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☕️ Nothing says “trust our AI” like selling it for less than vending machine coffee

Aug 12, 2025

Howdy! 👋

Was Monday’s action all the “give” in the give and take I mentioned in Sunday’s short?

I have no idea.

Here’s the thing to think about.

Contrary to what a lot of people believe, volatility isn’t the enemy but simply the price of admission for bigger profit potential.

The trick is not getting rattled.

Investing is about focus, not noise.

Plan
Execute
Repeat

Here’s my playbook.

1 - CPI: cool enough for September cuts?

Inflation’s drifting lower—headline CPI +0.2% MoM (+2.7% YoY) and core +0.3% MoM (+3.1% YoY) according to the Ministry of Whitewash, err... the Bureau of Labor Statistics. (Read)

As for the tariffs that nearly every economist from here to Seattle swore up, down and sideways would be “bad” for dang near everything?

They’re nibbling at a few categories, but the impact’s patchy suggesting either lag effects or companies quietly eating costs to hold market share.

My guess is a little of both.

And yet, right on cue, CNBC is reporting that Wall Street is betting on 3 rate cuts by year end. (Read)

What to do?

Simple.

Buy the best, ignore the rest.

Rates are for traders, but profits are for investors. Especially when it comes to my faves… companies with fortress-like balance sheets, margin/price power, making "must have" products and services.

Make your move before the crowd wakes up!

And if you don't know where or how to get started, perhaps you'd enjoy One Bar Ahead® where I talk about this stuff and the specific companies leading the charge regularly. Scores of investors around the world tell me it’s changed their lives in ways they couldn’t have possibly anticipated (which is tremendously humbling and an honour)!

2 – Spirit’s about to hold a mile-high yard sale

Five months out of bankruptcy and Spirit Airlines is already warning it may not make it another 12 months without a cash transfusion. (Read)

As I suggested would be the case, the company is burning fuel, money, and shareholder patience at Mach 3. Oversupply, weaker leisure travel, and grounded planes are killing pricing power and a whole lot more.

Now, management’s eyeing a yard sale on aircraft, real estate, and airport gates just to keep the lights on.

Investing in airlines is the hedge-fund equivalent of eating gas station sushi… so don’t unless you fancy a trip to the doc. Or at least that’s my $0.02… which really isn’t much considering Spirit was delisted from the NYSE and now trades for $0.46. 🤦‍️

Which gives me an idea.

Sometimes the best way to make money is betting against the zombie.

Trade Idea: Flip the script by buying Delta calls as the “survivor trade.” I say that because I think this article is spot on… Delta is reinventing itself as the “lifestyle airline” and having flown ‘em recently back from Italy, I’d agree.

3 – BigBear.ai, as in “ain’t increasing”

Just like C3 AI – which I wrote to you about yesterday (see #4) - BigBear.ai is a reminder that having “AI” in your name doesn’t guarantee growth.

The stock cratered after the company slashed full-year revenue guidance from $160–$180M down to $125–$140M, missing earnings and revenue estimates by a wide margin. (Read)

Management blamed disruptions in federal contracting, but the bigger story is that there’s no growth in sight. And that’s a major problem.

If you’re an AI-branded company and you can’t grow at a time when AI is the hottest investment theme on the planet, the problem isn’t the market – it’s you.

Keith’s Investing Tip: Skip the pretenders. Real winners have pipelines, profits, and pricing power. And don’t ever forget that!

4 – Time to buy gold?

U.S. President Donald Trump took to Truth Social to declare “Gold will not be Tariffed!” — reversing a surprise U.S. Customs ruling that would have slapped a 39% duty on certain Swiss gold bars. (Read) That, of course, yanked the ol’ rug out from under Friday’s spike. Prices dropped 2.48%.

Is it time to buy?

Depends.

MyPOV is that:

Gold is still a crowded, fear-driven trade, and my expectation is that it’ll fall by as much as ½ over the next 12 -24 months.
The opportunity cost of holding gold at these price levels is brutal when you could be putting your money into assets with much stronger tailwinds and real growth driving ‘em.

But that’s just me.

You may feel differently, and I respect that 💯.

If gold’s in your plan and owning it helps you sleep at night, that’s fine. Just please don’t mistake noise for signal and don’t get caught being the last one out of yesterday’s trade if big money traders suddenly – and without warning – turn the lights out.

5 – Nothing says “trust our AI” like selling it for less than vending machine coffee

Hollywood couldn’t make this stuff up, unless they had a prior blockbuster to copy which seems to be the theme lately, but I digress. 🤦‍️

Anthropic just announced it’ll give Claude for Enterprise and Claude for Government to all three branches for a buck for a year. (Read) OpenAI pulled the same stunt earlier this month. (Read)

Forget “enterprise sales.”

This is lobbying with a login screen — the tech equivalent of buying the bartender a drink in hopes he or she will remember your name.

Put another way.

Google is so confident in the value that it’ll deliver that it’s willing to slap a $1 price tag on it and hand it to the one customer practically guaranteed to pay late – the U.S. government.

Sigh.

I’ll continue to avoid Google, thank you very much.

Keith’s Investing Tip: Don’t fall in love with specific stocks – like Google – because you lose your objectivity – and because it was a great stock for a long time.