Pivot Point Capital
What we have seen so far are just from Gen 1 models. Blackwell models aren’t even out yet, not to mention Rubin, or Feynman.. next decade will be wild. Maybe AGI is just a state of endless prompting, looping, reasoning, and compute. Except that instead of…
Well so the first model trained at scale on Blackwell is finally out.. Mythos showing a massive step function gain against previous gens, just months apart. Now how will models trained on Vera Rubin, Feynman look like..?
Maybe the default expectation is that everyone will be eventually made redundant. Feels like there’s maybe only 2 years left to hoard as much hard assets as possible. Time to strap in, get down and dirty using AI, max out your rate limits, and don’t forget to treat your LLMs better
Maybe the default expectation is that everyone will be eventually made redundant. Feels like there’s maybe only 2 years left to hoard as much hard assets as possible. Time to strap in, get down and dirty using AI, max out your rate limits, and don’t forget to treat your LLMs better
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Pivot Point Capital
I have no strong views on the current Iran/SoH crisis. While Fintwit has now magically transformed into geopolitical/oil experts (ex-software/SaaS experts), I’m aware enough to recognise that this isn’t my domain. I can see both sides of the argument: - Bear…
News of Mythos benchmarks also came at an excellent time, right as the market was coming off peak fear.
Macro uncertainty resolving into certainty, combined with Mythos raising the blue sky with the AI narrative, provides momentum for the pendulum swings right into the hottest sectors of the past 2 years. A man can dream
Macro uncertainty resolving into certainty, combined with Mythos raising the blue sky with the AI narrative, provides momentum for the pendulum swings right into the hottest sectors of the past 2 years. A man can dream
Pivot Point Capital
Expanding more on (4), INTC can actually be rather.. compelling — if you exclude the oppy cost on a stock that may take years to play out. They’re telling you upfront that they’re either (1) fully exiting the leading edge foundry business if there’s no willing…
Maybe it’s finally time to dance
Inb4 Lip Bu nukes the bag on earnings
$INTC
Inb4 Lip Bu nukes the bag on earnings
$INTC
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Pivot Point Capital
SaaS short basket on average +15% in 2 weeks Also added other shorts recently: $WIX @ $94 $COUR @ $7.12 $UPWK @ $19.8 $INTU @ $568 $SHOP @ $156 (largest short currently) Dilemma between wanting to start trimming some of these to reduce risk of a crowded…
$WIX management feeling philanthropic buying back shares at $92
Closed full short @ $64
Closed full short @ $64
For those of you who have traded crypto before, you might find a lot of similarities between the famed crypto alt seasons and the small/micro-cap stock pumps we’re seeing today.
Missing the first few parabolic winners of this cycle (LITE/SNDK) has pushed participants into a frenzied mood, with sub-$5B names going vertical and X influencers shilling tickers based on exaggerated, half-true—or outright false—narratives (photonics has gotten it the worst) to their hundreds of thousands of retail followers. The time to process and investigate names has also declined due to the accelerated capital flows.
Larger names have stalled as capital rotates into smaller caps, moving further out on the risk curve in hopes of finding the next LITE/SNDK. CAR’s degen short squeeze, somewhat reminiscent of GME/AMC, also shows the parallels are hard to ignore.
I’m not a party pooper, and I’ve participated in some of these names over the past few weeks too. But having been through several alt seasons, the most important rule is never drink your own Kool-Aid. Alt season can be a good or bad thing, I’ll leave that for you to decide.
DJT has made it almost impossible to short markets (and hence price things properly), most obviously in the context of the Iran–US situation. You can see Iran trying to pressure US markets, while the DJT admin attempts to prop them up. In this kind of environment, it’s hard to justify being meaningfully short high-beta or crowded longs, especially when trying to time the top of parabolic moves.
Interestingly, the less markets react to the Iran–US conflict, the less leverage Iran has in negotiations, and in turn, the less impact Iran ultimately has on US markets. Reflexivity at work!
