Latest news with #DanHowley

AMD is Nvidia Blackwell's 'closest' competition, strategist says

Yahoo

06-08-2025

Business
Yahoo

AMD is Nvidia Blackwell's 'closest' competition, strategist says

Advanced Micro Devices' (AMD) forecast left out revenue from its MI308 chip as China license reviews continue, raising fresh questions about the company's artificial intelligence (AI) momentum. Yahoo Finance Technology Editor Dan Howley and Kimberly Forrest, Bokeh Capital Partners founder and chief investment officer, break down what's holding AMD back in its race against Nvidia (NVDA). To watch more expert insights and analysis on the latest market action, check out more Market Catalysts here. AMD CEO Lisa Su said they didn't include any revenue for the MI 308 chip in the third quarter guidance. That's the one that goes into China because the licenses are still under review. And this coming after Nvidia said last month that the US would be granting licenses to ship AI chips to China. Uh my panelists Dan Hally, Kimberly Forest still with me. Um Dan, when you looked through the earnings, you know, and you sort of were figuring out what your takeaways were, does the China stuff sort of overshadow what seemed like a good quarter? Yeah, I mean, that's really kind of what hurt, uh, the the operating income, right? why they saw that operating loss, uh, for the quarter. I think one of the other issues, um, just being that the PC side, the gaming side seem to do rather well, uh, while the AI side, the data center side just kind of met expectations. So I think, you know, when it comes to a company like AMD, a lot of investors want it to be the the next Nvidia, uh, and it just doesn't appear to be doing that at this moment. But they do have their MI 355, uh, MI 350, uh, those are coming. Those are to compete with Nvidia's Blackwell chips, uh, and then obviously we have the MI 400s coming. Uh, those would also compete, uh, with Nvidia's higher end chips, the the VR Rubin, uh, in the future. Uh, and so I think that's really kind of the the biggest issue here is, um, we were, I was reading some of Bernstein's notes this morning, uh, basically saying that, look, the the outlook for data center doesn't really impress the street when, you know, they're anticipating the the kind of explosive growth that they saw out of Nvidia. But you know, Nvidia is the the leader in this space. AMD is trying to to catch up. Uh, they also, while doing that, have to convince customers that they should buy their chips, not just Nvidia's. Right, definitely. So that's sort of the underlying story here. And this brings me back to a comment I read this morning came from Jordan Klein over at Mizuho, who tracks the tech stocks. And he said, who really owns owns AMD or Nvidia just due to upside from sales back into China that had been blocked by Trump. He's but basically he's saying that's not really the story here. Um, so is that how you feel about AMD too? And sort of how much ramp do they have room do they have in that data center business? Sure. Well, I think that they have a lot of room. And yeah, it would be nice for them to be able to sell, um, chips today. But if you're owning a stock and we own them for three to five years. So we have a longer term view. Our view is that AMD is the closest, um, thing to be able to compete against that Blackwell chip. Now, they have a couple of really important hurdles to get over. The first is just basic data center hygiene. Um, data center managers like to have everything uniform and the same because things are always breaking. They have to be able to understand, you know, the parameters of the chip. What does it look like when it's going to break? How can we whip that, um, board out, slide a new one in and get on with our jobs. So that is the first hurdle. The second hurdle is Nvidia's name brand. I, in my note that I wrote earlier today, this really to me feels like era where any kind of goofy idea could get funded as if they had two things. If they specified Oracle as their database and Sun Microsystems was the servers that they were going to run on it, because that tech stack looked like you knew what you were doing. And in today's funding world, I am sure nobody's out there saying, hey, we're going to give a whirl with these AMD chips because they're probably as good and cheaper and, you know, that's that's good. I'm sure every new AI idea is specifying the Nvidia as part of its tech stack. So these are the things that AMD has to overcome. But I think they can with because of their product knowledge and they have financial latitude to, you know, last as long as it takes to kind of chip away at that market. So, Kim, all of that said, um, do you want to own AMD over Nvidia or you still got to own both of them? I think you have to own both. You know, Nvidia's today and AMD has the potential for tomorrow. Related Videos Novo Nordisk warns copycat drugs continue weighing on sales Snap earnings: Stalled growth isn't just from an 'ad glitch' Top 3 takeaways from Uber's Q2 results JPM's Crawford Still Sees Value in Owning Bonds in US 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

