Six stocks for putting Elon Musk’s “New Currency” idea to work

Today’s issue in preview:

• Six stocks for putting Elon Musk’s “New Currency” idea to work

• The AI world just got huge news. Here’s how to trade it

• This industry has turned into a stock market juggernaut. Are you profiting yet?

• Learn our Top Themes to buy now

The AI world just got huge news. Here’s how to trade it

Credit: KanawatTH

If you think the AI investment boom is running out of steam, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, and Anthropic have some news for you.

This week, SpaceX (SPCX), Meta (META), and leading AI firm Anthropic publicly updated their plans for AI infrastructure investments. The numbers are extraordinary…

-On October 20, SpaceX reported $19.6 billion in third-quarter capital expenditures, including approximately $16.4 billion directly related to AI.

More strikingly, management forecast $35 billion-$40 billion in fourth-quarter capex, roughly double Q3 spending. Elon Musk aims to more than quadruple SpaceX’s AI computing capacity in just one year, expanding from a projected 2.5-3 gigawatts at the end of 2026 to at least 13 gigawatts by the end of 2027.

-According to The Wall Street Journal, Anthropic has committed more than $600 billion to future AI computing infrastructure, with potential commitments reaching $750 billion. The figures come from a draft of the company’s IPO filing that the newspaper reviewed this week.

The reported commitments include $111 billion with Google, $110 billion with Amazon, and $31 billion with Microsoft. Roughly 80% of the overall commitments are reportedly noncancelable or require payments regardless of utilization.

-This week, Meta announced it expects to spend $135 billion-$145 billion on capital expenditures in 2026, primarily supporting AI infrastructure and computing capacity. Management anticipates continued aggressive investment in 2027 as it expands AI capabilities across advertising, social media, and new products.

The meaningful takeaway from these big announcements isn’t just the big dollar amounts. It’s that these companies increasingly see computing capacity, electricity, and physical infrastructure as strategic assets worth securing years in advance.

These updates are giving investors good reason to believe higher stock prices are ahead for what we call “the world’s most important trend.”

Over the past three months, we’ve published a special series of research notes analyzing the AI infrastructure trend.

The status of this critical trend has become one of the great sagas of the business and investment world… a source of intense disagreement among industry bulls and bears. It’s a trend whose outcome could have large effects on your portfolio.

Given AI’s enormous promise, large tech firms such as Amazon (AMZN) and Microsoft (MSFT) have invested over $1 trillion in AI infrastructure. They are on pace to invest over $700 billion this year alone and more than $4 trillion after that.

Both the scale and the velocity of this investment boom are unprecedented. It is the largest collective investment effort in history.

Big Tech’s historic investment boom has made the entire “AI infrastructure” trend responsible for a large share of America’s GDP growth and stock market returns over the past two years. It has also drawn the skeptical scrutiny of many widely followed investment analysts who claim the trend is a bubble… one that will soon explode and cause tremendous damage to stock prices and the global economy.

If this hugely consequential trend isn’t the most important in the stock market, then it is certainly in the top three.

I believe the AI infrastructure trend has years to run. I believe the world’s smartest, most connected tech insiders who know the true state of bleeding-edge AI development and have real-time stats on AI investment ROI, such as Elon Musk, Jensen Huang (Nvidia), Satya Nadella (Microsoft) and Andy Jassy (Amazon), perhaps maybe… just might… know far more about AI and their businesses than outsiders know about it.

As much press as AI gets, let’s remember that less than 1% of the global population pays for top-tier AI programs. And I estimate less than 10% of large companies believe AI has made a meaningful impact on their businesses.

This revolutionary technology hasn’t yet proliferated, achieved mass adoption, or had mass impact. However, the Agent Supernova is coming… and it’s going to change the world.

The announcements above are certainly reassuring for AI bulls. However, all the good news, strong fundamentals, and optimism in the world aren’t worth much if the market is moving against you.

Regular readers know I care a lot more about what the market thinks of any stock, announcement, or industry than what any one person thinks of it, including me. You can be bullish or bearish on a trend all you like, but if that trend is moving strongly against you, then your idea isn’t worth a hell of a lot in my book.

For the AI infrastructure megatrend, we can gauge market sentiment by analyzing the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH).

This fund is full of key semiconductor firms whose fortunes rise and fall with AI infrastructure spending trends. Major holdings include Nvidia (NVDA), Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM), AMD (AMD), Texas Instruments (TXN), ASML Holding (ASML) and Micron (MU).

As you can see in the two-year chart below, SMH enjoyed a gigantic run from June 2025 to June 2026. The fund gained 176%. Since June 2026, however, the fund has corrected and moved in a volatile, sideways pattern.

The fund attempted a breakout in late Sept./early Oct., but huge selling pressure over the past few weeks has sent it back into its sideways base, back to a trendless state. This week’s big announcements did little to dislodge SMH from its consolidation.

