u/Comprehensive_Tea388

Moderna and Merck announced that their personalized cancer vaccine intismeran, combined with Keytruda, significantly reduced the risk of melanoma returning or spreading in a Phase 3 trial. Moderna shares surged as much as 160% on the news. This is the first positive late-stage trial for an mRNA cancer vaccine, which is a pretty major validation of the technology beyond COVID.

The bigger question now is whether this becomes Moderna’s second act. If this platform starts working across multiple cancers, the company looks very different than a declining COVID-vaccine story.

Full Moderna data and Congressional activity:

https://app.walnutmarkets.com/ticker/MRNA

Do you think today’s move is justified by the Phase 3 result, or did a 100%+ move price in too much too quickly?

We are happy to announce the launch of Walnut Strategies! You can now browse live strategies built from our exclusive datasets including Congress trades, insider activity, fundamentals, and much more. Save the ones you like to your watchlist, and follow the trades as they happen.

For the Congress strategies we use the disclosure date, not the original trade date. That difference is key. The backtests act on information that was actually public at the time, so the results are much closer to what someone could have realistically achieved by following the disclosures live rather than benefiting from hindsight.

See the full performance history, CAGR, excess return vs. SPY (ie. alpha), Sharpe ratio, drawdowns, and whether each strategy is currently live. The goal is to make these strategies reproducible and easy to follow, not just show a pretty backtest.

Walnut Strategies will continue to evolve as we add more datasets, strategies and features to the UI.

Would love feedback from anyone who tries it. Which types of strategies do you want us to add next?

https://app.walnutmarkets.com/strategies

Rare earth stocks ripped higher Friday, with MP Materials up ~8%, USA Rare Earth up ~9%, and NioCorp up ~3%.

The policy backdrop is getting hard to ignore. Trump recently told a defense audience to “do magnets”, while the administration continues pushing to build a domestic rare earth and permanent magnet supply chain. The U.S. is still heavily dependent on China for processing, so every new tariff, defense contract, subsidy or supply chain restriction matters a lot for this group.

This trade is starting to feel less like a commodity bet and more like an industrial-policy bet. Humanoid robots can require dozens of motors/actuators per unit, and S&P Global notes some designs may use 30+ motors, each potentially relying on rare earth magnets.

MP, USAR, or NB.. which one do you think actually becomes the biggest winner if the U.S. keeps throwing money at domestic magnet production?

https://app.walnutmarkets.com/ticker/MP

https://app.walnutmarkets.com/ticker/USAR

https://app.walnutmarkets.com/ticker/NB

Volatility Shares Trust has filed to launch an ETF built around publicly traded companies with exposure to every NHL franchise. On the surface it sounds like a sports ETF, but the interesting part is what it would actually hold; media companies, arena owners, sponsors, betting exposure, and other businesses tied to the league rather than the teams themselves.

I actually think this is a pretty clever theme. Sports franchises keep getting more valuable, media rights are still huge, and there’s a growing appetite for ways to invest around professional sports without actually owning a team.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1884021/000121390026090260/ea0302107-01\_485apos.htm

Would you buy an NHL or sports-themed ETF?

Pretty busy week even though the indexes barely moved. The S&P 500 gained 0.4%, Nasdaq added 0.1%, Russell 2000 gained 1.1%, while the Dow slipped 0.6%. The S&P still managed another record close Thursday and has now finished higher three weeks in a row.

Macro was probably the bigger story. July CPI eased to 3.4% YOY, then retail sales unexpectedly fell 0.6%, the first decline in nine months. Combined with the weak jobs report from the week before, markets now put the odds of the Fed holding rates in September around 69%. At the same time Brent crude jumped almost 6% for the week to $88.52, so inflation risk definitely hasn't disappeared.

Earnings were interesting too. CoreWeave reported $2.58B revenue, +112% YOY, and raised 2026 CapEx guidance to $35–39B. Nebius also posted another huge growth quarter, while Cisco beat with $17.3B revenue and $1.22 EPS.

We also picked up a cluster of Berkshire insider purchases this week, including a $764k BRK.A buy plus several BRK.B purchases.