Yahoo

03-08-2025

Business
Yahoo

Who could lead Apple after Tim Cook

Meta's hefty AI CapEx spend is already paying off, analyst says

Yahoo

03-08-2025

Business
Yahoo

Meta's hefty AI CapEx spend is already paying off, analyst says

It's been a busy week for Big Tech. Not only did Microsoft (MSFT) and Meta (META) both beat big on earnings this quarter, but Microsoft officially reached a $4 trillion market cap. Additionally, Apple (AAPL) and Amazon (AMZN) are getting ready to report quarterly results on Thursday after the markets close. Jefferies senior analyst Brent Thill and Yahoo Finance Technology Editor Dan Howley join Market Catalysts with Julie Hyman to discuss Meta's artificial intelligence (AI) capital expenditure (CapEx) spending and whether the numbers are showing a return on investment (ROI) yet. To watch more expert insights and analysis on the latest market action, check out more Market Catalysts. Something else I want to point out that you and I were talking about this morning and that Laura Martin of Needham pointed out is the relative spending of these various companies, right? The capex. And I think the point that she's making with respect to meta in particular on which she is neutral equivalent rated is that if you look at something like capex to sales. In other words, how much these companies are spending relative to their size, the size of their revenue. Meta is a lot higher than the others in terms of the amount of what it's bringing in that's going out the door for this stuff. And she's really questioning the rationale of meta on that front. Now, the noise on that has gotten a lot quieter with regard to to meta, right? But you know, it's interesting that she's still bringing up that point. Yeah, and look, you know, I was just pulling up meta's market cap. Uh they're going continue to spend as I said on the data centers as well as the people they're building out this data center. That's like, I don't know, they overlayed it on an outline of Manhattan and it takes up a huge chunk of the city itself. Not gonna obviously land in Manhattan. It's gonna be somewhere else in the country. I think Tennessee or around there. Uh but their market cap is 1.96 trillion right now. Microsoft seemed to indicate that they were going to be slowing a bit on their capex, whereas meta is saying, look, we're we're going all in. We we're we're doing AI for ourselves. Uh we're doing you know, open source. So it seems to indicate that they're not going to be open sourcing all of their their AI models going forward. And then they have obviously the the consumer business as far as hardware goes. So they they continue to to lay these out. But you're right. It does seem a little misbalanced when you look at, okay, Microsoft is, you know, powering these data centers, using them for enterprises with, you know, thousands of people and then consumers as well. And then meta is, you know, offering up its services to advertisers, but then, you know, regular folks who are on reels and, you know, scrolling through, I don't know, whatever, food or, you know, people's vacations or my very basic, you know, pictures of beer and food and video games. Um it does feel strange. Yeah, yes. And so Brent, let's go back to you on this. I think we have you back. Maybe. Hopefully. There he is. There he is. Um so we were just talking about um a point that one of your peers on the street brought up, which is sort of meta's capex relative to its revenue and that it's higher than pretty much all of these other companies. Does that concern you at all? No, because they're in the consumer world and they're monetizing this. If you think about what happened, meta's head count is actually down from the peak. And so they're generating accelerating revenue and profits despite all these investments with fewer people. So what does that tell you about AI? It's working. They drove in the quarter 9% price increase in advertising and it's because of AI. So the capex number I think is just getting completely overblown, which is like, if you're spending the money, you're getting the return, who cares what they spend? And last night we raised our capex number for the industry, and just in the last week, we've raised Google, meta, and Microsoft by 50 plus billion dollars. And what what I'd say is you're seeing this in the numbers, Microsoft accelerating Azure, improving operating margin. Any hood, the CFO Microsoft gave you operating margin improvement for the last two years in the face of AI. Meta just gave you accelerating revenue growth and improving margin, uh with fewer head counts and it's because of AI. So the point is like, who cares what you're spending as long as your bookings and the revenue growth and the margins are going higher and that's what's happening. So I think there's just, you know, again, I I understand that there the number one question I get from our investors, which are institutional investors are feels like railroad companies. Like we're putting these railroad tracks in, we don't know when the ROI is coming. That's not true. You see the ROI today. The numbers are very clear. And they and if people listen, you're you're hearing it. Anyhood has said this. AI margins are higher than cloud. What does that tell you? So I I again, I I don't know, I I don't know how to be, you know, more crystal clear. Revenue, margins, building, accelerating in the face of all these investments. And by the way, we're literally at the beginning of this wave, we're not at the end of it. And so, again, I I I think in many of the past cycles we've been in, it takes longer for this to happen. Cloud took a long time. Internet took time. We've lived through these cycles. This cycle's happening faster. You know, by the way, every CEO from JP Morgan to the CEO of Mettronic to the CEO of United Airlines to you go through it. Every CEO including our own CEO, we're all being asked at Jeffries to embrace AI. And if we don't, um there's big consequences. consequences. So I don't think this is um a question of is this paying off or not. I think it's pretty clear it's paying off and you're seeing it already in the numbers. Related Videos Who could lead Apple after Tim Cook Palantir, AMD, Disney: Earnings to watch this week Bad news flurry, IPO market, crypto dive: Market takeaways Earnings, Fed commentary, consumer credit: What to Watch 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

