Fortum (FORTUM FH) Finland
Utilities
Pitched as a long idea at Revelare’s latest investor event, FORTUM operates in Europe’s most attractive market for AI datacentre development. Finland’s grid is mostly hydro and nuclear, with no marginal cost and power prices 60% below mainland Europe, while the cold climate further lowers datacentre cooling needs. All that is required for prices to rise back towards €100/MWh parity is new demand - and that is coming fast. Over 3GW of AI datacentre projects have already been approved, while Google has also bought a huge piece of land in the middle of the country and other hyperscalers are expected to follow. As Finnish power prices increase the company’s earnings should rise from €1 to €3 per share, implying the stock could reach €60 vs. <€20 today.
Edition: 223
- 31 October, 2025
Technology
Nvidia’s coding momentum is weakening, raising concerns about its AI dominance. Once a leader in developer mindshare across GitHub, StackOverflow, searches, and job postings, its trends have declined sharply in 2025, ranking near the bottom of 150 stocks. This signals a potential headwind for sales, though hyperscaler-driven revenues limit direct correlation. More importantly, the trend reveals structural risks: developers are shifting from Nvidia’s proprietary CUDA toward hardware-agnostic frameworks like PyTorch, TensorFlow, and JAX, which run across AMD, Google TPUs, and others. With optimised kernels reducing Nvidia’s software edge, the erosion of developer focus may undermine long-term competitive strength.
Edition: 219
- 05 September, 2025
The security infrastructure enabling the AI revolution
Technology
Akamai and CyberArk are showing strong momentum in developer interest, according to AnteData’s coding activity data. Repositories related to the two companies’ software platforms are frequently forked and starred - clear signals of rising popularity and adoption among developers. This surge aligns with growing Google search interest and reflects their central role in securing the infrastructure that powers the AI boom. In general, AnteData’s coding activity shows that security companies focused on protecting communication layers - like AKAM, Cloudflare and CYBR - are outperforming those focused purely on asset protection, such as Tenable or CrowdStrike. Evidently, in this new wave of Machine-to-Machine communication, speed, security and connectivity matter more than ever.
Edition: 217
- 08 August, 2025
IT Survey: Robust spend, GenAI boom, staffing cuts
Technology
Rosenblatt’s July survey of 100+ senior IT managers reveals a surprisingly robust IT spending outlook, with two-thirds of budgets being revised higher since the start of 2025, despite macro concerns. GenAI is the top investment priority, with 60% increasing spend and nearly 70% expecting a material organisational impact. Over 75% expect developer staffing cuts of 10%+. Cybersecurity remains a defensive spending priority with investment flowing towards securing modern, distributed environments (Cloud, SASE/SSE) and data itself - benefitting CrowdStrike, CyberArk, Palo Alto, Zscaler and Fortinet. AWS fared much better, ranking first in "cloud service provider best positioned in AI", with 28% (vs. 16% in Dec 24), surpassing Google and Microsoft. Infrastructure names like Snowflake, Rubrik and MongoDB are also well-positioned amid data estate modernisation.
Edition: 216
- 25 July, 2025
Brookfield Renewable Partners (BEP CN) Canada
Utilities
BEP signs a landmark Hydro Framework Agreement with Google, representing the largest-ever corporate hydroelectric power deal. However, Veritas estimates the deal’s initial pricing of $56-76/MWh is below BEP’s current US hydro average of $83/MWh in 2024, contrasting with management’s expectation of ~2-4% annual FFO growth from hydro recontracting. Furthermore, BEP faces significant barriers to scaling beyond the initial 670 MW, including long-term contractual commitments and geographic mismatch between available hydro capacity and Google’s priority markets (PJM & MISO). Despite the market’s positive reaction to the news, Veritas maintains their Sell rating and TP of US$20 (30% downside).
Edition: 216
- 25 July, 2025
Technology
At MYST’s recent TMT event, one of the most interesting bearish theses centred on HUBS, described as the “poster child” for structural disruption from AI. The presenter highlighted two major LLM-related themes: 1) AI’s impact on Search Engine Optimisation; and 2) the emergence of AI coding assistants like Cursor and Replit. HUBS’ dominance in customer acquisition via Google Search is unravelling, with organic traffic plunging ~80% from its 2022 peak. This erosion is doubly damaging as HUBS’ Marketing Hub (~40% of revenue) also loses relevance. A deteriorating leadership structure, slowing revenue growth and stretched valuation (48x FY25 FCF) further reinforce the bearish case.
Edition: 215
- 11 July, 2025
Technology
SPR’s latest channel checks suggest RBRK is evolving from a backup player into a recognised leader in data security. Systems integrators report strong traction in large enterprise accounts, driven by RBRK’s security-first messaging, ransomware protection and smooth implementations. Channel partners note upbeat sentiment, strong execution and growing confidence in the company's ability to deliver. In cloud marketplaces (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud), RBRK’s visibility is increasing thanks to deep cloud-native integrations, AI-driven features and new partnerships like Rackspace’s Cyber Recovery Service. With a ramping product roadmap and rising adoption across cloud and security use cases, RBRK’s momentum looks set to accelerate through 2025.
