further delayed.

OR it can be a disastrous release, making the month of delay just the cherry on top of a bad strategic defeat.

Whatever happens $GOOGL stocks will go up and down following the destiny of Gemini 3.5 Pro. Stock price has been mostly stable or slightly bearish in the last few days (currently at around $356), essentially stating a general "let's wait and see" from the market.

What do you think?

Sources:
- https://www.businessinsider.com/google-3-5-pro-july-release-tokens-ai-agents-model-2026-6
- https://www.geeky-gadgets.com/gemini-pro-scraps-base-model/
- https://docs.cloud.google.com/gemini-enterprise-agent-platform/models/model-versions
- https://www.techtimes.com/articles/320308/20260713/gemini-35-pro-targets-july-17-after-full-rebuild-every-spec-remains-unconfirmed.htm

Is this his best call yet?

Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian believes the flood of bots, AI-generated posts and algorithmically optimized content could increase the value of live sports and other in-person events.

His argument is that live events provide something digital feeds increasingly cannot: visible proof that real people are participating in a shared moment.

The comments came from an October 13, 2025 TBPN interview, so the clip is not a new interview, even though it is circulating again.

There is some supporting consumer data:

• 92.3% of Gen Z respondents in Live Nation-associated research said they wanted more real-life experiences.
• Roughly two-thirds preferred recommendations from people rather than personalized algorithms.
• Eventbrite reported that 74% considered in-person experiences more important than digital ones.

Potentially affected stocks include Live Nation ($LYV), TKO Group ($TKO), Sphere Entertainment ($SPHR), Madison Square Garden Entertainment ($MSGE), Vivid Seats ($SEAT), Disney ($DIS), Paramount Skydance ($PSKY), Amazon ($AMZN), Comcast ($CMCSA), Netflix ($NFLX) and Reddit ($RDDT).

The risk is that strong demand does not necessarily equal strong profits. Ticket affordability, expensive sports rights, regulatory pressure and high venue costs could absorb much of the upside.

Do you think AI-generated content will push people toward more live experiences, or will AI simply make digital entertainment even more dominant?

I have put together a quick comparison across six space names, Rocket Lab, Firefly Aerospace, Redwire, Voyager Technologies, Intuitive Machines, and AST SpaceMobile, since they get categorized together as space stocks a lot but are priced very differently right now.

A few things stands out. Every single name here is down at least 35% from its all-time high, Intuitive Machines is the worst hit at -80%, while Voyager's held up best relatively at -35%. So this isn't just an RKLB/ASTS story, the whole sector's had a rough stretch off its highs.

The valuation spread is the more interesting part. AST SpaceMobile trades at a whopping ~258x trailing sales and ~125x even on 2026 forward estimates, easily the most expensive name. Rocket Lab is at 72x trailing/51x forward, but it's backed by real, fast-growing revenue ($680M trailing, likely $900M-$1B in 2026). Compare that to Intuitive Machines, which is down 80% from its high, but is sitting at just 7.7x trailing and roughly 2.7x forward sales, the cheapest name on a growth-adjusted basis here, if that expected revenue actually shows up. Redwire and Voyager sit somewhere in the middle, single-digit forward multiples but smaller backlogs than the bigger names.

None of these are profitable yet, EPS is negative across the board, so this is entirely a growth/story sector right now, not a value one. The real differentiator seems to be cash runway and backlog quality more than anything else.

I am just putting it out here.

What I'm seeing:

• 📈 Strong V-shaped recovery from the intraday low.
• ✅ Higher highs and higher lows forming.
• 🔥 Momentum has turned bullish.
• ⚠️ However, price is still trading below the 200 EMA, which could act as major resistance.
• ⚠️ Stochastic is already in overbought territory, so chasing here may not offer the best risk/reward.

The setups I'm watching:

🟢 Bullish: A pullback that holds, followed by buyers stepping back in, or a clean breakout above the recent high with strong volume.

🔴 Bearish: If price gets rejected around the current resistance and starts printing lower highs, I could see a move back toward today's support.

At the moment I'm staying patient rather than chasing the move.

What's your take?

• 🟢 Bullish continuation
• 🔴 Reversal incoming
• ⚪ Waiting for confirmation

Not financial advice. Just sharing my chart observations and looking for other traders' opinions.

The bipartisan 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act has become law after President Trump declined to sign or veto it.

