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AppLovin gains amid report on its plans to launch a social networking platform

Ad tech company AppLovin has designs on starting a social networking platform of its own after it was unable to get its hands on TikTok’s US operations.

Shares are up today on the heels of a massive gain on Wednesday, though it’s unclear whether this has much to do with this potential foray or if traders are aiming to call a bottom in the stock after last week’s post-earnings tumble took shares below $360 for the first time since July.

These social plans were discussed in a podcast days ago, and the company has had a job posting for a software engineer to build this platform, though a Bloomberg headline on the subject was only shared this morning.

“We aim to build a completely new next-generation social media platform,” Chief Product and Engineering Officer Giovanni Ge said on the “Valley 101” podcast.

He described the course the company is charting as the opposite of Meta’s, which started by gathering eyeballs and then built advertising around it.

Presumably, such a venture would give AppLovin more digital real estate to run ads, and any data it collects from its users may be useful in offering better targeted ads on other apps.

Last April, CNBC’s Marc Faber reported that the ad tech firm had made an offer for TikTok, and that the Trump administration had been “fully aware” of its interest.

AppLovin’s post-earnings swoon last week, despite solid Q4 results and a better-than-expected Q1 outlook, came as investors have worried about competitive threats to its business from new AI entrants as well as Meta.

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Airline stocks fall as US-Iran tensions push oil prices up

President Trump on Thursday said “bad things will happen” if a “meaningful deal” is not reached between the US and Iran, escalating tensions between the two countries as well as the threat of a possible conflict.

“Now we may have to take it a step further or we may not. Maybe we are going to make a deal [with Iran]. You are going to be finding out over the next probably 10 days,” Trump said. West Texas Intermediate crude futures climbed more than 2% on Thursday morning.

Oil’s reaction sent airline stocks, which are sensitive to fuel costs, downward. JetBlue, Allegiant, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Alaska Air, and United Airlines all experienced a sell-off on Thursday morning. Other airlines including Frontier and Southwest Airlines also dipped.

markets

Super Micro jumps above 50-day moving average on elevated call activity

A jump in call activity has propelled shares of Super Micro Computer sharply higher, above their 50-day moving average.

As of 10:45 a.m. ET, call volumes of 114,333 are on track to handily surpass the 20-day average of 166,558 for a full session (a period that encompasses the release of its quarterly results earlier this month).

The action has a bullish tilt, with a put/call ratio of less than 0.16 compared to a 20-day average of 0.38. Call options that expire this Friday and next Friday with strike prices between $32 and $33.50 are seeing the most activity.

The AI server company’s post-earnings bounce had been short-lived, with shares returning to near a 52-week low before today’s surge.

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Klarna sinks after Q1 guidance for revenue and gross merchandise value comes in short of estimates

Buy now, pay later, issue guidance that Wall Street likes even later.

Shares of Klarna are tumbling in early trading after the fintech payments company’s Q1 outlook came in below analysts’ projections.

Management sees Q1 revenues between $900 million and $980 million, the midpoint of which is below Wall Street’s call for $965.1 million. The company’s range for gross merchandise value in the current quarter of $32 billion to $33 billion is fully below the consensus estimate for $33.37 billion.

(Gross merchandise value is the dollar figure associated with all purchases made via Klarna’s different modes of payment.)

This disappointing outlook outweighed a solid set of Q4 top-line results. Revenues of $1.08 billion came in $10 million above expectations, gross merchandise volume beat estimates at $38.7 billion (consensus: $38.06 billion), and active consumers of 118 million were nearly a full million above what Wall Street had penciled in.

The stock is poised to open at an all-time low.

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Palantir dips as stock removed from Bank of America’s list of best US investment ideas

Palantir is lower in premarket trading amid news that the stock has been removed from Bank of America’s US 1 List.

That list is the best of the best: the subset of “buy”-rated stocks that BofA selects as its top US-listed investment ideas.

Between this news, Michael Burry, and, well, just the share price, it certainly seems like investor sentiment has decisively shifted on the once high-flying AI retail darling.

Palantir recently traded at its biggest discount to Wall Street’s average price target since late 2022.

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Herbalife rallies after Cristiano Ronaldo invests $7.5 million in its personal health and wellness software subsidiary

SIUUUUUU!

Herbalife is soaring in premarket trading after announcing that longtime partner Cristiano Ronaldo has invested $7.5 million into one of its subsidiaries.

The football/soccer legend acquired a 10% equity interest in Herbalife’s HBL Pro2col in a deal that also sees him commit to providing services and sponsorship rights to this entity.

Pro2col offers individualized health and wellness tips based on user-input information, data from wearable tech, DNA analysis, and more.

Herbalife reached a deal to acquire these assets in March 2025. At that time, Ronaldo was tapped as an adviser who would be supporting the development and deployment of this technology. He’s endorsed Herbalife products since 2013.

The company made this announcement along with the release of Q4 earnings, which were mixed to roughly in line with estimates.

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