The AI infrastructure boom is a complex trend with hundreds of moving parts. It has passionate supporters and passionate critics. Trying to make sense of all their conflicting assertions and theories is a difficult, full-time job.

But at the end of the day, assessing the health of this trend and creating a trading plan for it is quite simple.

If SMH breaks out of its consolidation to the upside, that’s good news for the bulls. It’s a compelling reason to be long. However, if SMH breaks down from its consolidation, I’m on the sidelines. The trend is down.

If you take just one idea from today’s issue, make it this one. The fundamental forces driving this trend are complex. The underlying technology is complex. The competing interpretations and forecasts are complex. But assessing the trend’s health and creating a trading plan for it are very simple.

I’ll keep you updated on the world’s most important trend. It won’t be long before we get meaningful price action that provides more direction for trading the semis and AI as a megatrend.

Six stocks for putting Elon Musk’s “New Currency” idea to work

Credit: OpenAI

Speaking of Elon Musk, the world’s greatest high-tech manufacturer believes one of the world’s most valuable currencies of the future won’t be the dollar, the euro, or gold.

It will be energy.

In a recent conversation with acclaimed biographer Walter Isaacson, Elon predicted that artificial intelligence, robotics, and space exploration could eventually make conventional money irrelevant.

His key statement about the future was: “There will still be currency, but I think currency will be measured in fundamental physics metrics like wattage and tonnage, mass and energy.”

Musk went on to predict that conventional currency would eventually cease to matter.

Musk envisions a future in which AI and robots perform virtually all economically productive work. In that world, the two most important constraints on economic output would become:

Wattage: The power available to run AI computers, robots, factories, and other machinery.

Tonnage: The physical materials available to manufacture products, construct infrastructure, and expand industrial capacity.

If Elon is right – and I’m betting he is – then the volatile bull market in U.S. natural gas stocks is likely to continue for years. These stocks not only provide you with a way to profit from AI, but they can give your financial life a robust “inflation defense” component as well.

Over the past six months, I’ve written a special series of research notes on publicly traded assets such as timberland giant Weyerhaeuser (WY) and construction aggregates firm Vulcan Materials (VMC) that can add a robust “inflation defense” component to your financial life.

You probably know why being vigilant against inflation is important: governments in most Western nations have promised far too many things to far too many people. They are spending far more on taxpayer benefits and wars than they collect in tax revenues.

The related debts and obligations that governments have taken on cannot possibly be repaid with sound money. They can only be paid back with debased, devalued money… much of which is created out of thin air. This is driving inflation and significant currency debasement.

Measured against a basket of commonly traded raw materials, the dollar has lost 49.6% of its value over the past seven years. That’s an annualized loss of purchasing power of about 8%.

Prices are going up because the value of our money is going down.

Everyone should consider which assets can help them preserve their wealth during periods of inflation.

When I provide people recommendations on how to approach this challenge, I urge them to keep my number one rule in mind: You want to own in-demand, useful assets that cannot be easily replaced or replicated. You want to own businesses and real estate properties that produce in-demand, scarce resources, products, and services.

This group of assets includes quality farmland, beachfront real estate, timberland, great businesses, and oil and gas pipelines.

When a very difficult or impossible-to-replicate business or piece of real estate produces in-demand, scarce resources, products, and services, it tends to hold its value no matter what the dollar is doing. Its price will constantly “recalibrate” to accommodate an increase in currency units.

It’s like the difference between slicing a pizza into 6 or 8 pieces. The number of slices changed, but the amount of pizza is the same.

In addition to the assets listed above, I’ve added “enormous proven reserves of in-demand natural gas” to our list of inflation defense vehicles this year.

As mentioned above, big tech firms are racing to build the world’s best AI models and infrastructure. They’ve already spent more than a trillion dollars. This year, they are on pace to spend over $700 billion on AI infrastructure, with more than $3 trillion expected to follow.

All that AI infrastructure is poised to consume vast amounts of electricity. The IEA projects that electricity consumption at AI-focused facilities will triple between 2025 and 2030, even as chips and software become more efficient. S&P Global estimates that global electricity demand will increase by nearly 50% by 2040.

I’ve frequently mentioned that AI’s growing power demands are a major driver of natural gas demand, as it is the preferred clean-burning fuel for power plants that support AI data centers. Growing demand for U.S. natural gas from Europe and Asia is another powerful demand driver.

A compelling way to invest in this theme – and fortify your portfolio against inflation to boot – is to own a basket of America’s leading natural gas producers. This group includes EQT (EQT), Expand Energy (EXE), Antero Resources (AR), Range Resources (RRC), CNX Resources (CNX), and Comstock Resources (CRK).

Buying a basket of these firms makes you the owner of a vast and diversified collection of the highest-quality natural gas fields in the United States.