My takeaway: the market is still willing to pay for growth, and softer economic data is keeping Fed fears contained. But we're sitting near record highs with the consumer slowing and oil moving the other direction. Makes next week pretty interesting.

What was the biggest signal you took away from this week?

Walnut picked up several Berkshire purchases reported Aug. 13: Charles C. Chang bought 1 BRK.A share for $764k, while Michael J. O’Sullivan disclosed multiple BRK.B buys totaling roughly $250k.

That puts the visible cluster at just over $1M of insider buying. Individually, none of these trades changes the Berkshire story. But multiple insiders buying around the same time is a lot more interesting than a one-off purchase.

Full Berkshire activity here:

https://app.walnutmarkets.com/ticker/BRK-B

Would you read anything into the cluster, or is ~$1M still too small to matter for a company Berkshire’s size?

July producer inflation came in unchanged, whuch was softer than expected, and traders pushed the odds of the Fed holding rates steady in September to roughly 65%, up from about 50% the day before. The S&P 500 responded by hitting a new intraday record, with tech leading once again.

What I find interesting is how quickly the market has flipped back to cheering softer data. We already had a weak July jobs report, CPI cooled, now PPI is tame too. That’s great if it gives the Fed room to stay put, but at some point the weaker growth starts showing up in earnings. Or so you'd think.

So where’s the line being drawn? How much economic weakness can the market celebrate before it stops being bullish?

July producer inflation came in unchanged, whuch was softer than expected, and traders pushed the odds of the Fed holding rates steady in September to roughly 65%, up from about 50% the day before. The S&P 500 responded by hitting a new intraday record, with tech leading once again.

What I find interesting is how quickly the market has flipped back to cheering softer data. We already had a weak July jobs report, CPI cooled, now PPI is tame too. That’s great if it gives the Fed room to stay put, but at some point the weaker growth starts showing up in earnings. Or so you'd think.

So where’s the line being drawn? How much economic weakness can the market celebrate before it stops being bullish?

Nebius reported $582.3M in Q2 revenue, ahead of roughly $570M expected, with adjusted EBITDA of $236M vs. about $169M expected. Revenue was up more than 450% YOY, four new AI-cloud deals were each worth more than $1B, and the stock jumped more than 20% after the print.

The growth is obviously there. What matters from here is whether NBIS can keep filling capacity fast enough to justify the spending. CapEx hit $5.7B, customer commitments are now above $40B, and management expects more than $9B of customer prepayments this year. That gives them a lot of visibility, but it also raises the bar for execution.

Our read: this quarter answered the demand question. Now the market is going to start caring more about margins, utilization, cash requirements, and how quickly all that contracted demand turns into revenue.

Full NBIS data and our updated confirmation view here:

https://app.walnutmarkets.com/ticker/NBIS

What are you doing after the move, holding, adding, or taking some off?

Gold hit a nine-week high around $4,413 yesterday, after jumping 2.4% on Friday. That came right after the weak U.S. jobs report, while oil is also back near $88 Brent and Wednesday’s CPI is expected around 3.4% YOY.

What I find interesting is stocks are still basically sitting near record highs. So this isn’t the usual 'risk-off everything is breaking' type of market setup. Equities are holding up, gold is pushing higher, and energy is rising at the same time. Something has to give eventually.

The market is hedging inflation and geopolitical risk without actually leaving the equity market yet.

Would you rather own gold here, keep buying equities, or is this exactly the point where both are getting too crowded?

Brent crude prices jumped about 3% to $87 today and WTI moved back above $80 as tensions around the Strait of Hormuz picked up again. Iran says negotiations with the US will halt until the end of Trump's term. At the same time, the market is heading into Wednesday’s CPI report expecting inflation to ease slightly to around 3.4 YOY.

The weird part is we just had a weak jobs report that reduced the urgency for another Fed hike. Now oil is moving the other way. If crude stays elevated, the “slower economy = easier Fed” trade gets a lot less straightforward.

What do you think matters the most from here: softer employment, or inflation pressures from higher energy costs?

Toyota raised its yearly operating profit forecast by 13% to 3.4T Yen (~$21.6B) and announced a 1T Yen (~$6.3B) share buyback. You’d think that would be enough to get a positive reaction but the stock proceeded to fall roughly 1.5%. Why? The answer is likely that the underlying business is still messy.

