☕ Palantir is now the year’s best performing stock – I sure hope you own it!

Howdy! 👋 

I hope you’re off to a great start today. 

I’ll keep it brief so I can tidy up some last-minute details for Shindig ’25, our annual conference (which starts tomorrow). Folks are coming in from all over the world and, like investing, I want to make sure I get the details right! 

Success is about focus, not noise. 

• Plan 

• Execute 

• Repeat. 

Here’s my playbook. 

1 – Netflix: Killer quarter, nosebleed price 

Netflix crushed it. (Read) 

• Revenue +16% 

• Net income: $3.1B 

• Operating margin: 34.1% 

• Free cash flow +91% to $2.3B 

• Raised full-year outlook 

And yet… shares dipped after-hours. 

The media will have you believe that the markets are hung up on forward guidance — specifically a margin dip tied to Stranger Things and Happy Gilmore 2. 🙄 

Not really. 

The truth of the matter is that traders engineered a "rug pull" to separate the skittish from their money by running a short-term liquidity sweep intended to drop prices quickly. So they can buy in at lower prices. 

As an aside, in the old days great earnings used to signal higher prices ahead but these days the game is all about the lead up into earnings and some quick profit taking. 

Both are noise. 

What catches my attention is that Netflix continues to show it’s tariff-resistant, ad-scalable, and dang hard to replicate. 

But at over $1,200 a share, I instinctively don't like it. 

I’m wondering  if a stock split is in the cards to bring in new capital and thinking about how I can dip my toe in the water using tactics like LowBall Orders or Selling Cash-Secured Puts to maintain the control I want and the risk I'm prepared to take. 

Keith's Investing Tip: Many people are put off by high prices but there's always a path to profits... fractional shares, buying smaller numbers of shares and specific tactics like LowBall Orders and Selling Cash Secured Puts (which, btw, I'll be detailing at this weekend's Shindig '25 for the OBA Family). 

2 – Chevron prevails 

Exxon and CNOOC tried to block it.  

The ICC said nope. (Read) 

Chevron now gets 30% of Guyana’s oil jackpot — the Stabroek Block — locking arms with Exxon (45%) and CNOOC (25%) in one of the world’s top offshore plays. 

Forget the noise.  

Inflation, oil price chops, emissions politics etc. 

The real game is energy security. 

Keith’s Investing Tip: M&A is very tricky but investing in it, not so much. The companies doing the buying have the vision, the capital, the strategy and the upper hand. The hunted and the blockers? They’re often just hoping for a lifeline and tend to be a drag on your portfolio. 

3 - Defense isn’t just a budget line item anymore 

Swedish defense contractor Saab jumped 12% after smashing earnings expectations and hiking full-year guidance. Q2 operating income rose 49% YoY, and sales climbed 30% — both well ahead of analyst estimates. (Read) 

Europe is in what the EU is now openly calling its “era of rearmament,” with member states pledging to push defense spending toward 5% of GDP.  

The stock is up 131% year-to-date, which may seem frothy, but in a world where defense is no longer optional, I’m not sure traditional valuation models matter all that much. 

To be fair, Saab’s a great company but it’s a niche player. That’s why I prefer other names with much deeper pockets, far bigger impact, full-spectrum exposure, and profit potential. But that’s just me. 

Why? 

Size matters in defense. Bigger players win more contracts, move faster on R&D, and can afford the long game. 

Hopefully you’re thinking along similar lines. 

Keith’s Investing Tip: History shows very clearly that you want to be aligned with companies in the slipstream of national policy when global priorities shift. Defense isn’t just a budget line item anymore — it’s a full-blown tailwind. 

4 – Alexa, who just got fired? 

Amazon just laid off hundreds of employees in its AWS cloud division, targeting specialist and customer-facing roles just weeks after CEO Andy Jassy warned AI would reshape headcount. (Read) 

Now let’s hope they improve usability and service. 

Our company used AWS but found it to be such a pain in the you-know-what that we pulled up stakes and took our business elsewhere. And I know we’re not alone. 

I can’t shake the nagging feeling that AWS could revisit $160 a share. 

Firing people who actually talk to customers is almost never a good development, especially when it’s already got a reputation for steamrolling ‘em. 

Putskies? 

Trade Idea: $165 strike puts, 45-90 days out if support buckles. Trail tight. 

5 – Palantir is now the year’s best performing S&P 500 stock 

Shares have returned 102.48% YTD, making Palantir the S&P 500’s best-performing stock. 

Hopefully you own it. 

Heck knows we’ve talked about it enough. 

And if ya don’t? 

My $0.02 is that there’s still plenty of upside ahead. 

My target is still $200 a share, a number I put on the map before half of Wall Street learned how to spell Palantir. 

Hooyah!  

Bottom Line  

Reflecting on the past can give us almost super-hero-like powers in the future.  

Doing so allows us to develop insight into decisions we’ve made.  

Success becomes information we build upon.  

Mistakes become tuition.  

New knowledge becomes a foundation. 

You got this – I promise! 

As always, let’s MAKE it a great day and finish the week strong. 

Keith 😀 

P.S. I’ll be off next week, recharging with my bride after a monster first half of the year and enough brain-frying work on Shindig '25 to make a supercomputer sweat. Thanks for reading along — and if you hear a sonic boom, it’s probably just us out in the desert letting loose on the bikes. YOU are the best! 💯💥 😀🏍️