Trump Disclosure Shows $57 Million in Earnings From Early Crypto Push
The president's assets were valued at roughly $1.7 billion, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis.
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Washington Post
30 minutes ago
- Washington Post
Taiwan adds China's Huawei and SMIC to export control list
TAIPEI, Taiwan — Taiwan's Commerce Ministry has added Chinese chipmakers Huawei Technologies and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC) to its export control list, as trade and technology frictions between the self-ruled island, China and the United States increase. Inclusion on the 'strategic high-tech commodities' list means Taiwanese companies will need to obtain export permits before selling goods to the respective companies. Other entities on the list include organizations such as the Taliban and al-Qaeda, as well as other companies in China, Iran and elsewhere. The export control entities list was last updated on Sunday. Neither Huawei nor SMIC initially commented on their inclusion. Huawei and SMIC have both been sanctioned by the U.S. The two companies are producing China's most advanced homegrown artificial intelligence chips in an effort to compete with U.S.-based Nvidia and supply Chinese tech firms with the much-needed chips amid export curbs. Taiwan is home the world's largest chipmaker, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), a major supplier for Nvidia. Last November, the U.S. ordered TSMC to halt supplies of certain advanced chips to Chinese customers as part of broader efforts to restrict China's access to cutting-edge technologies. China claims self-ruled Taiwan as its own territory, to be annexed by force if necessary. The U.S. is Taiwan's biggest unofficial ally and arms seller.
Yahoo
32 minutes ago
- Yahoo
2 Top Stocks to Profit Off the AI and Cryptocurrency Booms
Advanced Micro Devices is positioned for explosive growth in the AI chip market. Coinbase Global is preparing itself to be a leading financial services platform for the digital economy. 10 stocks we like better than Advanced Micro Devices › Artificial intelligence (AI) and cryptocurrency are two high-growth markets that offer promising return potential. Investing in the right stocks could pay off handsomely in the coming years. Here are two stocks that could deliver. AI is expected to increase the global economy by $15.7 trillion by 2030, according to PwC. This is a huge opportunity for one of the leading chipmakers, Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ: AMD). AMD stock pulled back sharply to start the year, but it has begun to recover. The business is set to supply a leading AI company with its new chips, which could benefit the stock. The last few years have seen a lot of chip investment go toward AI training, which is the process of feeding large data sets to AI models to make them smarter. Nvidia capitalized on the demand for AI training with its graphics processing units (GPUs). While AMD was late to the party, its first data center GPU, the MI300, was launched in late 2023 and raked in $5 billion of revenue last year. Management still sees a $500 billion opportunity as it launches new GPUs designed for AI inferencing, which takes a model to the next level by teaching it to make decisions on its own from new data. This is expected to be a huge market, and AMD has positioned its new chip lineup to take advantage of the opportunity. The company reported accelerating revenue growth last quarter, with data center revenue up 57% year over year. It gained business from one of the leading AI model developers that is using its Instinct GPUs for daily inferencing needs. AMD will launch its Instinct MI400 GPU in 2026, and OpenAI just announced plans to use the chip. This is a huge win and signals growing momentum for its data center business. Demand for AI inferencing hardware is expected to grow from $106 billion in 2025 to $255 billion by 2030, according to MarketsandMarkets. AMD is well positioned for this opportunity, making the recent dip a great buying opportunity. The cryptocurrency market was worth more than $3 trillion as of June 12, yet only 7% of the global population uses cryptocurrency, according to the crypto exchange Kraken. As interest in digital currencies continues to grow, Coinbase Global (NASDAQ: COIN) could grow along with it. Coinbase is a leading cryptocurrency exchange with more than $300 billion in assets on the platform. It saw a sharp increase in revenue last year as trading volumes soared, which has sent the stock up nearly 600% since 2022. But the shares have been volatile over the last few years, reflecting the downturn in the markets a few years ago. The risk for holding the stock is when markets decline, trading volumes drop, which depresses revenue. However, Coinbase has a lot of opportunity to attract more assets to its platform. It is expanding the number of trading products and services to appeal to institutional investors, which make up the majority of its trading volume. Its push into crypto options and stablecoins, as well as improvements to its trading infrastructure are positioning it to attract more customers. As demand for digital assets continues to grow, the exchange should see increasing trading volumes and revenue. And there are strong signals pointing