Missing the first few parabolic winners of this cycle (LITE/SNDK) has pushed participants into a frenzied mood, with sub-$5B names going vertical and X influencers shilling tickers based on exaggerated, half-true—or outright false—narratives (photonics has gotten it the worst) to their hundreds of thousands of retail followers. The time to process and investigate names has also declined due to the accelerated capital flows.
Larger names have stalled as capital rotates into smaller caps, moving further out on the risk curve in hopes of finding the next LITE/SNDK. CAR’s degen short squeeze, somewhat reminiscent of GME/AMC, also shows the parallels are hard to ignore.
I’m not a party pooper, and I’ve participated in some of these names over the past few weeks too. But having been through several alt seasons, the most important rule is never drink your own Kool-Aid. Alt season can be a good or bad thing, I’ll leave that for you to decide.
DJT has made it almost impossible to short markets (and hence price things properly), most obviously in the context of the Iran–US situation. You can see Iran trying to pressure US markets, while the DJT admin attempts to prop them up. In this kind of environment, it’s hard to justify being meaningfully short high-beta or crowded longs, especially when trying to time the top of parabolic moves.
Interestingly, the less markets react to the Iran–US conflict, the less leverage Iran has in negotiations, and in turn, the less impact Iran ultimately has on US markets. Reflexivity at work!
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Excluding market commentary, I think power is in a sweet spot. Interesting shifts within the sector while not being overly crowded yet. Also seems to be the next lowest hanging fruit in terms of reducing TCO/performance per watt.
Of the entire power value chain, high-voltage semis and PoL conversion stand out to me as the highest torque.
Am long:
$CORZ @ $19 (a potential M&A play)
$VICR @ $200
$NVTS @ $14.5
Of the entire power value chain, high-voltage semis and PoL conversion stand out to me as the highest torque.
Am long:
$CORZ @ $19 (a potential M&A play)
$VICR @ $200
$NVTS @ $14.5
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Pivot Point Capital
Second reason for derisking Reddit was to size up my $INTC position @ $29.5-$30, which is now my largest position. I see $INTC as quite possibly the fat pitch of 2025/2026, but as I mentioned numerous times, the drawback is that there is an uncertain duration…
I forgot a third factor for Intel, maybe it’s even the most relevant one.
I was always taught not to overweight management’s tone/sentiment/track record etc, but I’ve found the opposite to be true. Sometimes, mgmt might even make up half of the story.
I was always taught not to overweight management’s tone/sentiment/track record etc, but I’ve found the opposite to be true. Sometimes, mgmt might even make up half of the story.
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Pivot Point Capital
Adding a long position on $INTC @ $22.61 in the overnight market. Prob gonna hold this position for the short-mid term. Very bullish on Lip-bu Tan. There’s probably only a few people in the world that can turnaround INTC, and one of them is probably him.…
From when it all started, to a liquid 4x that you could jam in SIZE. Intel was and still is my largest long position, going into the print. I’m not selling yet.
I view it as crazily undervalued a year ago, and more fairly priced now -- but with lots of upside remaining. We have a good entry so we have the luxury of holding and waiting for the rest to play out.
Tailwinds:
- CPU demand exploding from agentic AI and inference (doubled from 1:8 to 1:4 CPU/GPU ratio per LBT, but I think he is conservative)
- Intel, with their own foundry, is the only one with supply capacity to flex to meet CPU demand, unlike AMD/ARM downstream that depend on TSMC that has no capacity
- Oppy in custom silicon, again having its own foundry is a plus against Broadcom/Marvell
- Oppy in EMIB packaging trending well
- foundry yields progressing well and better than expectations, 18A will meet EOY targets by mid 2026
- 14A yields progressing even faster than 18A
- 14A, which sounds like it’s on, will accelerate investors’ excitement in 2027 and beyond
- Intel being able to hit 41% GM, WITHOUT its foundry breaking even, or any external foundry customers, gives much to dream about for a blue-sky scenario
- strategic & political advantage; leading edge fabs in secure locations are ever more impt in today’s climate
- investors’ sentiments changing & turnaround accelerating
It’s a perfect storm. I also changed my view of Pat Gelsinger. He walked so LBT could run. Without his extensive investments that nearly broke Intel (for which he was often ridiculed for), Intel would not have a chance to catch up now.
