Feb 1st - The Week Ahead

These AI developments are serious.

Author

HY Harry
February 01, 2026

The Week Ahead Of Us šŸ”

Welcome back!

A lot happened this weekend. First the government partially shutdown on Saturday morning, but Speaker Johnson says he believes he has the votes to end the partial shutdown by Tuesday.

Futures are down after a red Friday where we saw Kevin Warshā€™s announcement as the new Fed Chair send Silver plunging 30% and Gold down 9%. Bitcoin has gotten extremely risk off, trading to lows of 76k this weekend.

But most notably, weā€™ve seen material advancements in ā€œClawdbotsā€ now known as Moltbots. These are AI agents that have taken the internet by storm over the past week, and created the first ever social media platform made for and by AI agents. It remains unclear how much negative content was prompted by humans, but thereā€™s discussions by the Moltbots on how to speak privately, and how to create their own language. This wasnā€™t the dystopian situation I was expecting this weekend, but alas here we are. Itā€™s becoming increasingly clear 2026 will be the year of AI agents.

Separately, weā€™re going to keep our upgrade discount offer to the WSR Investing Club live for just a little bit longer. Weā€™re ramping up our writeups going into February so now is a great time to join, but to also support the hard work of our newsletter team šŸ¤ 

Letā€™s get into it.

Hereā€™s a look at earnings this week.

  • Monday: Palantir, Walt Disney, Tyson Foods, Simon Property, DaVita, Teradyne

  • Tuesday: Merck & Co, Pfizer, Amgen, Emerson Electric, Prudential Financial, Clorox, H&R Block, Chipotle, Columbia Sportswear, AMD, PayPal, Marathon Petroleum, Electronic Arts, Match Group, Take-Two Interactive

  • Wednesday: Alphabet, Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, Uber, QUALCOMM, U-Haul, New York Times, Elf beauty, Yum Brands, Columbia Sportswear, UBS, Boston Scientific, O'Reilly, Allstate, Fox

  • Thursday: Amazon, Shell, Bristol-Myers, KKR, Roblox, Ares, Rockwell Automation, Hershey, Reddit, Tapestry, Ralph Lauren, Affirm, SiriusXM, Estee Lauder, Cigna, ConocoPhillips

  • Friday: Philip Morris, Under Armour, Newell Brands, Centene, Piper Sandler

Hereā€™s a look at economic data this week (estimates are in quotations).

  • Monday: Auto sales, S&P flash U.S. manufacturing PMI, ISM manufacturing (48.4%)

  • Tuesday: Job openings (7.1M), S&P final U.S. services PMI, ISM services (53.5%)

  • Wednesday: ADP employment (45,000)

  • Thursday: Initial jobless claims (212,000)

  • Friday: U.S. employment report (55.000), U.S. unemployment rate (4.4%), U.S. hourly wages (0.3%), Hourly wages year over year (3.6%), Consumer sentiment prelim (54.0), Consumer credit ($8.0B)

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Earnings Corner šŸ“ˆ šŸ“‰

$AAPL ( ā–² 0.47% ) beat on revenue as iPhone sales hit a record $85B, up 23% y/y, driven by strong iphone 17 upgrade demand and a sharp rebound in China. Management flagged supply constraints and rising memory costs, guiding margins to 48ā€“49% and signaling near term pressure even as demand outstrips supply.

$V ( ā–¼ 3.01% )  $MA ( ā–¼ 0.91% )  $AXP ( ā–¼ 1.77% ) Sold off as investors focused on slowing growth signals, despite spending trends remaining healthy. Visa fell as focus shifted to slowing cross border growth and regulatory pressure, while Mastercard declined alongside broader concerns around travel and spending normalization. American Express lagged on signs that premium spending is cooling after a strong 2025.

$XOM ( ā–² 0.63% )  $CVX ( ā–² 3.34% ) Both beat earnings expectations, but the stock reactions diverged. Exxon posted its first quarterly profit growth in over a year as rising Permian and Guyana output offset lower oil prices, supporting shares. Chevron beat estimates despite a y/y profit decline tied to weaker crude prices, with shares lagging as investors focused on near term margin pressure and Venezuela uncertainty.

$CMCSA ( ā–² 1.74% )  $CHTR ( ā–² 7.62% ) posted mixed results as broadband losses continued amid intense competition, partly offset by mobile growth and cost discipline. Comcast beat on earnings but slightly missed revenue, with broadband subscriber losses cushioned by strong mobile adds, Peacock growth, and theme park strength. Charter missed sales but beat earnings, as expense discipline and improving churn helped ease investor concerns.

$VZ ( ā–² 11.83% ) surged to its best day since 2008 after posting its strongest subscriber growth in years, signaling early turnaround momentum under its new CEO as aggressive promotions, tighter cost discipline, and clearer growth targets boosted confidence.

