Four years back, global markets stood still as US oil prices plunged into the red for the first time — hitting negative $30 on Apr. 20, 2020. This collapse spelled doomsday for industry powerhouses like Shell ($SHEL) and British Petroleum ($BP), which boldly declared that the world had finally reached peak oil demand. Luckily for them, they were wrong. Greasing the stocks: Two years later, oil demand not only bounced back but surpassed pre-pandemic levels with record back-to-back years of demand that sent oil and gas giants like Exxon Mobil ($XOM) and Chevron ($CVX) to new heights. That’s help ..read more

China, known as the leading gold producer and buyer, isn’t only mining gold but bagging it at a rate like never before. For 17 consecutive months, China’s central bank has been buying the precious metal — aiming to shift its reserves away from the US dollar despite the associated high costs and a weakening yuan. It’s the country’s longest gold-buying run (ever) and an important ingredient in the commodity’s rally to record highs this year. Over the past two years, China has imported over 2.8K tons of gold — experiencing a 34% increase in imports in the first quarter of this year compared to l ..read more

Much like its fast-moving burrito assembly lines, Chipotle ($CMG) is a well-oiled machine. Four straight quarters of better-than-expected earnings have the Mexican chain’s stock up 61% over the past year — and sales are growing even faster, largely due to increasing prices. Since 2021, Chipotle has raised menu prices six times, yet customers remain loyal to their burrito bowls. That’s partly because of the chain’s affluent customer base — about 34% earn over $125K/year and are less sensitive to price hikes. This is crucial as dining out has become 29% more expensive since Mar. 2019, with deli ..read more

Disney ($DIS) fans in Southern California can finally rejoice: after years of proposals, the City of Anaheim has unanimously approved Disney’s $1.9B expansion of its California theme parks — clearing the way for final approvals in May. It will include several new themed lands — and mark the company’s largest expansion in the state since Disney’s California Adventure opened in 2001. The $1.9B expansion is a tiny sliver of the $60B worth of proposed expansions made by CEO Bob Iger last year, which Disney plans to roll out over the next decade. This new California expansion joins ongoing develop ..read more

Does debt matter? For the average American, definitely. But for the US government? Not so much. The US has been operating in the red for the vast majority of its existence — issuing bonds to fund everything from wartime efforts to scientific advancement. But since 2001, the national debt has ballooned to $35T and is only accelerating. America’s debt problem: Thanks to higher interest rates, the national debt is now rising nearly $10B per day. That’s drawn the ire of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which warns that the country’s spending habits aren’t just a possible problem at home— but ..read more

We’re reminded to look both ways before crossing the street, yet many American drivers seem to overlook this basic safety rule entirely. Last year, the number of American fatalities from motor vehicle crashes fell 3.6% from 2022. Despite the improvement, the rate is still three times higher than in other developed countries. And after 50 years of declining fatalities, accidents have continued to increase since 2014 — coinciding with growing cannabis legalization across states, the widespread use of smartphones, and rising homelessness. One study found that 55.8% of serious accidents involved ..read more

It’s not just pension funds leaving the stock market. Given worries about high inflation and interest rates, investors are also swapping their stocks for cash — taking profits after the S&P 500’s banner 10% rally in the first quarter, its best start to a year since 2019. Since then, the index has dropped ~5.3%, largely influenced by underperformance in tech goliaths like Nvidia ($NVDA), which has fallen 15% in the past month — and “higher-for-longer” warnings could push stocks down further. At the start of the year, analysts believed up to six interest rate cuts could be on the table — bu ..read more

Houston to Earth, the Bitcoin ($BTC) halving is hours away — but the moon is nowhere in sight. This much-anticipated event, which will cut the rewards for mining Bitcoin in half, is expected to make the world’s most valuable cryptocurrency even rarer. And based on forecasts and historical trends, it could set off a new bull run — but will it? Halve to hold: Bitcoin has gone through this process four times since its inception in 2008. Each time, the number of new coins mined per block gets halved, from 50 Bitcoins to 6.25 by 2020. Every halving has been followed by massive price rallies — a 93x ..read more

We’ve always been told to save for a rainy day, but it looks like we’ll need to budget for hotter ones, too. A Nature study warns that by 2049, climate change could cost the global economy a staggering $38T every year (measured in 2005 dollars). If we don’t cut emissions soon, we’ll not only feel the heat literally but financially as well. In the next 25 years, rising temperatures could slash global income by 19% — with the potential loss growing to 60% if we fail to address the issue quickly. Developed nations like the US, Germany, and France could miss out on an 11% to 13% increase in GDP ..read more

Semiconductor giant TSMC ($TSM) once again proves that the chip boom isn’t over, beating revenue and profit expectations in Q1 thanks to stronger AI demand. Revenue climbed by 16.5% compared to the previous year, with net income also rising by 8.9% — and looking ahead to Q2, TSMC foresees continued success: The company said sales could jump 30% in Q2 from the year-before period, fueled by what its CEO describes as “insatiable AI-related demand.” TSMC also benefits from growing demand for AI servers, projected to contribute 20% of its revenue by 2028. So why are chip stocks down? The $SOXX iS ..read more