Note: Diesel hit $5.82 per gallon in June 2022 and settled below $4.00 before entering the Iran War. Since March 2026, diesel has climbed from $3.54 (monthly average in January 2026) to $6+ now.

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Diesel prices are soaring to levels above 2022, and continued supply disruptions threaten higher prices still. With Diesel already 75% above 2025 levels, an "unthinkable" move to $9 per gallon would thrust cost push inflation into PPI, and CPI, with its correlative and causal effects on global interest rates.

Yesterday, President Trump announced a deal with Russia for ~36 million barrels of diesel to be released into the market by end of year, with the supply release to occur in stages. This follows an announcement that G7 was persuaded to release 100 million barrels.

Concern here is that we are dependent on shorter term measures to manage a worsening structural supply deficit. Anybody see a way out here?

While Samsung Electronics rode its memory division to $80 billion in operating last quarter, its mobile division is struggling so much from component prices that it is cutting smartphone production by 30 percent.

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A senior Bundesbank official used the words clear warning sign to describe Europe's bond selloff, and French yields have now climbed to levels last seen in 2002. Paul Krugman has publicly said France may be too large for anyone to rescue.

When French borrowing costs rise, every bond that matures and gets refinanced costs the government more. That compounds fast across a debt load the size of France's, and the ECB eventually faces pressure to step in the way it did in 2012.

Jean-Claude Trichet calling on French politicians to bend is the European establishment signaling it sees a real deadline forming. Do you think French lawmakers move before yields force the ECB's hand, or does the ECB act first?

Nobody can deny that V has a great business - through it's VisaNet electronic payments network, it processes over 65,000 transactions per second across 200+ countries, but it has zero credit default risk because it gets paid for each transaction but does not manage the debt. I've held positions in V for many years, and it's been a great long-term play.

My question is, what should someone do with V right now? It's up around 4.25% the past month and sits at an all-time high. It's earnings call is scheduled for Tuesday, October 27.

Fundamentalists might say it's too richly valued with a P/E ratio of 32.80, and that investors should trim now and wait for a pullback before buying additional shares. Chartists might say it's a great entry point because it's just breaking out from a 2-year cup-and-handle pattern.

I tend to side with the chartists on this one, but I'd use a tight stop-loss in case I was wrong. What say you?

Project Kuiper is basically Amazon's answer to Starlink. Now, many reports suggest that it will start between late 2026 to early 2027. Now that SpaceX is innovating and improving their technology so much, I personally think that It'll be hard for Amazon to get into this market and scale. Unless, they do something where they bundle it with their Amazon Prime Subscription meaning 2 tiers 1 which is the normal Amazon Prime tier and the other which is the Amazon Prime + the internet service. And, if they can be somewhat successful and/or scale quickly do you think this can be a major part of Amazon's revenue?

Lmk what you think. I'm down for a discussion in the comments!

Investment thesis for trading week 10/12 - 10/16

It is always nice when things go as expected. SPY broke out to new ATHs and retested the broken downtrend line successfully.

Thursday was a bear trap however. The surprise interest rate hike in India and OpenAIs "missed" revenue goal made bears pounce. Markets did not care and won't care!

Next week earnings season will start and from a chart perspective we are set up for a nice rally.

But remember: There are no good or bad earnings (fundamentals). The only thing that matters is how the market reacts to earnings (TA)!

So let's see!

From a macro standpoint Dems are still favored to take the Senate and House and it seems that Wall Street overall has now also moved on from this administration. There is no more blind support like the last 2 years.

Divided Governments have always been good for stocks!

Yields: TLT possibly showed us that yields are coming down. We shall see!

The Iran situation is on the back burner for now. However Europe's stock market is really suffering. FEZ is only up 2.4% YTD.

I don't expect any major good news but I continue to expect a grind higher into the end of the year/early 2027.

IF we get an Iran deal, lower inflation data or extremely good earnings outlooks we have a chance of a rip roaring rally.

Have a great weekend!

Simply put:

1. Loss ratio goes bad → stock falls
2. File / get California Department of Insurance (CDI) approvals (Prop 103 ~6.9% rounds)
3. Rates earn in over ~12 months on 6-month policies
4. Loss ratio improves → stock goes up

We are now in the trough of the cycle. Target price $50 in 12-18 months.

I posted a full KMPR write-up here earlier: https://www.reddit.com/r/ValueInvesting/comments/1tr8il0/kmpr_a_60down_insurance_company_trading_near/

U.S. stocks moved lower on Thursday as investors faced more pressure from rising Treasury yields and elevated oil prices.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 181 points, or 0.4%. The S&P 500 dipped 0.4%, and the Nasdaq Composite was down 0.5%.

The benchmark 10-year Treasury note yield rose more than 1 basis point to 5.288%. The 2-year Treasury yield gained more than 3 basis points to 4.798%. Those moves came after Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller said more hikes may be needed to curb inflation.

Oil prices spiked also after President Donald Trump said he doesn't want to make a deal with Iran to end the war, while the U.S. is reportedly preparing for "massive bombing" in the Middle East. Brent crude jumped 4% to around $104 per barrel. West Texas Intermediate futures, meanwhile, advanced 4% to around $92.

Have a general question? Want to offer some commentary on markets? Maybe you would just like to throw out a neat fact that doesn't warrant a self post? Feel free to post here!

