“Take risks now. Do something bold. You won’t regret it.” – Said X Owner Elon Musk
Mad Hedge Technology Letter
September 15, 2023
Fiat Lux
(GEN Z AND TECH)
($COMPQ)
America is changing as we know it.
That’s not always bad, but readers need to understand the major ramifications to the tech sector ($COMPQ) and the US consumer.
By 2030, Generation Z will account for nearly one-third of the U.S. workforce, scary isn’t it?
While a sizable percentage still has yet to penetrate the talent market, they’re already taking a far more radical approach to career growth than their predecessors.
That's due, in part, to the fact that Gen Z, much of whom is still under age 18, is accumulating debt at higher rates than any other generation.
The cohort is least likely to think they will ever be able to retire and is generally concerned that climate change will prevent them from any chance at a normal life or career.
I am particularly referring to the concept that hard work, determination, and loyalty to one’s company will score financial success.
These young bucks are making a full 180-degree turn.
This is devastating for certain industries like housing where Gen Z rather rent and cruise the globe to beautify social media profiles.
I won’t say that Gen Z has their priorities wrong, I will just say that they have interesting priorities.
For various reasons true and somewhat true, Gen Z is taking the microphone back and saying they wish to do something else.
Many of the Gen Z don’t want to grow up and bear the responsibilities of scary life events that are remotely connected to settling down.
It terrifies them.
It would behoove employers to pay keen attention to Gen Z’s expectations or alternative desires.
Understanding Gen Z as the up-and-coming, entry-level positions at these companies is valuable. We cannot just discard them.
I expect the bulk of Gen Z to target companies like Google, Apple, Amazon, Meta, Tesla, Snapchat, and TikTok as corporate America tries to appease this upcoming generation. I say those specific companies because they are the most accepting of social media activists.
Another key takeaway here is that Gen Z are hooked more on tech devices, hardware, software and products more than other generations before them.
Not only did they grow up with tech, but they are described as the first generation to be “tech natives.”
During a 3-year stint in the most formative years, they were forced to lock down in their parents’ house and make do with technology as their only friend.
Many data surveys show that Gen Z uses technology devices more than any other generation with some ages registering 10 hours of use per day.
These trends are highly bullish for tech companies because it means more hours logged watching Netflix, more screen time on Apple iPhones, and more pizza orders on Uber Eats.
It’s my belief that in the next 10 years, the US economy will experience a 50% increase in the average use of tech devices per day thanks to the additive Gen Z tailwind and the Baby Boomer generation dropping off.
More often than not, surveys have shown that high users of products often handpick the same stocks to purchase for the long term because anecdotal experience seals the deal.
Gen Z will also be the generation fully utilizing generative artificial intelligence to supercharge Silicon Valley business.
These trends are highly bullish for tech stocks.
“There is no art which government sooner learns of another than that of draining money from the pockets of the people.” – Scottish Economist Adam Smith
Mad Hedge Technology Letter
September 13, 2023
Fiat Lux
(A GREAT CHIP STOCK TO BUY AND HOLD)
(QCOM), (APPL), (SOC), (SAMSUNG), (TSM)
If there is a company I would tell my grandkids to work for then it would be semiconductor company Qualcomm (QCOM).
Why?
Even Apple (APPL) can’t replace them so easily and that counts for a lot in this day and age.
We learned just as much as Qualcomm said that it will supply Apple with 5G modems for smartphones through 2026.
Qualcomm expected to lose the Apple smartphone business, because they expected Apple to use an internally developed 5G modem starting in 2024.
They couldn’t develop the product fast enough so it is back snapping up modems with QCOM.
QCOM is the best of breed for smartphone chips and they can be found in every flagship Android device.
I am specifically referring to QCOM’s Snapdragon products which are a suite of system on a chip (SoC) semiconductor products for mobile devices.
The Snapdragon's central processing unit (CPU) uses the ARM architecture.
This line of chips is incredibly competitive and one of the foundational reasons to hold the stock.
Samsung’s SoC competitor named the Exynos is still a far cry from the Snapdragon no matter how hard they try and it seems like each iteration of the Exynos flagship SoC is always a generation behind the Snapdragon.
Apple do use their own SoC with the newest one named the Apple A17 Bionic, but QCOM will still monopolize the Android market with their own Snapdragon that is actually slightly better than the A17 Bionic chip.
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 beats the CPU clock speed of the A17 Bionic.
This doesn’t always translate to better real-world performance, but it’s still an impressive feat.
People believe the new Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSM) 3 nanometer (nm) processing can lose to the advanced 4nm node on the 8 Gen 3.
However, Apple will probably maintain a CPU lead, thanks to better software tuning and more transistors in the same area thanks to a smaller 3-nanometer node.
Basically, Snapdragon is a little faster but Apple has higher performance because of its superior software.
There is no denying that Apple has fantastic software.