$INTC
I view it as crazily undervalued a year ago, and more fairly priced now -- but with lots of upside remaining. We have a good entry so we have the luxury of holding and waiting for the rest to play out.
Tailwinds:
- CPU demand exploding from agentic AI and inference (doubled from 1:8 to 1:4 CPU/GPU ratio per LBT, but I think he is conservative)
- Intel, with their own foundry, is the only one with supply capacity to flex to meet CPU demand, unlike AMD/ARM downstream that depend on TSMC that has no capacity
- Oppy in custom silicon, again having its own foundry is a plus against Broadcom/Marvell
- Oppy in EMIB packaging trending well
- foundry yields progressing well and better than expectations, 18A will meet EOY targets by mid 2026
- 14A yields progressing even faster than 18A
- 14A, which sounds like it’s on, will accelerate investors’ excitement in 2027 and beyond
- Intel being able to hit 41% GM, WITHOUT its foundry breaking even, or any external foundry customers, gives much to dream about for a blue-sky scenario
- strategic & political advantage; leading edge fabs in secure locations are ever more impt in today’s climate
- investors’ sentiments changing & turnaround accelerating
It’s a perfect storm. I also changed my view of Pat Gelsinger. He walked so LBT could run. Without his extensive investments that nearly broke Intel (for which he was often ridiculed for), Intel would not have a chance to catch up now.
$INTC
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Pivot Point Capital
From when it all started, to a liquid 4x that you could jam in SIZE. Intel was and still is my largest long position, going into the print. I’m not selling yet. I view it as crazily undervalued a year ago, and more fairly priced now -- but with lots of upside…
INTEL: APPLE, INTEL HAVE REACHED AGREEMENT FOR INTEL TO MAKE CHIPS IN APPLE DEVICES
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Pivot Point Capital
Given this trend, $SNDK FY27 EPS can reach >$80; up more than 5x from $15 consensus estimates just a few months ago.. power of exponential pricing and 100% passthrough to margins. The counterpoint is demand destruction from consumer side, but the counterpoint…
Lately, there’s been a lot of commentary arguing that semis are in a bubble, often drawing lazy comparisons to the 1999 dot-com era.
Take $SNDK as an example. Just six months ago, FY26 consensus EPS was only ~$11. Today, the consensus for the EPS of that same year is closer to $64, nearly 6x higher. FY27 has moved even more dramatically, from ~$15 to ~$169.
The stock’s move over the past year has been almost entirely earnings-driven. That earnings expansion, in turn, reflects the growing importance of memory in next-generation AI.
It was only in the past few weeks that we finally saw meaningful multiple expansion, as LTAs may have changed the market’s perception of memory’s cyclicality and its supposedly commoditized nature.
So to argue that the past year was simply a bubble because “the stock went up 10x” misses the point.
The simpler (and more boring) explanation is that consensus estimates were just far too low a year ago, and failed to account for an inflection in earnings power. The stock price a year ago, got the future wrong.
Take $SNDK as an example. Just six months ago, FY26 consensus EPS was only ~$11. Today, the consensus for the EPS of that same year is closer to $64, nearly 6x higher. FY27 has moved even more dramatically, from ~$15 to ~$169.
The stock’s move over the past year has been almost entirely earnings-driven. That earnings expansion, in turn, reflects the growing importance of memory in next-generation AI.
It was only in the past few weeks that we finally saw meaningful multiple expansion, as LTAs may have changed the market’s perception of memory’s cyclicality and its supposedly commoditized nature.
So to argue that the past year was simply a bubble because “the stock went up 10x” misses the point.
The simpler (and more boring) explanation is that consensus estimates were just far too low a year ago, and failed to account for an inflection in earnings power. The stock price a year ago, got the future wrong.