Microsoft is seeing big wins, including $4T market cap

Yahoo

03-08-2025

Business
Yahoo

Microsoft is seeing big wins, including $4T market cap

It's been a busy week for Big Tech. Not only did Microsoft (MSFT) and Meta (META) both beat big on earnings this quarter, but Microsoft officially reached a $4 trillion market cap. Yahoo Finance Technology Editor Dan Howley joins Market Catalysts with Julie Hyman to discuss the latest. To watch more expert insights and analysis on the latest market action, check out more Market Catalysts. But let's get more on Big Cap Tech right now. Meta and Microsoft shares rocketing higher. Microsoft topping a $4 trillion dollar market cap off the back of their strong earnings results, although it has pulled back a little bit right now, but the AI euphoria fueling a rally in broader markets as well. Joining me now on this Yahoo Finance Tech editor, Dan Howley. Dan, first of all, give us some of your takeaways, some of your themes that we saw from these results. Uh yeah, I mean, look, let's start off obviously, you've mentioned it. Microsoft hitting the $4 trillion dollar mark, just the second company to do this beyond uh Nvidia. Uh I think, you know, the the highlight number for Microsoft during the call uh was its $75 billion dollars in revenue from Azure. That's the first time we really got Azure revenue from Microsoft. Previously, it was like, okay, well, Azure growth was X percentage, uh intelligent cloud, which includes Azure brought in, you know, blank number. So you had to kind of infer what Azure was a part of that. But now, uh they're coming out and saying uh it was 34% growth, I believe on that $75 uh billion dollars uh of revenue. That's year over year uh for the company. Uh huge win for for Microsoft. A lot of uh the obviously the benefit of OpenAI uh being a part of Microsoft using their cloud infrastructure. Also Microsoft spreading that technology out across its its different uh product offerings. Uh and then on on meta side of things, look, they beat on the top and bottom line just like Microsoft, and then they offered better than anticipated Q3 expectations. So that obviously sent shares higher. Uh the company also uh acknowledged the kind of moves that they're doing as far as their AI uh recruitment, where they're poaching people from, you know, OpenAI or or Apple, uh and bringing them into their their super intelligence lab. Uh they said that there's going to continue to be upward pressure on spending, uh that includes the data center. But then they also basically said, look, we're hiring a lot of people for this. So that's going to be the second main contributor to that upward pressure. So it's it's a lot going on for both companies here, but, you know, obviously the the biggest takeaway overall is that their AI efforts appear to be paying off big time at this point. And don't forget, we have just seen Google announce uh in last week saying more or less the same thing. Amazon's after the bell today. They really need to show that their AI efforts are stepping up or the market could turn sour on them. You know, uh Dan, tell me if it feels this way to you. Uh you know, obviously, we've been talking about AI for a while. We've been talking about the big spending that we've been seeing for a while. But it felt there, especially when it came to sort of software names, but also even these names, like, was it actually real? Was it actually happening? Was it actually starting to bear fruit? And this feels like the quarter, maybe that is that tipping point, because not only are we hearing from these companies, we're hearing from a lot of the enterprise software companies, the service nows of the world, for example, that are also using this stuff. So it feels like we maybe are getting to that point. What what do you think from your coverage? Yeah, Julie, I think you're you're totally right, right? I mean, you know, we were previously talking about how they're, you know, plowing billions of dollars into these data centers, you know, springing up all around the country. Um you know, there's been the obviously the conversation of, you know, how those impact neighbors in regions, the the electrical usage, the water usage. Uh those continue to be uh issues as well. But you know, on the on the revenue side, we're we're starting to see that kind of payoff, those those big build outs showing for them finally. Now, I think one of the things to point out is that for for something like an OpenAI, they're getting a lot of that uh through consumers, right? Regular folks who are just going on and using uh OpenAI chat GPT. Uh but for the likes of Microsoft or uh Google, uh you know, that's also going to be on the consumer side, but also in the enterprise side. Microsoft is really, you know, enterprise forward. And so they're benefiting from from the enterprises at large. I think, you know, we we've kind of had the discussion before where in my mind, right now at least, the enterprise is where AI kind of makes sense the most. Uh you know, you have Apple being criticized for not having AI in their iPhone uh that's up to snuff. I mean, are you going to buy an iPhone because of the software you never have? You know, you didn't go out and buy it for Siri to begin with. You bought it because it had a better camera. So I don't really know if that's going to be, there's going to be a moment where you say, cool, awesome software on this iPhone, got to go out and buy it now. You're going to say, cool, it folds, or cool, it's a lot thinner. I got to go out and buy it now. Or my battery stinks. I need a new one. Um so the consumer side is still kind of everybody in their their like little app silos, you know, you're on your chat GPT, you're on your Gemini. Right. But for the enterprise, I think that really is is what the big story is and that's really where we're starting to see this growth. Related Videos Who could lead Apple after Tim Cook Palantir, AMD, Disney: Earnings to watch this week Bad news flurry, IPO market, crypto dive: Market takeaways Earnings, Fed commentary, consumer credit: What to Watch 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