On the revenue side, this is great news for the staying power of Snapdragon products and continued sales to Apple will boost Qualcomm’s handsets business, which reported $5.26 billion in sales in the past quarter and could soften the blow of potentially losing a critical customer.
About 21% of Qualcomm’s fiscal 2022 revenue of $44.2 billion came from Apple.
APPL purchased Intel’s smartphone modem division in 2019 to build its own modem. However, evidence suggests that it will be challenging for Apple to move away from Qualcomm’s chips because of their complexity.
Qualcomm also makes money from Apple through cellular licensing fees, which were about $1.9 billion in 2022.
Qualcomm continues to collect royalties from Apple under a six-year agreement. That agreement was struck at the end of a legal battle between Apple and Qualcomm over royalties that was settled in 2019.
Qualcomm says that it expects to only supply 20% of the modems needed for Apple’s 2026 smartphone launch, signaling that it likely still expects the Apple business to eventually decline.
Apple’s new iPhone called iPhone 15 uses QCOM modems as do many other high-end smartphones.
It’s hard to believe that QCOM’s market capitalization is only $125 billion. The eye test alone makes me think this is a half a trillion-dollar company.
Revenue is accelerating and they offer a 2.9% dividend yield.
I can’t talk more about the high quality of products made by QCOM.
This company will have staying power and even if Apple decides to move on, there are a slew of companies ready to gobble up QCOM chips.
Readers shouldn’t trade this stock, but they should buy and hold for the long haul.
Mad Hedge Technology Letter
September 11, 2023
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(DEATH OF LEGACY MEDIA)
(CHTR), (DIS), (NFLX), (NXST), (DISH)
Negotiations between Spectrum’s parent company, Charter Communications (CHTR), and Walt Disney (DIS) finally got over the impasse and they struck a deal.
No deal for both would have been catastrophic for both.
Disney faced the potential loss of 14.7 million Charter pay TV subscribers, or 20% of ESPN's current linear subscriber base of 74 million.
That equates to linear revenue losses of roughly $5 billion, or 6% of overall revenue.
Cord-cutting has been occurring at a brisk pace in the last few years, but the lack of solidarity among the legacy media negotiators appears to turn the trickle into a breaking of the dam.
What am I talking about?
Disney decided to go nuclear by removing its channels from the cable provider. Charter (CHTR) proposed that Disney (DIS) offer its customers free access to Disney’s streaming services, especially ESPN; Disney rebuffed the offer, but CHTR finally agreed to add Disney+ Basic ad-supported offering being provided to Charter customers who purchase the Spectrum TV Select package at no additional cost, "as part of a wholesale arrangement."
This is really the beginning of the end for legacy media and this melee could trigger a swift bout of consolidation as disagreements become the norm and not the outlier.
It’s no surprise the cost of creating content is going up and these channels like DIS feel they can just pass the costs
Remember that many people pay for cable just to watch college football and the NFL.
Roughly 25% of Charter’s clients engage with Disney content, Charter said on a call last week.
DirecTV is also embroiled in its own content squabble with local broadcast network Nexstar (NXST), which recently pulled over 200 stations in more than 100 metro areas from DirecTV’s network over a similar price dispute.
While the cable TV business has been declining for years, there’s concern this is the last hurrah.
Down the road, the winners out of all of this may be internet TV operators, including YouTube TV, Hulu TV, FuboTV, and Dish’s DISH’s (DISH) Sling. Some of these have been gaining steady traction even before negotiations soured, with Hulu’s web traffic up 7.2% year-over-year in July and Sling’s traffic up 11.8%.
Web traffic may pick up as consumers look for ways to watch their regularly scheduled programming. Online search interest in five major live TV streaming services picked up Sept. 1 when news of Disney’s blackout became public, according to Google Trends data.
I believe that online momentum will translate to a long-term subscriber bump for these companies.
CEO of CHTR Christopher Winfrey and CEO of DIS had to make this deal.
The ongoing chaos in the legacy media markets signals that cord-cutting will supplant the legacy markets within the next 10 years.
Baby Boomers are the last stalwarts of the legacy media market and they are retiring in droves.
Netflix (NFLX) is another streamer that is in line to pick up some of the demand for streaming content.
With high rates, the era of excesses is rearing its ugly head.
Platforms are being careful with the type of agreements they make as less quality content is facing a bleak future.
Live professional sports are lynchpin to why many consumers don’t quit cable.
I believe the next contract cycle will see many pro sports leagues go all streaming much like the American soccer league MLS did with Apple TV.
When pro sports migrate 100% into digital, expect to be outsized winners and losers while distributors like SlingTV should sink like a rock.
“A good sign as to whether there’s free speech is: Is someone you don’t like allowed to say something you don’t like? If that is the case, then we have free speech.” – Said Owner of X formerly Twitter Elon Musk
Mad Hedge Technology Letter
September 8, 2023
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(THE SUSHI HITS THE FAN IN CUPERTINO)
(APPL), (MCHI),