1. Hyper Scalers vs. Chip Stock Free Cash Flow
Holger Zschaepitz
2. Along with Data Center Buildout…Hyperscalers have $850B in Off Balance Sheet Leases
Bloomberg
3. AI Scaling 3x Faster than IT Build Out
AI economy. “AI is scaling three times faster than any IT wave”.
4. This Chart Shows SMH Semiconductors vs. Mag 7 Stocks MAGS
StockCharts
5. History of Bitcoin -50% Drawdowns
Bespoke The chart below shows Bitcoin in the year after each of the prior periods when prices first fell 50%+ from an all-time high. One of the things you always hear about Bitcoin after it sees a large decline like the current one is that “prices always come back”. That’s an accurate statement, but after prices experienced a 50% haircut in the three prior periods, the road back to new highs wasn’t necessarily short or smooth.
As shown in the chart, one year after each of the prior three periods, Bitcoin was lower a year later than it was when the drawdown first reached 50%. Not only that, but in two of the three periods, it barely even experienced a bounce. The one exception was after the June 2021 drawdown when prices quickly rebounded to new highs, but almost as quickly returned back to new lows. Perhaps the best thing Bitcoin has working in its favor is that you don’t hear much about $500,000 or even million-dollar price targets anymore.
Bespoke
6. United Kingdom Market Underperformance
Abnormal Returns
7. Hedge Fund Managers Earnings Dwarf Pro Athletes
Meb Faber
8. Households Sitting on $3.2 Trillion in Cash Plus $8 Trillion Money Markets
Household cash. “U.S. households are sitting on $3.2 trillion of cash”.
9. Home Price Increases by State 2021-2026
Visual Capitalist
10. 10 Meaning Questions for Your Midlife and Retirement
Reflections to make a difference in the direction and quality of your life.-Psychology Today Elaine Dundon
Key points
- Retirement can often present a crisis of meaning.
- It is up to us to determine how we will embrace midlife and beyond.
- Our choices are shaped by our inner perception of ourselves.
We are the ship that travels our life’s journey, our odyssey. Along the way, we encounter many adventures; some enjoyable, some challenging, some upsetting.
The phase of retirement and our corresponding older years represent a time where we are faced with new challenges. It is up to us to determine how we will embrace this new phase: growing, evolving, and actualizing our potential; or instead, stagnating, complaining, and even ending up further adrift or shipwrecked.
Socrates, an ancient Greek philosopher, taught us the importance of asking questions to raise our awareness of our thinking patterns, to uncover our biases, assumptions, and blocks, and importantly, to see the direction and consequences of our current thinking.
10 “Meaning Questions”
Here are 10 “Meaning Questions,” derived from my research in MEANINGology, designed to stimulate your deeper understanding of yourself as you prepare for, hopefully, a happy and very fulfilling future:
- Our choices are shaped by our inner perception of ourselves. Do you believe you are now too old to change the direction or the circumstances in your life?
- In what ways do you feel discontent with your life, question your past decisions, or feel that you failed to manifest the life you thought you would have by now?
- Who will you be without the identity you have adopted from your previous jobs, titles, and trophies; social status; or material possessions?
- What do you need to do to live more authentically—to stop living by other people’s expectations and instead live a life truly your own?
- Do you dread the future or do you see a vibrant future, full of hope and possibility?
- Do you prefer the safety of staying the same and within the current borders of your current life or do you want to embrace the challenges of change and growth?
- What dreams have you lost along the way? What have you always wanted to learn and experience?
- How do you plan to build new social friendships so that you will feel alive and connected and to combat potential loneliness in the future?
- How will you contribute to humanity and help to make the world a better place in this next phase of your life?
- What is limiting you from moving forward?
Retirement can present a crisis of meaning when we leave the safety of our jobs and find ourselves without the structure of work and without a sense of identity and belonging.
Remember, just because you may have been able to save money for your retirement does not mean you will live a meaningful life during your later years. Life with money but without meaning suggests you are simply surviving, not thriving. As I shared in our book, Prisoners of Our Thoughts1, the world-renowned psychiatrist and existential philosopher Viktor Frankl so wisely concluded, “Even more people today have the means to live but no meaning to live for.”
Now is the time to start reflecting and asking these existential questions that will truly make a difference both in the direction and the quality of your life in midlife and beyond. Outside forces may control the external circumstances but you control your internal world. Importantly, your choices create your own unique journey or odyssey in life. It is up to you. You are the captain of your life voyage! Every day is a new day to be enjoyed, not simply endured.