Palantir Co-Founder Joe Lonsdale on the growing important of AI in defense
CNBC's Morgan Brennan sat down with Palantir Co-Founder Joe Lonsdale at the Reagan National Economic Forum to discuss how AI is powering growth in the defense sector and how artificial intelligence could change the workforce.
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CNBC Sport: Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr on Stephen Curry's leadership style
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Yahoo
3 hours ago
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Billionaire Stanley Druckenmiller Sold Palantir and Amazon and Is Piling Into This Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stock Instead
Palantir and Amazon have been two of the biggest winners in generative AI. Druckenmiller has traded in and out of each stock, but he's moved away from them recently. His focus has shifted toward a tech giant that is key to the entire AI industry, and its stock is cheap. 10 stocks we like better than Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing › Back in 2022, billionaire Stanley Druckenmiller made a sizable bet on chipmaker Nvidia. The company has gone on to become one of the biggest winners of advancements in generative AI, for which its graphics processing units (GPUs) are well suited. Druckenmiller has also been an investor in Palantir Technologies (NASDAQ: PLTR), which has used AI to improve its software and expand its market. Druckenmiller has also made a lot of money by investing in Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) throughout his career, taking advantage of the cloud computing leader's growth. But Druckenmiller is shifting his attention and his money away from these AI giants. He sold out of Nvidia about a year ago (although he says he regrets that decision). In the first quarter, he got rid of his remaining shares of Palantir and trimmed his Amazon investment by more than half. In their place, he's buying a different company that stands to benefit from continued spending on AI development but whose stock looks undervalued. Both Amazon and Palantir are producing strong results as enterprise customers spend heavily on AI software and development. Palantir has seen its U.S. commercial business take off thanks to its Artificial Intelligence Platform (AIP). Businesses are expanding their use cases for AIP, and the service is reducing the need for clients to hire new workers. That has helped Palantir grow revenue extremely quickly without much overhead, resulting in strong earnings growth. Amazon remains the largest public cloud platform in the world with Amazon Web Services (AWS). The company is seeing strong demand for AI services on AWS, and it's spending as quickly as it can to meet that demand, including plans to pour over $100 billion into capital expenditures (mostly for AWS) in 2025. The operating margin for AWS has soared to nearly 40%, pushing Amazon's operating profits considerably higher. But Druckenmiller's decision to reduce his stake in these companies seems to be based purely on valuation. Indeed, Palantir is one of the most expensive stocks on the market trading at over 75 times management's 2025 revenue outlook. Druckenmiller has also traded in and out of Amazon stock based on price, and shares reached an all-time high of more than $240 per share last quarter. With all that in mind, it appears Druckenmiller has found a suitable replacement in the AI space that offers exceptional value at its current price. With hyperscalers like Amazon committing to investing billions of dollars per year in AI data centers, the growth in AI spending seems to be far from over. One company stands behind practically all of the silicon chips you'll find in those data centers: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (NYSE: TSM), or TSMC. TSMC is the leading chip manufacturer in the world, commanding a dominant share of the market. Its lead is cemented by the best-in-class technology required for making the most cutting-edge chips. That's why companies like Nvidia choose TSMC to print and package its chips. Using another manufacturer would likely result in a higher cost with an inferior product. TSMC benefits from a virtuous cycle. It's the largest chip manufacturer in the world, which means it brings in a ton of revenue. It can, therefore, invest more in research and development and capital expenditures to maintain its technological lead and ensure enough capacity to meet growing demand. That, in turn, brings in more revenue. That said, chip fabrication is a capital-intensive, cyclical business. If demand falls, TSMC is still responsible for maintaining its expensive equipment, even if it's not producing as many chips. The good news for investors is that TSMC also expects strong growth in AI spending through the end of the decade. Management believes AI-related revenue will double this year, and the company could produce a compound annual growth rate of close to 40% for AI chips through 2029. Overall, management is guiding for 20% compound annual growth for the entire business. Revenue is up over 43% year over year through the first four months of 2025. Despite the potential for strong revenue growth over the next five years with excellent gross and operating margin profiles, the stock trades for less than 21 times forward earnings estimates. There's a reason to discount the stock somewhat, given the ongoing global trade war launched by the Trump Administration and the geopolitical risk surrounding Taiwan. But the current valuation still looks extremely attractive for investors, and Druckenmiller seems to agree. Druckenmiller tiptoed into the stock in the second half of last year, investing about $20 million, but he more than quintupled his investment in the first quarter, making it one of his biggest holdings. With TSMC's share price sitting around where it started the year, there is still an opportunity to join Druckenmiller with an investment in TSMC. Before you buy stock in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $656,825!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $865,550!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 994% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 172% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join . See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of June 2, 2025 John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Adam Levy has positions in Amazon and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon, Nvidia, Palantir Technologies, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. Billionaire Stanley Druckenmiller Sold Palantir and Amazon and Is Piling Into This Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stock Instead was originally published by The Motley Fool Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
CNBC
4 hours ago
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CrowdStrike CEO talks DOJ inquiry: 'We stand by the accounting of those transactions'
In a Wednesday interview with CNBC's Jim Cramer, CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz indicated the cybersecurity outfit is confident in its finances as it faces a government inquiry about information related to a massive outage last year, along with deals and other matters. '"Someone asks a question, we're going to cooperate. It's an inquiry, and we'll give them the answers they need and, and we'll go from there," Kurtz said. "We stand by the accounting of those transactions." Last July, CrowdStrike suffered a major IT outage that disrupted businesses around the world, including airlines, hospitals and financial services firms. CrowdStrike attributed the issues to a faulty software update, "not a security incident or cyberattack," Kurtz said at the time. Crowdstrike released its quarterly report Tuesday night, which sent shares plummeting during Wednesday's session, down 5.77% by close. Although the company posted solid earnings and revenue, it disappointed Wall Street with a weaker-than-expected revenue forecast for the current quarter. Kurtz told Cramer that customers have been sticking with the company despite the outage, saying CrowdStrike has seen a 97% retention rate. He also explained that the company's package to help customers and partners deal with the issue lead to an $11 million loss in the quarter. "I think we handled it the right way, I think customers respect us for that," Kurtz said. "And, ultimately, we gained greater intimacy with those customers, and they're buying more through Falcon Flex." Click here to download Jim Cramer's Guide to Investing at no cost to help you build long-term wealth and invest
