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Weekly digests

Week 40, 2026

Week of 28 Sept – 4 Oct 2026

12 of 28 public holdings rose, with an average move of −0.8% against −0.3% for the S&P 500.

Biggest moves

Up most

Down most

From the notebook

Note of the week

NAND flash prices are tipped to keep rising into 2027

The one that matters most to a long-term holder, weighed by Jev.

  1. Connections

    Intel pulls ahead of TSMC on ASML's priciest lithography tool

    ASML is the only maker of the EUV machines both Intel and TSMC need for their most advanced chips, and the two customers are now moving at very different speeds. Intel and ASML have processed more than one million wafers using High NA EUV, including production layers for Intel's Panther Lake chips. TSMC won't deploy the same tool until 2030, a four year gap that hands Intel rare bragging rights in a foundry race it has mostly been losing.

    ASML Intel TSMCbyteiota.com

    Since this note:ASML −5.2%Intel −10.3%TSMC −3.1%(S&P 500 +0.6%)

  2. Theme

    NAND flash prices are tipped to keep rising into 2027

    Gartner expects global NAND flash revenue to surge 372 percent in 2026 on tight supply and AI data centre demand, with another 30 percent price rise pencilled in for 2027. Sandisk, which holds around 11 percent of the NAND market, posted fiscal 2026 revenue up 175 percent to $20.25bn on the back of it. Micron sells into the same crunch, though its mix leans more to DRAM and high bandwidth memory than Sandisk's NAND-heavy lineup.

    Sandisk Micronfool.com

    Since this note:Sandisk −6.4%Micron −3.6%(S&P 500 +0.6%)

  3. On the map

    The Aussie dollar slipped under 70 US cents this week

    The RBA's official rate fell from 0.6977 to 0.6933 US dollars between 30 September and 2 October. That matters for Australian holdings like AutoGrab and Flyweel, whose cloud bills from Amazon and Microsoft are priced in US dollars while their revenue sits in Aussie ones. A softer dollar also means the US-heavy public basket is worth more back home, even before any share price moves.

    AutoGrab Flyweel Amazon Microsoftrba.gov.au

    Since this note:Amazon +1.0%Microsoft +1.0%(S&P 500 +0.6%)

  4. People

    Cloudflare's long-serving CFO takes an outside board seat at Crusoe

    Thomas Seifert, Cloudflare's chief financial officer since 2017, joined the board of AI data centre company Crusoe on 17 September, alongside Tesla and Redwood Materials founder JB Straubel. Seifert keeps his day job running Cloudflare's finances, but the move puts him on the board of a firm building the physical AI infrastructure that companies like Cloudflare increasingly rent and compete with.

    Cloudflare Tesla

    Since this note:Cloudflare −2.1%Tesla +1.2%(S&P 500 +0.6%)

  5. Coming up

    TSMC's Q3 result lands on 15 October

    TSMC reports third-quarter earnings on 15 October, Taiwan time, having guided revenue to $44.6bn-$45.8bn and flagged pressure on margins. That guidance reflects temporary pressure from 2-nanometer technology ramp-up costs, even as AI-driven orders keep volumes climbing. The call is the first real test of whether advanced-node demand from Nvidia, AMD and Apple is still outrunning TSMC's capacity to build it.

    TSMC Nvidia AMDinvestor.tsmc.cominvesting.com

    Since this note:TSMC −0.3%Nvidia −0.2%AMD +0.8%(S&P 500 +1.3%)

  6. What could go wrong

    Burry swaps his Micron short for puts struck near $500

    Michael Burry replaced his Micron short with put options expiring June 2027 with strike prices in the $500 range, telling subscribers he is "moving timelines up" on an AI bubble call. That is a bet the stock roughly halves within nine months. Citi, by contrast, lifted its Micron target from $1,150 to $1,300 on 23 September citing tight DRAM supply, right after Micron posted record fiscal Q4 revenue of $54.2bn.