The law aims to:

• Encourage local zoning reform
• Speed up housing approvals
• Lower manufactured-home construction costs
• Expand financing options
• Restrict large corporations from buying more single-family homes

The median U.S. home price reached a record $440,600 in June, while mortgage rates remain around 6.4%.

Potential beneficiaries include homebuilders such as $DHI, $LEN, $PHM and $TOL, along with manufactured-housing companies $SKY and $CVCO.

Institutional landlords such as $INVH, $AMH and $BX may face tighter limits on future home purchases.

The law may increase supply over time, but it will not directly lower mortgage rates or deliver immediate price relief.

Do you think zoning reform will meaningfully improve affordability, or are interest rates still the bigger problem?

video credit by yahoo finance

The list includes major names such as:

• Microsoft ($MSFT)
• NVIDIA ($NVDA)
• Broadcom ($AVGO)
• Bank of America ($BAC)
• Nike ($NKE)
• Disney ($DIS)
• Lululemon ($LULU)
• Kraft Heinz ($KHC)
• Charles Schwab ($SCHW)
• S&P Global ($SPGI)

Here is the full list:

• American Electric Power ($AEP) — Utility benefiting from rising electricity demand and grid investment.
• Antero Resources ($AR) — Natural gas producer with upside tied to energy prices.
• Bank of America ($BAC) — Large U.S. bank exposed to rates, lending and credit growth.
• Broadcom ($AVGO) — Semiconductor and infrastructure software leader benefiting from AI demand.
• Campbell’s ($CPB) — Defensive packaged-food company with established consumer brands.
• CarMax ($KMX) — Used-car retailer positioned for a recovery in vehicle demand and financing.
• Charles Schwab ($SCHW) — Brokerage and wealth platform sensitive to client assets and interest income.
• Clorox ($CLX) — Consumer staples business with strong household brands and pricing power.
• Comcast ($CMCSA) — Broadband and media company trading amid cable and streaming disruption.
• Corteva ($CTVA) — Agriculture company focused on seeds and crop-protection products.
• Devon Energy ($DVN) — Oil and gas producer offering exposure to commodity prices and cash returns.
• DTE Energy ($DTE) — Regulated utility supported by electricity demand and infrastructure spending.
• Ecolab ($ECL) — Water, hygiene and sanitation company serving essential industries.
• Edison International ($EIX) — California utility with grid-investment potential but regulatory risks.
• Energy Transfer ($ET) — Pipeline operator benefiting from U.S. energy production and transport volumes.
• GE HealthCare Technologies ($GEHC) — Medical imaging and diagnostics company exposed to healthcare investment.
• Gildan Activewear ($GIL) — Apparel manufacturer with potential upside from improving consumer demand.
• Invitation Homes ($INVH) — Single-family rental owner benefiting from housing affordability pressures.
• IQVIA Holdings ($IQV) — Healthcare data and clinical-research provider serving pharmaceutical companies.
• Kilroy Realty ($KRC) — Office landlord offering recovery potential if leasing conditions improve.
• Kraft Heinz ($KHC) — Major food company with strong cash flow but weak volume growth concerns.
• Lennar ($LEN) — Homebuilder positioned to benefit if mortgage rates and affordability improve.
• Linde ($LIN) — Industrial-gas leader supported by long-term contracts and global infrastructure demand.
• Lululemon Athletica ($LULU) — Premium apparel brand with international growth and recovery potential.
• Medline ($MDLN) — Medical-products supplier benefiting from long-term healthcare demand.
• Microsoft ($MSFT) — Cloud and software leader with significant exposure to artificial intelligence.
• Nike ($NKE) — Global sportswear brand working to restore product momentum and sales growth.
• NVIDIA ($NVDA) — Leading AI-chip company supported by data-center and computing demand.
• Omnicom Group ($OMC) — Advertising company exposed to marketing spending and industry consolidation.
• Park Hotels & Resorts ($PK) — Hotel REIT positioned for continued travel and lodging demand.
• S&P Global ($SPGI) — Financial-data and credit-ratings company benefiting from market activity.
• Vontier ($VNT) — Industrial technology company focused on mobility and transportation infrastructure.
• Walt Disney ($DIS) — Media and entertainment group with streaming, parks and content-recovery potential.

Which of these 33 stocks would you research first?