to rising demand for cryptocurrencies over the long term. A recent report from Coinbase showed that 60% of Fortune 500 executives are working on blockchain initiatives, which serve as the digital ledger for crypto transactions. Another strong signal supporting the long-term future of the market was President Donald Trump's recent executive order to establish a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve for the U.S. government. These are bullish indicators for crypto and Coinbase. There are a lot of places to buy and sell cryptocurrency, but Coinbase is on a mission to become not just a leading crypto exchange but also a leading financial services platform. This makes the stock a great way to benefit from this booming market. Before you buy stock in Advanced Micro Devices, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Advanced Micro Devices 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 $653,702!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $870,207!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 988% — 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 9, 2025 John Ballard has positions in Advanced Micro Devices and Nvidia. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Advanced Micro Devices, Bitcoin, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool recommends Coinbase Global. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. 2 Top Stocks to Profit Off the AI and Cryptocurrency Booms was originally published by The Motley Fool Sign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Statistically and Historically Speaking, 2 of Wall Street's Highest-Flying Stocks Are in Epic Bubbles That I Fully Expect to Burst
Although nothing is guaranteed on Wall Street, select historical and statistical events have a knack for predicting the future. One of the market's preeminent artificial intelligence (AI) stocks is running on borrowed time. Meanwhile, a company undertaking a unique operating strategy is rife with red flags. 10 stocks we like better than Palantir Technologies › For well over a century, Wall Street has been a stomping ground for wealth creation. Although getting from Point A to Point B involves everything but a straight line, no asset class has come particularly close to matching the annualized return of stocks for more than 100 years. While patience is often rewarded, it doesn't stop investors from occasionally chasing after the market's highest-flying stocks in the hope of snagging game-changing returns over a shorter time frame. Though we often think about emotion-driven investing impacting equities when the stock market's major indexes are taking the elevator lower, we can see this fear of missing out, also known as "FOMO," take place when select stocks are delivering jaw-dropping gains. To preface the following discussion, calling for a top in any stock or major stock index lies somewhere between difficult and impossible. If there were a metric or correlative event that could, with 100% accuracy, guarantee directional moves in the broader market or specific stocks, everyone would be using it. Nevertheless, certain data points and events have strongly correlated with moves higher or lower in the major stock indexes or select sectors, industries, or major companies throughout history. What follows are two of Wall Street's highest-flying stocks that, statistically and historically speaking, are running on borrowed time before their epic bubbles burst. The first seemingly unstoppable stock in a monumental bubble that's eventually going to burst is artificial intelligence (AI) goliath Palantir Technologies (NASDAQ: PLTR), whose shares have gained more than 2,000% since the beginning of 2023. To be upfront, just because I believe Palantir is in an epic bubble, it doesn't mean I don't appreciate the company. Palantir can be viewed as a fantastic business that happens to have a historically unsustainable valuation. One of the prime reasons investors have gravitated to Palantir stock is its sustainable competitive advantage. Its AI- and machine learning-inspired operating platforms, Gotham and Foundry, lack one-for-one replacements at scale. This means Palantir doesn't have to look over its proverbial shoulder and worry about its customers being taken away or jumping ship to a rival. This cash-flow predictability is what helped push Palantir to recurring profitability well ahead of Wall Street's expectations. Palantir is also generating consistent double-digit annual sales growth from Gotham, which collects and analyzes data for the U.S. government and helps with military mission planning and execution. Having the federal government as a customer ensures the bills are being paid. While Palantir's business is profitable and it offers a sustainable moat, there are two historical/statistical issues that can't be overlooked or swept under the rug. To begin with, every game-changing technology or innovation for more than 30 years has navigated its way through a bubble-bursting event early in its expansion. The simple fact that most businesses haven't optimized their AI solutions and/or aren't generating a positive return on their AI investments all but confirms that investors have, yet again, overestimated the early-stage utility and broad-based early adoption of a next-big-thing trend. If there's a