This Week in Barrons: 11.2.2025

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•  Click to watch Neo do chores around the house.

• 1X just opened preorders for NEO … its biped home robot built to automate everyday chores with a tap or a voice command.  Shipping next year in the U.S., NEO arrives loaded with autonomous skills.  Early adopters can purchase NEO for $20K or opt for a $499/mo. rental plan.  Initial deliveries will start in 2026.  NEO autonomously handles basics like opening doors, fetching items, and turning lights on/off, with skills added over time via software updates.  To control NEO, you just talk to it – as NEO uses a built-in large language model to understand speech, gestures, and context for natural, hands-free operation.

• Neo’s relatively low price and the 2026 delivery date … has ignited hopes that the era of home-based, advanced robotics is arriving sooner than expected.  Count me as one of those people who’d like a Neo.  As my wife and I age, I’m finding that locating quality, dependable staff is difficult.  Would we pay $499 a month for a robo-maid – heck yeah.  I think the potential for AI and robotics to meaningfully transform eldercare is an overlooked part of both markets.

• As an aside … it takes about 900,000 minutes to become a well-skilled, board-certified dermatologist.  It takes less than 9 minutes to make your patient feel seen, understood, and reassured.  Per S. Godin: If you skip or gloss-over the 9 minutes, you completely wasted the 900,000.

• The Gold chart shows that investors' gold ETF holdings remain low … and despite gold's strong performance, this indicator still hasn't surpassed its last two record highs.

• Big Tech kicks off earnings season amid ‘AI bubble’ fears:

  o Meta spooked investors after the company unveiled plans to "notably" ramp up AI spending through 2026, causing shares to plummet 8% and wiping out about $160B in market value.

  o Microsoft dipped 3.6% - a major Azure outage and slowing cloud growth dampened its report.

  o Alphabet rallied 6% after reporting its first-ever $100B revenue quarter.

  o Apple and Amazon rallied, beating earnings and revenue – and increased full-year guidance. 

• Our FED cut its key interest rate by a quarter of a point … to a target range of 3.75% to 4%.  That is the lowest rate since late 2022.  Our FED also announced it would end its quantitative tightening policy starting Dec. 1^st.  The overall decision was a risk-management one aimed at addressing signs of a weakening labor market.  In terms of future rate cuts, FED Chair Powell stated that another cut in December is "far from a foregone conclusion".  Chair Powell called the most recent 3% inflation reading ‘good’ because it beat a bleaker inflation forecast.  [FYI: Honestly, that’s like celebrating a “no cancer” diagnosis, while ignoring the ones for: high cholesterol, hypertension, and heart disease.]

• Nike’s new robotic sneakers will turn running into a cakewalk …  Project Amplify, the world’s first powered running system – targets recreational runners in the 10 to 12-minute mile range.  They essentially work as a "second set of calf muscles" making uphill running feel like flat ground.

• Uber is launching a robotaxi service in San Francisco in 2026 … using Lucid Gravity SUVs equipped with Nuro’s self-driving system == Waymo’s competition.

• Aurora is launching a second 600-mile driverless trucking route … from Fort Worth to El Paso, Texas – just six months after its commercial debut.

• Google Labs has dropped Pomelli … an AI marketing assistant that helps businesses maintain consistent branding across social media, websites, and advertisements. The tool grasps your brand’s identity, whips up campaign ideas, and creates editable, high-quality marketing assets for businesses.

• Nvidia’s CEO outlined projections for $500B in revenue … as they became the world’s first $5T company.  The chip giant announced: (a) a $1B investment in Nokia, the legacy telecom company, (b) a partnership with the US Department of Energy, and (c) a partnership with Palantir.

• OpenAI CEO Sam Altman revealed … that his company is on track to achieve an “intern-level research assistant” by 2026, and a fully automated AI researcher by 2028.

•  Tether projects 15% YoY profit growth to $15B in 2024 …. Tether’s USDT stablecoin makes up ~60% of the $183B stablecoin market.  Tether has generated more than $10B in profit YTD as it minted $17B in additional USDT.

• November is Bitcoin’s best month… per CryptoTwits:

  · November’s Averages: Years analyzed = 15 / Win rate = 60.00% / Average increase when up = +73.87% / Average decrease when down = -17.24% / Overall average monthly change = +38.57%.

  · November vs. Other Months: Average Increase When Up = Rank 1 of 12  / Average Decrease When Down = Rank 10 of 12 (1 = gentlest) / Overall Average Change = Rank 1 of 12.

  · Consistency & Streaks: Win Rate = 9 of 15 Novembers (60%) / Longest Green Streak = 6 years / Longest Red Streak = 2 years / Best November = +470.94% (2013) / Worst November = -36.54% (2018).

