Trump’s stock-market loyalists are getting cold feet at the last minute

“Palantir’s Maven artificial intelligence system will become an official program of record, Deputy Secretary of Defense Steve ​Feinberg said in a letter to Pentagon leaders, a move that locks in long-term use of Palantir’s weapons-targeting technology across ‌the U.S. military.

In the March 9 letter to senior Pentagon leaders and U.S. military commanders, Feinberg said embedding Palantir’s Maven Smart System would provide warfighters ‘with the latest tools necessary to detect, deter, and dominate our adversaries in all domains.’”

Key benefits of being named an “official program of record” include eligibility for permanent funding from the Department of Defense. The designation also implies a long-term commitment to a technology, which significantly decreases competitive threats from alternate military contractors and vendors.

In other words, being a “program of record” implies significant long-term cash flow in the future from the US Treasury to Palantir, and thus the market reaction.

Prediction markets have emerged as competitors to sports-betting platforms, which are primarily regulated at the state level, and companies like DraftKings and Flutter Entertainment have risen on the news in premarket trading.

Meanwhile, Robinhood Markets and Interactive Brokers, which both offer prediction markets covering sports and other contracts, ticked down on the news before President Trump’s latest Iran announcement sent much of the stock market jolting higher, with futures on the S&P 500 rising more than 3% in a matter of minutes.

(Robinhood Markets Inc. is the parent company of Sherwood Media, an independently operated media company subject to certain legal and regulatory restrictions. I own Robinhood stock as part of my compensation. Event contracts are offered through Robinhood Derivatives, LLC — probabilities referenced or sourced from KalshiEx LLC or ForecastEx LLC.)

Elliott Managing Partner Jesse Cohn told the WSJ that “Synopsys is essential to the global chip industry,” and that it is “uniquely positioned to benefit” as the AI industry continues to require more capital, more complex chips, and therefore, more software to design them.

The firm’s investment is predicated on a “clear opportunity for Synopsys’ financial performance to more fully reflect the value it delivers.” While memory stocks like Micron have been on a tear recently, Synopsys has dropped 8% over the past year, lagging behind its biggest rival, Cadence Design Systems, which is up 6% in the same period.

Citing people familiar with the investment in Synopsys, the Journal reports that Elliott sees room for the company to boost sales and improve its margins to be more in line with that of Cadence. In its fiscal year 2025, Cadence notched an adjusted operating margin of nearly 45%, while Synopsys eked out only 37%.