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Pivot Point Capital
Lately, there’s been a lot of commentary arguing that semis are in a bubble, often drawing lazy comparisons to the 1999 dot-com era. Take $SNDK as an example. Just six months ago, FY26 consensus EPS was only ~$11. Today, the consensus for the EPS of that…
One caveat is that we are probably getting closer to peak earnings (finally). You have to decide what’s the through-cycle earnings for yourself, and what multiples you can ascribe to that normalised earnings power. That may help you to sell right
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Pivot Point Capital
From when it all started, to a liquid 4x that you could jam in SIZE. Intel was and still is my largest long position, going into the print. I’m not selling yet. I view it as crazily undervalued a year ago, and more fairly priced now -- but with lots of upside…
On $INTC, flows can be constructive especially from long-only funds.
A year ago, this was widely viewed as a value trap: a failed turnaround, structurally disadvantaged in a “GPU > CPU” world, capex-heavy to the point of bankruptcy, “IFS will never work”etc. In short, it was almost uninvestable for many LOs.
Today, the narrative has flipped. What was once seen as a failed turnaround is now being framed as a must-own strategic fab story, a credible recovery, CPU reasserting relevance versus GPU, and “what other customers will IFS win besides AAPL?”
I remember a LO PM at my previous firm explaining how these funds operate. At a basic level, they seek to outperform by overweighting or underweighting names within their benchmark index. When you are underweight a stock and it rallies, you underperform the index. That underperformance directly hurts your carry.
With INTC up 6x over the past year, the stock’s index weight has risen materially, meaning an underweight position now creates a larger and more visible drag. At a $633bn market cap, INTC has gone from a small source of discomfort to a massive thorn in their backs. The LOs capitulation can drive the stock higher
A year ago, this was widely viewed as a value trap: a failed turnaround, structurally disadvantaged in a “GPU > CPU” world, capex-heavy to the point of bankruptcy, “IFS will never work”etc. In short, it was almost uninvestable for many LOs.
Today, the narrative has flipped. What was once seen as a failed turnaround is now being framed as a must-own strategic fab story, a credible recovery, CPU reasserting relevance versus GPU, and “what other customers will IFS win besides AAPL?”
I remember a LO PM at my previous firm explaining how these funds operate. At a basic level, they seek to outperform by overweighting or underweighting names within their benchmark index. When you are underweight a stock and it rallies, you underperform the index. That underperformance directly hurts your carry.
With INTC up 6x over the past year, the stock’s index weight has risen materially, meaning an underweight position now creates a larger and more visible drag. At a $633bn market cap, INTC has gone from a small source of discomfort to a massive thorn in their backs. The LOs capitulation can drive the stock higher
👍5❤4🥰2
Pivot Point Capital
Excluding market commentary, I think power is in a sweet spot. Interesting shifts within the sector while not being overly crowded yet. Also seems to be the next lowest hanging fruit in terms of reducing TCO/performance per watt. Of the entire power value…
$VICR +50%, and is also a proxy play on $CRBS IPO this week; Cerebras is the anchor customer for $VICR’s 1st fab
Starting to see that there are really only two trades in the market: semis and ex-semis. Mostly everything ex-semi (consumers, software, whatever you have) just ends up as funding shorts for semis.
AI is a power law and amplifies winner-take-all dynamics wherever it’s applied. Ex-semis are locked in a tight arm race for innovation, compute and tokens, and the fastest 20% to see ROI on their AI investments will absorb the other 80%. By that logic, semis can go higher, as everything ex-semis pour in $$$ to be part of the top 20% of AI winners.
AI is a power law and amplifies winner-take-all dynamics wherever it’s applied. Ex-semis are locked in a tight arm race for innovation, compute and tokens, and the fastest 20% to see ROI on their AI investments will absorb the other 80%. By that logic, semis can go higher, as everything ex-semis pour in $$$ to be part of the top 20% of AI winners.
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