Yahoo

03-08-2025

Business
Yahoo

Who could lead Apple after Tim Cook

There are no indications that Apple (AAPL) CEO Tim Cook is planning on leaving his role anytime soon. But the company's underwhelming AI developments have some questioning if it's time for new leadership. Yahoo Finance Tech Editor Dan Howley takes a closer look at some of the potential contenders. To watch more expert insights and analysis on the latest market action, check out more Market Domination. Good morning! Welcome to Apple Park. Apple may not be the powerhouse it's become without CEO Tim Cook. He served in the position since 2011, and has overseen the rollout of some of Apple's biggest products, including the iPhone 10, the launch of its TV streaming platform Apple TV Plus, and ushered in Apple's push into financial products with the Apple card. Now, the company faces pressure from Wall Street over its slow move into AI, and the search for its next big product post iPhone. This has led analysts at Lightshed Partners to question whether it's time for Cook to step aside and make way for a product focused CEO. Right now, there's no indication Cook is in danger of losing his job, but Cook is 64 years old, and despite his successes, he won't lead the company forever. Cook continues to be the Hall of Fame CEO. He will lead Apple, I believe at least the next five years. It wasn't that long ago that you could give Tim Cook credit as having created more value as a CEO than any other CEO in history. And we're talking about like two to three years ago. It's not that long ago. I think there's a sense that, you know, maybe some fresh blood in terms of the thinking within executive management would make some sense. That leaves the question of who will take up the reins of one of the most important technology companies in the world. Jeff Williams, Apple's previous COO, was once seen as Cook's potential successor, but he's retiring from the company later this year. Still, there's no shortage of top candidates at Apple who could take over for Cook. Craig Federighi, the company's senior vice president of software engineering, leads development of its Mac and iOS products. He also makes regular appearances at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference, making him one of the most visible candidates in Apple's lineup. John Turnus is also a solid option as Apple's future CEO. He's been with the company since 2001 and has overseen the development of a number of products, including the iPad and AirPods. Perhaps more importantly, he's also been instrumental in Apple's move away from using Intel chips in its Macs to its own processors. Greg Joswiak, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide marketing, has worked at Apple since the late 1980s, giving him a wealth of knowledge about the company and its various products and services. Eddy Cue, Apple's senior vice president of services, currently leads the company's most important business segment outside of the iPhone. He's been with Apple since 1989, and brings the institutional knowledge necessary to navigate such a massive company. And then there's Deirdre O'Brien, Apple's senior vice president of people and retail. A 30 plus year Apple veteran, O'Brien brings along the experience and understanding of Apple's customer base that the company needs to ensure it's meeting user expectations. Cook's still on top for the foreseeable future, but it remains to be seen what Apple's leadership could look like down the road. Related Videos Amazon & Apple earnings: Takeaways from the tech giants' results Meta's hefty AI CapEx spend is already paying off, analyst says Microsoft is seeing big wins, including $4T market cap Meta and Microsoft earnings: What to watch for 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

Latest news with #DanHowley

AMD is Nvidia Blackwell's 'closest' competition, strategist says

Who could lead Apple after Tim Cook

Meta's hefty AI CapEx spend is already paying off, analyst says

Microsoft is seeing big wins, including $4T market cap

Who could lead Apple after Tim Cook

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