Sunday Reads and Listens....Let Trends Breathe...AI, Spatial Computing and The Degenerate Economy.

Good morning…

I am home alone. Ellen is with her sister at Sundance in Utah.

I head out this week to work. I am at a T3 (wealthtech) conference in Vegas tomorrow and a data conference in Miami for rest of week. I’ll get to see Max and I’m having dinner with my friends Josh Brown, Michael Batnick and Joe Fahmy which means lots of talk about investing, media and food trends.

I write about trends all the time here on this blog and I read something great yesterday about trends from my friend Brian:

The one trend everyone has been talking about since Chat GPT exploded onto the world in late 2022 is AI and while everyone chases shiny objects with AI in the name, those that are sticking with $QQQ (like me) are able to let the AI trend breathe.

It is not just AI that you own in $QQQ, you will now own ‘spatial computing’ which is being shipped by Tim Apple in a few weeks (great commercial):

But the Apple Vision Pro is really about TV. I have linked to a few pieces by Om Malik on the subject of the Vision Pro the last few months, but in this interview with Ben of Stratechery, I liked how he explains the Vision Pro as a video consumption device.

We are in a period where Apple is not growing fast, but I am sticking with the stock and $QQQ because Apple is not going to launch just one version and be done. This trend needs to breathe.

Another trend you hear me talking about the last couple of years is the ‘degenerate economy’. I set up an index last year which I am trying to just let breathe (up 68 percent the last year). Here are the stocks in the index right now:

The glaring hole in the ETF is not having $NVDA or $SMH as a chip proxy in the portfolio because they are at the center of the ‘degenerate’ trend and all tech trends right now. I plan to fix that.

This ‘degenerate economy’ trend is easy to suffocate with opinions and news because it is not so obvious and it is edgy. The trend as I see it is tied to ‘free time’. Technology which now includes AI, is rapidly accelerating our personal free time. That free time has created a culture of ‘speculation is entertainment’.

Speculation and degeneracy covers a wide and growing swath of the economy now that crypto, sports betting and daily options are at everyone’s (globally) fingertips 24/7/365.

I speculate as entertainment all the time and while I don’t much often drink or gamble do consider myself part of this ‘degenerate economy’.

As an exmaple…I don’t agree with how Dave Portnoy invests, speculates, gambles, but I find it hilarious and can’t turn away (nor can anyone make him stop)…

A few more…

I love this Morgan Housel piece titled ‘Information That Would Get Your Attention’.

The Apple Macintosh is 40 years old (a true reminder to let things breathe).

My friend Tadas always has a great list of business podcasts he links to every week. This week no exception. Just subscribe to it.

Last but not least…

This Israeli comic Shahak Shapira does a fantastic job of being funny and calm while dealing with an anti-Israel heckler. Click the link.

I am off for a bike ride …have a great Sunday.