Walmart's market cap was $1.02 trillion at the end of the day Tuesday after its stock climbed more than 28% over the past year, according to CNBC. It joined the Nasdaq exchange, also home to technology companies like Amazon, in December. In the company's third quarter, which ended in October, its global e-commerce business grew 27% year over year, with its Walmart Connect advertising business in the U.S. up 33%, according to its earnings release.
A new prediction markets startup with strong ties to billionaire Thomas Peterffy is hiring staff and preparing to launch, job postings and corporate filings reviewed by Business Inside show. Lumina Markets began advertising last week for roles in marketing and legal. Job listings say it's "backed by a billionaire pioneer of electronic trading," and note that it's preparing to launch a new prediction markets platform. The jobs were posted on LinkedIn by an employee at Interactive Brokers, the trading giant founded by Peterffy.
If you haven't thought about diversifying your equity portfolio internationally, perhaps the performance of non-U.S. financial markets might have you looking beyond the S&P 500 for your next big investment. Undoubtedly, the S&P has done just fine, now up over 15%, with a potential move to the 7,000 level in sight if investors can shrug off recent concerns that have made for a rather rocky ride in this fourth and final quarter of 2025.
The price of bitcoin, which more than doubled last year in a trend that many attributed to the "Trump trade," obviously played a big role in this alchemy, but there was also another factor-one that did seem a little magical, or insane, depending on your viewpoint. As MicroStrategy expanded its purchases, eventually accumulating more than three per cent of all the bitcoins in existence, its purchases helped drive the price of the digital currency higher.
Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto 6 is expected to be, by some accounts, the most important release in the history of video games as it relates to helping the video game industry rebound. But GTA 6 is not a magic bullet and cannot solve the wider issues within gaming as it relates to health and stability, according to analyst and NYU Stern professor Joost van Dreunen.
Among the headline announcements this year: ChatGPT parent company Open AI, Softbank and Oracle pledged to invest $500 billion (433 billion) in AI supercomputers, Open AI and chip giant Nvidia announced a $100 billion fund to maintain the United States' dominance in advanced chips, while Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Tencent hiked investments to help speed up China's ambition to lead AI by 2030.
Valuations further differentiate the periods: dotcom tech stocks often traded at 150 to 180 times trailing earnings, while current AI frontrunners average around 40 times. Some AI hardware purchasers have reported improved return on ivested capital (ROIC), but results vary across the industry. This solid groundwork distinguishes AI from historical bubbles and primes leading companies like Nvidia for substantial expansion.
Markets often rally in anticipation of rate cuts but then decline when those cuts are implemented. J.P. Morgan's trading desk recently warned that despite stocks setting "more than 20 all-time highs this year," the Federal Reserve's next rate cut threatens to curb investor zeal through a potential sell-the-news drop. Sure enough, as soon as the Federal Reserve cut the federal funds rate by 25 basis points, the market promptly sold off for the next three days.
The market dropped almost 20% in April. It is now 34% above its 52-week high. There is no single reason to think it will stop rising, except that it is already rising. The market is expensive, based on S&P ratio yardsticks. However, strong earnings, particularly in the big tech sector, can offset this. Big tech rules the market value. Big tech earnings were super.
Black Rock Coffee Bar has confidentially filed for an initial public offering in New York, targeting a valuation exceeding $1 billion. This will mark the first IPO from a U.S. coffee company since 2022.