Edition: 213
- 13 June, 2025
Communications
Andrew Freedman sees Google’s AI Overviews as a critical and underappreciated threat to RDDT’s business model, with RDDT content already pushed lower in search results vs. 2024. This validates his earlier view that the company’s heavy reliance on Google traffic is a key risk. Marketer feedback from 1Q25 also points to sharp declines in organic traffic, hitting both user growth and monetisation. While global user numbers may appear encouraging, they are largely driven by new translation features in international markets like India. These markets, however, monetise poorly and are unlikely to contribute meaningfully to revenue or profit growth. Looking ahead, Andrew anticipates increasingly volatile advertiser and user behaviour going into 2H25. He forecasts a faster-than-anticipated deceleration in revenue growth and a stock that is 40% lower over the next 12-months.
Edition: 211
- 16 May, 2025
Communications
META is doubling down on AI infrastructure, raising its 2025 capex forecast to $64–72bn as it accelerates data centre construction amid rising costs. CEO Mark Zuckerberg is committed to making META a leading AI platform and insists on building in-house capacity to avoid reliance on others. While the AI strategy (centred on open source) is progressing well, it comes with a steep price tag, notably the ongoing $4bn+ quarterly burn at Reality Labs. Richard Windsor sees a growing risk of AI infrastructure overbuild, with META, Google, Microsoft and Amazon all ramping up spend - setting the stage for a painful correction. Despite this, META’s core business remains solid, with strong Q1 performance and improved operational efficiency via AI. At 23.5x FY25 PER, META is reasonably valued, but Richard prefers Google, where AI disruption risks from players like OpenAI are, in his view, overstated.
Edition: 210
- 02 May, 2025
Technology
Cyber diamond in the rough - unloved and out-of-favour, VRNS has underperformed its peers by a wide margin over the last 12 months. However, Felix Wang thinks its fortunes may start to change this year. His bullish thesis revolves around overplayed concerns re. the company’s ongoing SaaS transition and with continued product leadership, alongside a better sales team, VRNS's 2025 ARR and earnings guidance are beatable. Investors are highly sceptical of the company’s ability to reach $1bn ARR by 2027. This is why it is trading at only 6.6x 2026 EV/ARR. With a multiple re-rating and M&A optionality (Google's historic acquisition of Wiz for $32bn could open the floodgates to more M&A in cybersecurity), Felix sees 30%+ upside.
Edition: 208
- 04 April, 2025
Technology Spending Intentions Survey: Tracking tech budget trends & vendor demand
Technology
ETR’s Jan TSIS, based on responses from 1,835 tech leaders, projects 5.3% Y/Y IT spending growth in 2025, the highest since Jul 22. 73% of organisations plan budget increases, driven by cloud expansion and project acceleration. Notably, only 6% cited new vendor adoption, while 12% focused on enhancing capabilities with existing vendors - reinforcing debates around platformisation vs. vendor sprawl. TSIS tracks hundreds of companies and each quarter ETR publishes 200+ vendor specific reports. In their most recent webinar, they highlighted 20 vendors including AWS, Google, Salesforce, Snowflake, Workday and Zscaler - 13 had positive outlooks, 2 were downgraded and 3 maintained their outlook.
Edition: 205
- 21 February, 2025
A complete breakdown of Google's Gemini AI Model
Technology
AceCamp recently interviewed a senior expert in the field of deep learning to discuss several questions including: 1) What is the architecture of the Gemini model? How does it compare to GPT-4? 2) When will virtual personal assistants or agents become a reality? 3) How to interpret rumours suggesting Google's next-generation TPU will not collaborate with Broadcom. 4) What is Google's plan for the penetration rate of AI search? How much does it cost, on average, to perform a query using TPU-based search? 5) What is the integration of SGE and traditional recommendation systems, including the processes involved? In which aspect does Google have an advantage?
Edition: 175
- 08 December, 2023
AI regulation should target people, not machines
Governments are moving to impose regulations on AI but a lack of understanding on their part may destroy most of the value that large language models bring. Some of the proposals are focused on topics such as veracity and accuracy, hallucination, and objectivity of AI models – each of which will be very difficult or even possible to effectively fix. Regulation will also impact competition, making it harder for smaller companies and benefitting the likes of Meta, Microsoft and Google. Richard Windsor still believes the machines are still quite dumb, yet they are managing to create a convincing illusion of sentience which leads people to anthropomorphise these systems. This in turn makes them much more capable of being used by bad actors; humans remain far more in danger from other humans than from machines and should be the focus of regulation.