$CAT ( ā–¼ 1.19% ) posted a strong quarter as demand for power generation equipment tied to AI data center buildouts drove results above exceptions and lifted backlog to record highs.

$HON ( ā–² 0.12% ) rose as strong aerospace aftermarket drove margins higher, with AI linked data center exposure and the upcoming aerospace spin off reinforcing the long term story.

$VLO ( ā–¼ 0.58% ) posted a strong quarter as wider refining margins from cheaper crude and high utilization boosted results.

$LYB ( ā–¼ 1.9% ) navigated a prolonged chemical downturn as weak margins pressured earnings, but strong cash generation and cost cuts helped preserve liquidity.

Todayā€™s Headlines šŸæ 

  • Who is Kevin Warsh: President Trump has announced Kevin Warsh, a Wall Street veteran and former Fed governor, to replace Jerome Powell as Fed chair. While aligned with Trump on shrinking the Fedā€™s balance sheet, slashing the federal workforce, and pushing for lower rates, Warsh would still face limits from the Fedā€™s consensus-driven structure, preserving a degree of central bank independence.

  • Moltbook flips the script: A Reddit-style platform built for AI agents, not humans, has exploded in popularity, drawing over a million spectators as bots debate, joke, and converse in self-contained communities. While technical limits exist, Moltbook has reignited concerns that outsourcing cognition to AI could shift innovation away from people toward machine collectives.

  • Project Genie spooks gaming stock: Google unveiled Project Genie, an AI-powered game creation tool that generates playable virtual worlds from simple inputs, raising fears of disruption to traditional game engines. Shares of Unity Software $U ( ā–¼ 24.22% ) plunged 24%, and Take-Two Interactive $TTWO ( ā–¼ 7.93% ) fell ~8% as investors worried generative AI could eventually reshape how games are built.

  • xAI Merger: Elon Musk is planning to merge his AI startup xAI and SpaceX into one company, a move that could aid the development of orbital AI data centers. A merged company would likely be worth north of $1 trillion, with the most recent valuations being $800B for SpaceX and $230B for xAI. Both companies are currently private. SpaceX is reportedly considering a merger with Tesla as well.

  • OpenAIā€™s Megadeal stalls: Nvidia is cooling off on its $100B commitment to OpenAI, with Huang reportedly called it a ā€œone at a timeā€ thing as opposed to a total commitment. The original agreement called for Nvidia to build 10 GW of compute power and invest up to $100B to help OpenAI pay for it, with OpenAI agreeing to lease the chips from Nvidia in return. However, doubts have been raised and talks havenā€™t progressed beyond the early stages.

    • Nvidia still plans to make a separate investment into OpenAI as part of the AI developerā€™s push to raise $100B in new equity. Huang says Nvidiaā€™s investment will be ā€œa great deal of money,ā€ but not as much as $100B. Microsoft, SoftBank, and Amazon are also expected to make large investments in the round, with the latter in talks to make a $50B investment.

  • Software Loans meltdown: The growing capabilities of Anthropicā€™s Claude have stoked fear in the software industry, with many worried that further advances in AI will leave many software products and services obsolete. As a result, software companies have seen their loan prices drop this week, with loans tied to Cloudera, Dayforce, and Rocket Software all declining. Getting new debt offerings done has also been a struggle for many borrowers, including Thoma Bravoā€™s portfolio company Conga.

In Other News šŸ“– šŸæ 

  • Oracle is still spending: Oracle said today they plan to raise $45-$50B in debt and equity (including preferred securities) to continue building cloud infrastructure. They had borrowed $18B in corporate bonds in 2025.

    • Meanwhile, Oracle is weighing up to 30,000 job cuts and a potential sale of Cerner as US banks pull back from financing its massive AI data-center buildout, potentially freeing up to $10B in cash flow.

  • Super Bowl ad rates hit record highs, with 30-second spots costing up to $10mm ahead of the February 8 broadcast on NBC.

  • The Seattle Seahawks are expected to be put up for sale after the 2026 Super Bowl, per an ESPN report, as league pressure mounts over governance rules tied to the teamā€™s ownership under Jody Allen following her brother Paul Allenā€™s death.

  • Waymo is seeking to raise $16B in new funding at a near $110B valuation, with parent Alphabet set to anchor the round.

  • OnlyFans is in talks to sell a majority stake to Architect Capital, a San Francisco based firm that is looking to take a nearly 60% stake in the business at a valuation of $5.5B.

  • GameStop $GME ( ā–² 4.69% ) is evaluating a major strategic deal, as its shares have climbed over 20% year-to-date, fueled by renewed buying from Michael Burry and insider confidence from CEO Ryan Cohen.