As you can see in the four-year chart below for natural gas giant Range Resources, the stock has formed a series of higher highs and higher lows since 2023. (Charts of fellow giants EQT and EXE are similar.) A series of higher highs and higher lows is one of the quintessential features of a long-term bull market.

Mind you, this series of higher highs and higher lows is extremely volatile. You could even call it ugly. Range and its fellow producers have volatile stock prices because the natural gas market is inherently volatile. Natural gas prices are subject to huge swings.

Natural gas demand is greatly influenced by weather, while supply depends on infrastructure, production capacity, and storage availability. This creates a volatile price environment where sudden changes in the weather can produce huge swings in the natural gas price.

It may be volatile and ugly, but it’s still a series of higher highs and higher lows for U.S. natural gas producers. If you have a strong stomach and a desire to invest in the AI boom while playing inflation defense, consider adding this theme to your portfolio. Your shares could become very valuable “currency” in Elon’s new world of money.

This industry has turned into a stock market juggernaut. Are you profiting yet?

Credit: Liudmila Chernetska

Another day, another big batch of winners in the health care sector.

This morning, the following companies reached new one-year highs:

• AMN Healthcare Services (AMN), a $1.7 billion provider of healthcare staffing, recruiting, and workforce management services to hospitals and medical facilities.

• Pfizer (PFE), a $172.6 billion pharmaceutical company developing vaccines and treatments for cancer, cardiovascular disease, infectious diseases, and inflammatory conditions.

• Biogen (BIIB), a $36.4 billion biotechnology company developing treatments for neurological diseases, including multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, and spinal muscular atrophy.

• Becton Dickinson (BDX), a $53.8 billion manufacturer of medical devices, diagnostic instruments, surgical equipment, and hospital supplies, including syringes and intravenous catheters.

• Charles River Laboratories (CRL), a $16.4 billion provider of drug discovery, preclinical testing, laboratory animal models, and research services to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies.

• IQVIA Holdings (IQV), a $45.4 billion provider of clinical trial management, healthcare data analytics, and technology services that help pharmaceutical companies develop and commercialize drugs.

• Exelixis (EXEL), a $16 billion biotechnology company developing targeted cancer therapies, including treatments for kidney, liver, and thyroid cancers.

• Takeda Pharmaceutical (TAK), a $64 billion Japanese pharmaceutical company developing treatments for gastrointestinal disorders, rare diseases, cancer, and neurological conditions.

• Medpace Holdings (MEDP), an $18.4 billion contract research organization that manages clinical trials and provides drug development services for pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies.

In addition to these individual firms, the world’s largest healthcare stock ETF – the Health Care Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLV) – powered to a new all-time high this morning. It is one of the few major equity ETFs to do so.

For more than three years, I’ve made “Boomer healthcare” one of my highest conviction long-term investment themes. We don’t know of another investment research publication that has written more bullishly, more often about this booming industry than we have.

Over the past year, we have published more than two dozen pieces on opportunities in drug development, biotechnology, senior living facilities, genomics, cardiology, diagnostics, and more.

Our bullish stance has produced a parade of home runs, with the healthcare industry dominating the stock market’s list of new highs over the past year.

Healthcare stocks are generating extraordinary returns because they are benefiting from several megatrends simultaneously. One is the enormous Baby Boom generation entering the phase of life when healthcare spending skyrockets.

And two: extraordinary innovation in the healthcare sector. Thanks to advances in genomic sequencing, AI-powered analytics, imaging technology, and preventive treatments, healthcare is becoming much better and more personalized. This is driving strong demand for all kinds of new tests, tools, and treatments.

After all, when a useful and important service you buy gets much better, you typically buy more of it.

Each time I check in on the “juggernaut-like” healthcare bull market, I worry some readers may tire of reading about it. We’ve devoted so much attention to healthcare because it has paid off well for us. This is where the money is. It’s like the stock market version of what the famed bank robber Willie Sutton said. When asked why he robbed banks, Sutton said, “Because that’s where the money is.”

We’ve been publishing a lot on healthcare because that’s where the money has been for the past year. It’s a trend that is paying us. Given the very large and long-term nature of the Boomer healthcare megatrend, we expect that to continue.

Market Notes

• Conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) hit a one-year high. It has risen 11% over the last year.

• Payment giants Visa (V) and Mastercard (MA) hit new one-year highs today. These are positive economic signals despite all the noise.

• Our recommendation to get long oil and gas stocks continues to pay off. Oil giants Chevron (CVX), ConocoPhillips (COP), BP (BP) and Suncor Energy (SU) hit new one-year highs today.

• Recent software leaders continue to lead as Atlassian (TEAM), Veeva Systems (VEEV), DocuSign (DOCU) and Manhattan Associates (MANH) hit new one-year highs today.

• Space economy leader AST SpaceMobile (ASTS) reached a new one-year low today.

Regards,

Brian Hunt
Editor, Money & Megatrends

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