bright spot for Palantir, it's that Gotham lands multiyear government contracts and Foundry is a subscription-based, enterprise-focused service. In short, sales won't fall off a cliff if the AI bubble bursts. However, investor sentiment would almost certainly weigh heavily on Palantir stock. The other issue is Palantir's valuation -- specifically its price-to-sales (P/S) ratio. Megacap stocks on the leading edge of previous next-big-thing innovations peaked at P/S ratios ranging from 30 to 43. As of the closing bell on June 12, Palantir was trading at 108 times its trailing-12-month sales. To put this into perspective, Palantir stock could trade sideways for the next five years, and its P/S ratio would still likely fall within the aforementioned range where previous bubbles popped for companies on the cutting edge of a next-big-thing investment. That's how far above the statistical norm Palantir's valuation currently sits, and it's why I believe the company's share price will inevitably tumble. The second high-flying, widely owned stock that, based on history and statistics, is headed for disaster is Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) (the company formerly known as MicroStrategy). Since 2023 began, shares of Strategy have skyrocketed by almost 2,600%. The tailwind has been CEO Michael Saylor going all-in on Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC), the world's largest cryptocurrency by market cap. Saylor's company became the first self-proclaimed "Bitcoin Treasury Company," with the goal of acquiring and holding this digital gold perpetually. This approach has lured investors because of Bitcoin's perceived competitive advantages, which include being the largest and most well-known digital currency, as well as its perceived scarcity. Only 21 million tokens are slated to be mined. Based on an 8-K filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on June 9, Strategy has spent approximately $40.8 billion to purchase its 582,000 Bitcoin, which works out to an average cost per token of $70,086. Put another way, Saylor's company owns 2.77% of all Bitcoin that will be mined. While this approach has thus far proven naysayers wrong, I believe it's historically and statistically destined to fail. From a historical standpoint, we've witnessed leverage-driven scenarios like Strategy's Bitcoin approach play out before -- and they've ended with tears for investors. One of the more memorable examples was that of banks securitizing loans, including subprime loans, which was one of the catalysts that led to the subprime mortgage crisis and near-financial meltdown during the Great Recession. Though a case can be made that Strategy hasn't gone overboard with its usage of traditional debt instruments, it is leveraging its preferred and common stock through a steady stream of issuances to fund all its Bitcoin purchases and, concurrently, prop up the spot price of the world's leading digital currency. History tells us this isn't sustainable. Since it began trading in the early 2010s, Bitcoin has navigated its way through over a half-dozen declines of at least 50%. Even though its peaks have decisively surpassed its troughs, Strategy's own SEC filings note the possibility of potentially being forced to sell its Bitcoin holdings at a disadvantageous price if it can't meet its debt obligations. In other words, steep bear markets are a built-in norm for Bitcoin and crypto, and Saylor's heavily levered model hasn't been tested for such an event. Statistically, Strategy's valuation also fails the sniff test relative to the net asset value (NAV) of its digital holdings. The 582,000 Bitcoin it holds equate to a NAV of $60.45 billion, based on a Bitcoin price of $103,868, as of this writing in the late evening of June 12. However, Strategy's market cap ended June 12 at $106.1 billion. Backing out a generous valuation of $1 billion for the company's money-losing software operations leaves a $44.65 billion premium (73.9%) to NAV. Instead of buying Bitcoin on an exchange at $103,868, investors are ponying up $180,588 to own Bitcoin via Strategy, which makes absolutely no sense and is unsustainable. The icing on the cake is that virtually all of Bitcoin's first-mover and competitive advantages are gone or misperceived. It failed the real-world utility test in El Salvador, isn't the fastest or cheapest blockchain network by a long shot, and its scarcity is held in place by computer code that, technically, can be changed by developer consensus. It wouldn't be a surprise if the next inevitable crypto winter decimates Strategy's highly levered and dilutive operating model. Before you buy stock in Palantir Technologies, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Palantir Technologies 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 $653,702!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $870,207!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 988% — 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 9, 2025 Sean Williams has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Bitcoin and Palantir Technologies. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. Statistically and Historically Speaking, 2 of Wall Street's Highest-Flying Stocks Are in Epic Bubbles That I Fully Expect to Burst was originally published by The Motley Fool