Edition: 172
- 27 October, 2023
The Exponential Age has begun
Raoul Pal has long believed that The Exponential Age, a revolutionary transformation of the world into a new digital era, would come. It has now arrived. We’re at that really sweet spot in the cycle where no one believes what is happening in tech and everyone is underweight equities. A sharp correction in the short-term is likely, but any purchase of stock stocks will soon pay off very well. Any sell-off is an opportunity to buy more. BUY NDX, tech stocks such as Google and Microsoft, and crypto including Ethereum and Solana. Don’t miss out.
Edition: 162
- 09 June, 2023
Advanced AI: Sink or swim time for cybersecurity vendors
Technology
How are AI advancements and hype affecting the cybersecurity industry? What are data security vendors doing with AI/ML and cybersecurity automation, and can they protect their market from the major cloud operators with their investments in AI-driven security for their own platforms? During the interviews conducted by Blueshift, industry sources were also asked how they would play the sector near to mid-term and out over time. Companies discussed include Amazon, CrowdStrike, Cisco, CyberArk, Fortinet, Google, IBM, Microsoft, Okta, Palo Alto and Zscaler.
Edition: 158
- 14 April, 2023
Technology
Stay short - while the Street recognises that ZM’s Online segment has likely peaked, it is still too bullish about growth prospects for the Enterprise segment - OWS argues that competition from Microsoft Teams and Google Meet is likely to impede ZM from attaining its mid-20s targeted revenue growth rate. Operating margin may also be lower than bulls anticipate due to mix shift to lower margin Zoom Phones and the need to up spending in R&D / S&M. The magnitude of the company’s SBC expense is starkly exposed by the fact that it has spent ~$1bn YTD on stock buybacks while lowering the share count by a paltry 1% Y/Y. TP $55.
Edition: 150
- 09 December, 2022
Renault (RNO FP) France
Consumer Discretionary
Finally lets Google off the leash - after four years of procrastination, the French car manufacturer has decided that its long-term future in EVs is not to do the software itself. It is the first major OEM to go in this direction and it is going to need to gain some market share to offset the impact of ceding the customer relationship to Google. Given the mess that the rest are in and how important the software user experience is becoming in the vehicle, this might just work for RNO. Qualcomm is also a winner here as RNO appears to be taking the whole QCOM digital chassis offering.
Edition: 148
- 11 November, 2022
Communications
During each of the first two weeks of the NFL season, DirecTV’s NFL Sunday Ticket streaming service went dark at numerous times. On top of this, some customers were unable to log in and numerous users complained that the Sunday Ticket app blacked out certain games even though they were available locally. After this football season, NFL Sunday Ticket will likely have a new home because DirecTV’s rights are set to expire this year. Google (GOOG) and Apple (AAPL) are reportedly in the running to secure the rights.
Edition: 145
- 30 September, 2022
Communications
Using Craig Huber’s 2024 EBITDA estimates and segment multiples in his SOTP analysis suggests that the current price is implying an overly punitive 42% conglomerate discount to NWSA’s valuation. If management won't break up the company, then they should at least sell / spinoff Subscription Video Services and break out Professional Information into its own segment. Craig notes that there are signs that NWSA’s portfolio is moving in the right direction including some shrewd acquisitions as well as content licensing deals with Google, Facebook and Apple, but the stock has been trapped in underperformance (7 of last 9 years) and something big needs to change here.
Edition: 142
- 19 August, 2022
Carmageddon
Apple declares war on OEMs - expansion of CarPlay into the instrument cluster pushes OEMs further away from the Digital Life of the vehicle and brings them closer to being handsets on wheels. RFM’s research has found that electrification and autonomy could reduce vehicle transport spending by up to 65% which no OEM is likely to survive in its current form. Hence, it is crucial that OEMs have a seat at the table when it comes to delivering digital services in the vehicle. So far OEMs have kept Google out of the heart of their vehicles, they now need to treat AAPL in the same way.
Edition: 138
- 24 June, 2022
Ferrovial (FER SM) Spain
Industrials
Prolonged traffic recovery at 407-ETR has been weighing on the share price, but Robert Crimes expects an acceleration as Covid restrictions were fully lifted at the end of Q1 - TomTom congestion data for Toronto is almost back to 2019 levels and Insight’s Google Maps survey shows 407-ETR average peak time savings of 26 mins and LV Cost of Time Saved per hour of US$30. Robert increases his valuation of FER's 43.2% stake in 407-ETR by +€0.6bn to €17.5bn (only slightly less than the group’s entire Managed Lanes portfolio at €18bn); it is the most valuable toll road in Insight’s Global Infrastructure universe. TP €62 (150% upside).
Edition: 137
- 10 June, 2022
Communications
Has Dotdash Meredith found hidden value in underappreciated brands? Jonathan Boyar discusses how Meredith’s legacy brands can help the company achieve the scale it needs to spin out of IAC and become an independent company making the $2.7bn acquisition look like a bargain. Dotdash has developed an effective playbook for building digital lifestyle brands and by engaging readers in their content (rather than treating them primarily as a conduit for advertising) it makes it an increasingly appealing alternative to large-scale subscription-based ad services run by the likes of Facebook and Google.
Edition: 135
- 13 May, 2022