THE PICKS AND SHOVELS

THE PICKS AND SHOVELS

EVERYONE IS BUYING THE GOLD RUSH. WE'RE BUYING THE SHOVELS. IN THIS EPISODE WE GO ONE LAYER BENEATH THE HBM AND PHOTONICS NAMES EVERYONE IS ALREADY IN AND MAP THE SUPPLY CHAIN PLAYS THE MARKET HASN'T FULLY PRICED. PACKAGING. SUBSTRATES. THERMAL. BONDING EQUIPMENT. THE INVISIBLE RACK THAT MAKES THE WHOLE MACHINE RUN.

The Chain Beneath The Chip

NVDA just dropped a monster quarter $81B in revenue, $91B Q2 guide, data center nearly doubling YoY. But the real trade isn't the headline. It's what Jensen can't ship fast enough. HBM is sold out through 2026. CoWoS packaging is maxed. Substrates are backlogged. We break down every layer of the AI supply chain bottleneck and the tickers that move when NVDA can't keep up with itself.

EXPIRATION, LEGISLATION, NEGOTIATION

OPEX

The R-Word That Moves Markets

Stock price = Earnings per share × Multiple (P/E). Earnings tell you what the company makes. The multiple tells you what the market is willing to pay for those earnings. A rerating or de-rating is when that second number changes without earnings changing at all.

CapEx & Chaos

In this episode, we break down one of the biggest market days of the year: the FAANG and mega cap earnings wave alongside Jerome Powell’s final Federal Reserve meeting as Chair. We start with Big Tech. Meta delivered strong revenue and earnings growth, but investors focused on another major jump in AI and data center spending. Alphabet may have posted the cleanest report of the group, with powerful Google Cloud growth and resilient Search demand. Microsoft continued to show strength through Azure and enterprise AI adoption, though expectations were skyhigh heading into the release. Amazon’s report centered on AWS reacceleration, margins, and whether it is keeping pace in the cloud AI race. Overall, the numbers showed that AI demand remains strong, but markets are becoming more selective about who can turn spending into profits Then we shift to macro. The Federal Reserve held rates steady again in what was Jerome Powell’s final meeting as Chair. Powell described the U.S. economy as resilient while reaffirming the Fed’s commitment to getting inflation back to target. Markets are now focused on what comes next: the policy path under new leadership, the timing of future rate cuts, and whether inflation or growth becomes the bigger risk into summer. We close with what it all means for stocks, bonds, semiconductors, and the broader AI trade. If hyperscaler spending remains elevated while inflation cools, risk assets could have room higher. If inflation stays sticky, markets may face a tougher setup despite strong earnings.