    Micronfool.comad-hoc-news.de

    Since this note:Micron −5.6%(S&P 500 +1.3%)

  7. Startup watch

    iion becomes Havas Play's exclusive playable ads tech partner

    Havas Play, Havas's culture-first agency network for sport, entertainment and gaming, has named Sydney's iion its exclusive technology partner for playable and mini-game ad builds across ANZ and APAC. The deal wires iion's Playable Creator Studio into Havas Play's operations, letting teams turn concepts into working interactive previews in days rather than weeks. Clients in retail, FMCG and beauty are already lined up to trial the format.

    iionexchangewire.comecommercenews.com.au

  8. Heard on X

    Salesforce buys Listen Labs to give Agentforce a customer read

    Salesforce announced on X it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Listen Labs, an AI customer research and human simulation platform used by Microsoft, Anthropic and Sweetgreen. Reports put the price near $2 billion, after Listen Labs walked away from a signed $125 million Series C term sheet valuing it at $1.5 billion. The deal pairs Listen Labs' AI interviews and 50 million person panel with Salesforce's existing customer data, aimed at giving Agentforce a better read on what customers actually want.

    Salesforcex.comx.com

    Since this note:Salesforce −0.8%(S&P 500 +1.5%)

  9. By the numbers

    11 of 28 public holdings sit over 20pc below their highs

    11 of the 28 public names in the portfolio list are more than 20% below their 52-week high, including Broadcom, down 26%, and Tesla, down 28%. That's over a third of the public book still deep in drawdown, even as the equal-weight basket of holdings is up 66.8% over the past year. Big aggregate gains can sit on top of plenty of individual pain.

    Broadcom Tesla

    Since this note:Broadcom +1.4%Tesla +6.3%(S&P 500 +1.2%)

  10. Big & small

    SpaceX reaches orbit while Zendir tests missions in software first

    SpaceX's Starship reached orbit for the first time on 28 September, a milestone even though the mission was cut short after an engine failure, and it placed 26 upgraded Starlink satellites in orbit along the way. Canberra's Zendir works the other end of the same problem, building digital twins that let engineers model a spacecraft's systems and failure modes before any hardware is built. One proves itself by flying, the other by simulating everything that could go wrong first.

    SpaceX Zendirbloomberg.com

    Since this note:SpaceX +7.6%(S&P 500 +1.2%)

  11. Big mover

    IREN falls 42pc from its high even as revenue jumped 41pc

    IREN shares are down 45.4% from their 52-week high and slid another 11.7% this week. The FY26 results on 27 August showed revenue up 41% to $707 million but a $684 million net loss and a warning of $25-30 billion in 2027 capex. Analysts at Redburn then started the neocloud group at Neutral, dragging IREN down with CoreWeave and Nebius even as JPMorgan raised its own target to $65.

    IRENsaasrise.com247wallst.com

    Since this note:IREN −14.4%(S&P 500 +1.1%)

  12. Then & now

    Bank of America bought Merrill for $50bn 18 years ago this month

    On 15 September 2008, at the height of the financial crisis, Bank of America agreed to buy Merrill Lynch for about $50 billion in stock, ending 94 years of Merrill's independence. Eighteen years on, Merrill Wealth Management alone reported $4.1 trillion in client balances in the second quarter of 2026, with wealth and investment management net income up sharply on the year.

    Bank of Americabusiness-standard.comwealthbriefing.com

    Since this note:Bank of America −3.4%(S&P 500 +1.1%)

  13. Connections

    Xanadu and AMD's Backline wires quantum chips into EPYC servers

    Xanadu and AMD this month released Backline, an open platform co-designed by the two companies for rapid communication between quantum and classical computing hardware. It targets end-to-end loop times under 3 microseconds between Xanadu's photonic processors and AMD's EPYC and Threadripper CPUs, Instinct GPUs and Versal FPGAs. For AMD it's a low-cost way into quantum-adjacent infrastructure; for Xanadu it ties its PennyLane software to chips already sitting in data centres.

    Xanadu AMD

    Since this note:Xanadu −17.3%AMD −1.6%(S&P 500 +0.3%)

  14. Theme

    Shopify defaults to AI-agent checkout, Amazon keeps the gate shut

    From 21 September, Shopify started enabling Shop Pay checkout for AI shopping agents by default across eligible US merchants, letting tools like Google's AI Mode buy without a manual integration. Amazon is going the other way: it has blocked OpenAI's shopping crawlers from indexing its listings and sued Perplexity's shopping agent over unauthorised purchases. Two of the biggest commerce platforms in the portfolio are now running opposite bets on how much buying power to hand to AI agents.

    Shopify Amazon

    Since this note:Shopify +15.7%Amazon +1.8%(S&P 500 +0.3%)

Most liked on X

Notes are written by AI and can be wrong; check the sources. Share-price moves run from the last close before the week to the last close in it. Not financial advice.

Noosa Heads, Australia

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