• Bitcoin will go higher because … per Mitchell Askew:

  · Capital is coming back into Bitcoin as uncertainty fades and rate cuts loom.

  · An institutional rotation has started with ETFs, collateral lending, and public companies accelerating exposure.

  · Through mining, individuals can still capture yield and tax benefits in an increasingly competitive landscape.

  · Bitcoin’s volatility is maturing – creating conditions for sustained growth rather than boom-and-bust speculation.

• In Q3, Coinbase (COIN) became a Top 10 U.S. Bank … faster than any organization before it.  This is further proof that financial prediction markets may drive outcomes rather than outcomes driving prediction markets.  I am a shareholder of COIN, but it feels like I’m underexposed.  Robinhood is attacking the financial community from the brokerage angle, and Coinbase is attacking it from the crypto side.  When they intersect, retail finance will never be the same.

• OpenAI has finalized its shift to a for-profit entity … controlled by a non-profit foundation, giving Microsoft a 27% stake worth about $135B while freeing the company to raise capital more flexibly from other investors.  Microsoft will receive 20% of OpenAI’s revenue until 2032.

• Brandon Chapman’s Cautions:

  -   #1: The SPY/RSP ratio … is showing the worst breadth in 20+ years of available data.  We've had periods of concentration before, but nothing like the current dislocation that started accelerating in early 2024.  Only 50% of S&P companies are above their 200-dma, only 45% are above their 100-dma, and only 34% are above their 20-dma.  Over Q3, only 3 sectors are higher: technology, communications, and healthcare – and that’s only because they contain at least 1 of the Mag-7.

  -   #2: The Retail buyer … tapped out in July – invested at record levels.  

  -  #3: The U.S. is not (yet) expanding credit … to drive markets higher. 

  -  #4: The SKEW is at 141 … signaling that a potential 5-10% correction is overdue.  

  -  #5: At fresh S&P highs … only 25% of stocks are above their 5-dma = showing investor concentration reaching extreme levels.  Value investing has failed since April. – as money continues to only flow into the Mag-7.

• Someone just bet $7.1m on a Corporate Bond collapse …  This was not Junk bonds or speculative debt, but rather the safest corporate bonds in the market.  It happened the same week that utilities started outperforming the S&P 500.  This could trigger a rise in financing costs, and a repricing of any capital-intensive growth stories built on cheap debt – like data centers, AI infrastructure, and Cloud buildouts.  That would explain why headlines were celebrating new highs – while professional money was quietly shifting to defense.  Credit tightening doesn't just hit bond prices.  It cascades through equity valuations, especially in capital-intensive sectors built on leverage.  And if financing costs rise materially, the economics change.  Projects that worked at a 4% interest rate – don’t work at 6%.  Capital allocation shifts, and growth forecasts get revised.

• I’m more nervous than I've been all year… and it has nothing to do with Halloween. 

• Factually: (a) The S&Ps gained +2.27% in Oct – their 6th monthly gain in a row.  Following 6 consecutive monthly gains, another gain is more likely. (b) Seasonally, November is historically the best month of the year.  (c)  Tech’s surging profit margins help explain their extreme highs in valuations.  Profit margins peak before stocks, and with no margin peaks – then no stock peaks.  Overall, per Callum Thomas: There is a statistical slant towards another month of gains in November.  Yet never be satisfied with a 1-sided synopsis, bad breadth, statistical tails, and/or increasingly expensive valuations.  I suggest you not get too complacent this coming week.

• HODLs: (Hold-On for Dear Life)

  - (+) IBIT – Blackrock’s Spot Bitcoin ETF ($62.3 / in at $24)

  - (+) ETHA – Ethereum ETF ($29.3 / in at $13)

  - (+) Physical Commodities = Gold @ $4,013/oz. & Silver @ $48.2/oz.

  - Bitcoin (BTC = $110,700 / in at $4,310)

  - Ethereum (ETH = 3,900 / in at $310)

  - (+) GLD – Gold ETF ($368.1 / in at $212)

  - (+) ICVT – Convertible Bonds ($103.3 / in at $103.7)

   

  More ‘De-Gen’ Economy holdings:

  - AAVE (crypto) == ($222 / in at $254)

  - GDX (gold miners) == ($72 / in at $52)

  - SLV (silver ETF) == ($44 / in at $27)

  - MAGS (Mag-7 ETF) == ($67.96 / in at $65)

   

  AI / Agent / Data-Center basket:

  - (+) NVDA ($202.4 / in at $168)

  - (+) HUT ($50.6 / in at $30)

  - (+) APLD ($34.6 / in at $20)

  - (+) PATH ($15.86 / in at $14.92)

  - (+) SOUN ($17.62 / in at $16.79)

  - (+) PEGA ($63.65 / in at $63.01)

Please be safe out there!

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