Operating profit fell 9% YOY. China sales were down 28%, while Middle East sales were down about a third as geopolitical disruptions like the Iran-Isreal war are still hitting logistics and costs. Toyota is now expecting to sell 9.7M vehicles this year with roughly 5M hybrids.

At the same time the stock is down about 13% YTD, so this is getting into the territory where the valuation starts becoming more attractive if you believe the earnings pressure is temporary.

Is Toyota cheap because the market is too focused on near term weakness, or is the discount justified given China, EV competition and geopolitical risk?

Berkshire just reported Q2 operating profit of $12.98B, up 16% YOY, while net income more than doubled to $25.7B. They also bought back about $4.5B of stock, were a net buyer of equities for the first time since 2022, including $10B for GOOGL, and cash and cash equivalents dropped from roughly $397B to $366B.

Buffett spent the last few years basically saying there wasn't much worth buying, and investors assumed his stockpiling of cash meant he believed he was waiting for a downtown that would offer better opportunities. Now Abel is stepping in and Berkshire is spending capital, even with the S&P 500 near record highs. Could be timing. Could be a different approach. Who knows, too early to say.

Berkshire is only up around 3-4% YTD versus roughly 13% for the S&P 500, so the market clearly isn't giving Abel the same confidence Buffett had.

Is Berkshire getting more aggressive because they finally see value again, or are we actually watching the investment philosophy change since Buffett? And at today's valuation, would you rather own BRK.B or just buy the S&P 500?

Berkshire just reported Q2 operating profit of $12.98B, up 16% YOY, while net income more than doubled to $25.7B. They also bought back about $4.5B of stock, were a net buyer of equities for the first time since 2022, including $10B for GOOGL, and cash and cash equivalents dropped from roughly $397B to $366B.

Buffett spent the last few years basically saying there wasn't much worth buying, and investors assumed his stockpiling of cash meant he believed he was waiting for a downtown that would offer better opportunities. Now Abel is stepping in and Berkshire is spending capital, even with the S&P 500 near record highs. Could be timing. Could be a different approach. Too early to say.

Berkshire is only up around 3-4% YTD versus roughly 13% for the S&P 500, so the market clearly isn't giving Abel the same confidence Buffett had.

Is Berkshire getting more aggressive because they finally see value again, or are we actually watching the investment philosophy change since Buffett? And at today's valuation, would you rather own BRK.B or just buy the S&P 500?

There are some potentially big movers reporting next week. We pulled together expectations, what happened last quarter, and, more importantly, what we think the market needs to see this time around.

RKLB - Monday, August 10
Consensus is around $232M revenue / -$0.06 EPS. Last quarter RKLB delivered $200.3M revenue vs. $174.8M expected, although EPS missed at -$0.07 vs. -$0.04. This quarter we're watching backlog, launch cadence and Neutron progress; another strong revenue beat could keep momentum going.

Our call: Bullish

SMCI - Tuesday, August 11
Consensus is around $11.7–11.9B revenue / $0.71 adjusted EPS. Last quarter SMCI reported $0.84 EPS vs. $0.62 expected, while revenue missed expectations; stronger forward guidance helped send shares roughly 16% higher the following session. With preliminary Q4 revenue already disclosed, margins and FY27 guidance are likely to drive the reaction.

Our call: Bullish

CRWV - Tuesday, August 11
Consensus is around $2.56B revenue / -$1.40 EPS, implying revenue growth of more than 100% YoY. Last quarter CRWV reported $2.08B revenue, ahead of expectations, but its loss was worse than expected and shares fell roughly 10%. The growth is clearly there; this quarter we're watching whether margins, CapEx and cash requirements show that growth can translate into sustainable economics.

Our call: Mixed

NBIS - Wednesday, August 12
Consensus is around $535M revenue / -$0.67 EPS, with revenue expected to grow more than 400% YoY. Last quarter revenue came in around $399M vs. $389M expected, and shares gained roughly 13–15% after the report. This quarter ARR growth, capacity deployment and progress toward management's year-end targets matter more to us than EPS.