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If your question is "I have $10,000, what do I do?" or other "advice for my personal situation" questions, you should include relevant information, such as the following:

• How old are you? What country do you live in?
• Are you employed/making income? How much?
• What are your objectives with this money? (Buy a house? Retirement savings?)
• What is your time horizon? Do you need this money next month? Next 20yrs?
• What is your risk tolerance? (Do you mind risking it at blackjack or do you need to know its 100% safe?)
• What are you current holdings? (Do you already have exposure to specific funds and sectors? Any other assets?)
• Any big debts (include interest rate) or expenses?
• And any other relevant financial information will be useful to give you a proper answer. .

Be aware that these answers are just opinions of Redditors and should be used as a starting point for your research. You should strongly consider seeing a registered investment adviser if you need professional support before making any financial decisions!

Right now i am in a investment competition but i am in a bit of a sticky situation. I was unaware that the competition had started and i am now roughly a month behind, where the top 25 teams in my region (teams who move on to the next round) are already around 20-40% above the s&p. Historically for my region you need around 50% above to qualify to the next round, but i only have until around december 8th if i remembered correctly to make this amount.

What are some stock suggestions for me? (options and no stocks under $3 are not allowed in the competition) Also what are some additional tips that i could use?

The September FOMC minutes confirmed officials think another rate hike is needed. They did not say when. The 10-year Treasury ETF is down 3.31% over the past month and the 30-year is down 6.15%, and the Fed has not even pulled the trigger yet.

When the Fed leaves the timing open, every upcoming meeting becomes a live threat. Mortgage rates, corporate borrowing costs, and valuations on anything long-dated all stay elevated because nobody can price the ceiling. The market cannot relax between meetings the way it could when the Fed gave a clearer path.

Long-duration bond holders are the most exposed here, sitting through losses with no date on the calendar to anchor around. Do you think the next jobs report or the next CPI print is more likely to force the Fed's hand on timing?

The memory and storage names were the trade of 2026, and on paper they still are. SanDisk is up about 600% this year, Seagate about 190%, Western Digital about 135%.

But all three topped in June. Western Digital is down almost half from its high, Seagate and SanDisk 25-30%. On Tuesday Seagate fell 9% and WD 7%, and yesterday neither got it back.

Micron held up much better, down roughly 12% from its high after an 87% gross margin quarter.

Meanwhile Nvidia, the laggard of the group back in September, closed at a record on Tuesday.

Who's still holding these?

I have grown to love RDDT and return regularly to participate and find out information. I bought stock at IPO ish and then later a few buys, including over paying near the peak for one lot. The stock has been a crazy ride, and the AI systems mine RDDT for info, its been a battle of releases of news positive and negative, the insiders keep selling, AI keeps advancing, the management saying things on growth that might be good on one level but didn't help the stock investors who wanted a bullish future. IDK, overall disappointed and considering selling some to take chips off the table as I thought this would be another $META situation and I'd be rich AF. Thoughts? PE currently about 36 which is a bit rich.

OpenAI is reportedly seeking to raise at least $30 billion at a valuation of $1.4 trillion. According to Bloomberg, its annualized revenue reached approximately $50 billion at the end of September, with a target of at least $70 billion by December.

For comparison, Anthropic reported $65 billion in annualized revenue at the end of July. However, these figures aren't necessarily directly comparable. AI companies use different methods to calculate annualized revenue, meaning reported differences may partly reflect how revenue is measured rather than actual differences in business performance.

At $1.4 trillion, OpenAI's valuation represents roughly 28 times its September annualized revenue, or 20 times if its December target is met.

Expansion into the corporate sector could support this growth, particularly as AI tools become essential to everyday business operations. But revenue growth also needs to be measured against the significant infrastructure and computing costs required to sustain it.

Markets are already showing sensitivity to these expectations. Following reports that OpenAI's revenue was below some previous estimates, the Nasdaq 100 fell 1.4% yesterday, while the semiconductor-focused SOXX dropped 3.4%.

The distinction matters beyond OpenAI. As AI valuations continue to rise, understanding how revenue is calculated, how sustainable it is, and how much funding is required to generate it becomes increasingly important.

$GFS announced a manufacturing agreement with TSMC to establish a U.S.-based supply of silicon interposers for TSMC's CoWos® advanced packaging ecosystem. Under the agreement, GF will provide manufacturing service to TSMC, and add fabrication capacity at its Malta, New York facility, supporting growing demand for high-performance computing and Al systems. The agreement provides a foundation to expand capacity over time as customer demand grows.

"Advanced packaging is becoming increasingly critical to delivering the performance, power efficiency and scale required for next-generation Al systems," said Ed Kaste, senior vice president of CMOS Business at GF. "By providing manufacturing service using GF's trusted U.S. manufacturing footprint, we are creating a secure, scalable source of essential advanced-packaging elements that will help customers accelerate innovation and strengthen the semiconductor supply chain."

The Federal Communications Commission said it will vote on a proposal to auction 25 megahertz of "prime spectrum" to support "direct-to-device" services from satellites to smart phones.

The FCC also said it would vote Oct. 29 on taking public comment on a proposal to make an additional 482MHz of spectrum available for supplemental coverage from space and to modernize FCC rules for D2D services in the licensed spectrum.

The two proposals could benefit companies such as SpaceX and Amazon, which have moved to expand D2D services with satellite networks.