Bubbly stocks?

[89th]

I have a neighbor who works for Seagate (of course, I think of external hard drives) and he was briefly talking about storage companies and fiber optic companies and their stocks.

It's pretty remarkable to see each stock having nearly the same trajectory since early 2025 when "something" happened.

Since the start of 2025 here's the return on these storage or fiber optic stocks:

• Seagate: 900%
• Western Digital: 1,100%
• Micron: 750%
• Sandisk: 3,500% (!!)
• Lumentum: 850%
• Coherent: 500%
• Cien: 850%

[Horace]

There's been free money for the taking ibn the market since the tariff crash, by picking the most banal and obvious tech stocks. The only argument against that strategy currently is a reiteration of the decades long cautionary tale about tech stock crashes and bubbles. Yawn.

I guess there's a chance that AI won't really be a huge evolution of the world's economy, but that seems an increasingly ignorant wishcast from those who just hate AI because they're old and it's new and they feel their very humanity and identity threatened.

There will plausibly be an economic populist (right or left) who'll be running on an isolationist platform with strict controls over AI, so truckers don't lose their jobs or whatever. So, those who hate AI will have someone to vote for.

[Axtremus]

Just because it’s a “revolution” doesn’t mean it’s profitable.

[Horace]

If there are free versions of AI that end up just as useful as commercial versions, I guess that's possible. Or government could crack down. But short of those scenarios, I don't think it's plausible that AI won't be monetizable. It's a done deal in my mind that AI will be ubiquitous one way or another in the coming generations, absent it being regulated out of existence by any country who wishes to do so. Just hope they don't plan on exporting any of their goods or services.

[Doctor Phibes]

I don't think that feeling threatened by AI is a particular stupid response. I'm close enough to retirement that I will hopefully be able laugh at unemployed tech people trying to retrain as plumbers and toilet cleaners.

[Horace]

It's totally rational to be wary of the AI future, but its inevitability and the total lack of reasonable options once the technology is available to the world, should probably be dealt with without resorting to wishful thinking or holding one's breath. The world will not be agreeing to put the genie back in the bottle, and no nation is going to be globally competitive without AI.

[Mik]

The key is not to resist it but to become adept at using it. Hopefully before your competition does. It's a totally logical next step in the consumption of information. To have at your fingertips a pretty reliable advisor who will be critical of your ideas and tell you why something is or is not a good idea, the pros and cons, is fantastic.

[Doctor Phibes]

I have used it at work, and if I'm honest, I fucking hate it. The overblown language it uses and vomit-inducing enthusiasm for everything makes me want to reach for the gas pipe, and the shiny faces everybody has in it's "artwork" is just gross.

But what I really hate isn't the technology itself, it's the ill-disguised glee of senior executives telling me how much it's going to improve my life, when I know full well what they're really thinking.