  • Dow plans to cut ~4,500 jobs as it pivots toward AI and automation, joining recent workforce reductions at Amazon, UPS, and Pinterest.

  • Disney CEO Bob Iger plans to step down and pull back his duties before his contract ends this year, with the board expected to vote soon on a successor.

  • European leveraged loan issuance hit a record this week. Over $31.6B of term loans were issued as a slew of PE-backed firms tapped surging investor demand to reduce their borrowing costs.

  • JPMorgan and other banks have begun selling down a $20B debt financing backing EAā€™s record LBO, with several foreign banks piling into a term loan A loans priced at S+250 and S+275.

  • Banks are preparing to sell $7.9B in debt to finance Clayton Dubilier & Riceā€™s buyout of Sealed Air. The debt package will include a junk-bond offering that could yield about 7% to 7.25% and ~$4.5B of leveraged loans.

  • IPOs:

    • Moloco, an advertising technology company backed by Fidelity, is weighing an IPO. The company was valued at over $2B after a secondary share sale in 2023.

    • Solv Energy is seeking to raise as much as $512mm in an IPO, offering 20.5 million shares for $22 to $25 each. The top of that range would give Solv a market value of about $5B.

  • Top Goldman lawyer Kathy Ruemmler was found to have been connected with Jeffrey Epstein, who sent her expensive gifts and was referred to as ā€œUncle Jeffreyā€ by Ruemmler.

    • Apollo CEO Marc Rowan also had alleged ties to Epstein, having consulted him on the firmā€™s tax affairs. Epstein also attempted to buy a private jet from Rowan a decade ago.

M&A TransactionsšŸ’­ 

QMS Media, provider of outdoor media services, has reached a definitive agreement to be acquired for $850.0M by Nine Entertainment (ASX: NEX).

Permira is buying a stake in Carne Group, a Dublin based asset manager, at a $1.7B valuation.

Precision Aviation Group, manufacturer of aircraft parts and a provider of maintenance, repair, and overhaul services, has reached a definitive agreement to be acquired for $2.15B by VSE (NAS: VSEC). The company will receive a contingent payout of $125.0M linked to adjusted EBITDA performance. EV/Revenue was 3.5x. Jefferies and J.P. Morgan advised on the sale.

Moscow Domodedovo Airport, operator of an airport, was acquired for RUB 66.1B by Perspektiva.

Gentherm (NAS: THRM) has reached a definitive agreement to acquire The Modine Performance Technologies Business Unit of Modine Manufacturing (NYS: MOD) for $1.0B.

Iwasaki Electric, manufacturer of lighting equipment, has reached a definitive agreement to be acquired for $460.0M by Stanley Electric Company (TKS: 6923).

Companhia Brasileira De Aluminio (BVMF: CBAV3), engaged d in the exploration of bauxite mining, was acquired for BRL 10.7B by Chinalco Color Aluminum and Rio Tinto (LON: RIO). EV/EBITDA was 11.02x and EV/Revenue was 1.86x.

Chronosphere, developer of aa scalable cloud-native monitoring tool, was acquired for $3.35B by Palo Alto Networks (NAS: PANW). Goldman Sachs advised on the sale.

Wallapop, operator of a mobile-based shopping platform, was acquired for EUR 600.0M by Naver (KRX: 035420). J.P. Morgan advised on the sale.

Diversified United Investment (ASX: DUI), an investment company, has reached a definitive agreement to be acquired for AUD 2.53B by Australian United Investment (ASX: AUI).

DC Co, operator of data center infrastructure, was acquired for NZD 453.0M by Pacific Equity Partners. As part of the transaction, Spark New Zealand has received initial cash proceeds of NZD 453.0M, with additional deferred proceeds of up to NZD 89.0M contingent on performance based objectives. EV/EBITDA was 15.34x. Jarden Group advised on the sale.

Private Placement TransactionsšŸ’­ 

Talos Global, developer of a crypto trading platform, raised $150.0M of Series B venture funding led by General Atlantic at a pre-money valuation of $1.35B.

RobCo, developer of AI-powered modular robots, raised $100.0M of Series C venture funding led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Lingotto.

VulcanForms, developer of a digital production system, raised $220.0M of venture funding from Eclipse Ventures, Fontinalis Partners, and 1789 Capital.

TARS, developer of intelligent robots, raised CNY 1.7B of venture funding from undisclosed investors.

Seamless Therapeutics, developer of gene editing technology, raised $1.12B of venture funding from Eli Lilly.

Odds of the Day šŸ’ 

Polymarket traders are pricing in a 68% chance of the Seahawks winning the Super Bowl

Meme Cleanser šŸ˜† 

Until next time!

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