Our call: Bullish

CSCO - Wednesday, August 12
Consensus is around $16.83B revenue / $1.17 adjusted EPS, representing roughly 15% and 18% YoY growth, respectively. Cisco entered the quarter with networking demand accelerating and AI infrastructure orders from hyperscalers becoming an increasingly important contributor; we're watching gross margins, networking orders and whether AI infrastructure demand can support another step-up in guidance.

Our call: Bullish

ONDS - Thursday, August 13
Consensus is around $68.5M revenue / -$0.10 EPS. Last quarter ONDS reported $50.1M revenue vs. $38.2M expected, with shares gaining roughly 20% around the report. We're watching backlog conversion and whether demand across its defense and autonomous-systems businesses can sustain the recent growth rate.

Our call: Bullish / High Risk

Research only. Not investment advice.

The S&P 500 and Russell 2000 are both at or near all-time highs. On the surface, that's exactly what you'd want to see from a healthy market.

But beneath the surface, leadership has narrowed. Over the past five trading days, the S&P 500 gained 5.8%, while the equal-weight S&P 500 ETF (RSP) fell 1.9%. That means the average large-cap stock actually underperformed, with a handful of mega-cap names doing most of the lifting.

Two questions arise:

Are enough stocks are participating to keep the rally going, and do you think the markets broadens from here or do the mega caps continue to carry the market?

I built Walnut Markets because I wanted one place to validate an investment idea.

There are great platforms for fundamentals, technical analysis, Congress and insider trades, institutional activity, and other datasets but they're all separate. I wanted to bring them together, cross-reference the data, and see whether everything points in the same direction instead of jumping between five different websites.

It took me several months to build, and now I'm focused on distribution.

I started with Reddit ads, which brought traffic, but it felt like low-intent traffic. People would click, read what they wanted, and leave. Very little engagement or exploration of the site. Since then I've shifted my focus toward SEO, AEO, and consistently posting research and discussions on Reddit to build organic traffic over time.

Some days it feels like shouting into the void. Traffic is still low, but I keep reminding myself that the product only launched four weeks ago. I'm trying to stay patient and trust the process.

For founders who have bootstrapped a SaaS, when did you get your first paying customer outside of friends and family? How long did SEO and content marketing take before you started seeing meaningful results? And at what point would you stop doubling down on organic growth and pivot to a different marketing strategy?

I'd love to hear what worked for you.

​

The split, it seems, is aggressive AI capex vs. real earnings.

AMD reported 50% YoY revenue growth and sold off. SpaceX nearly doubled revenue and sold off. Microsoft added nearly $450B in market value after showing Azure AI demand was translating into revenue. Meta rallied after demonstrating that heavy AI spending is driving advertising and engagement. Amazon continues spending aggressively, but investors are still waiting for a clearer payoff from AWS AI investments.

It feels like the market is becoming much more selective when it comes to companies in the AI ecosystem. Investors are rewarding companies that can either clearly show they are monetizing AI today (Microsoft, Meta), or sell the infrastructure (Nvidia, Broadcom, Micron). Simply spending billions on AI is no longer enough.

The next phase of this cycle may be less about who builds the biggest AI clusters, and more about who actually earns returns on them.

Where do you think the most value accrues over the next 3–5 years:

infrastructure (Nvidia, Broadcom, Micron), hyperscalers (Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Meta), or

software companies building on top of AI?

Gold rallied about 2% on Tuesday, its strongest one-day gain in roughly six months, as the US dollar weakened and Treasury yields fell. It continued higher today, rising another 1%. Meanwhile, US equities remain near record highs. (reuters.com).

Is this just a short-term move or are we entering a period where gold starts outperforming again?

​

Q2 revenue grew 50% YoY to $11.54B, adjusted EPS was $1.66 (vs. $1.62 expected), data center revenue more than doubled to $6.72B, and Q3 guidance came in above consensus. Excellent numbers by any means. Despite that, the stock fell almost 7%.

My takeaway is that AMD isn't being judged against its own analyst estimates anymore, it's being judged against the AI expectations already priced into the stock. Strong execution was expected, but the market wanted exceptional.