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“Follow the feds” replaces “follow the Fed” as financial market maxim

Taking a position in companies the US government has exposure to has worked out handsomely so far.

9/29/25 11:14AM

The concept that investors should “follow the Fed” explains how risk appetite rebounds from its nadir during times of extreme market stress.

The US central bank purchases Treasurys after liquidity and credit conditions cause investors to flee all assets and turn to cash? Well, buy US Treasurys, then. Things are bad enough, like during the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, that monetary policymakers are willing to dip their toes into US corporate bonds? Again, “buy what the Fed is buying.”

Lately, investors in the US stock market have enjoyed a variation on this theme: don’t follow the Fed — follow the feds. That is, buy stocks of companies where the government has accumulated an equity position, or is rumored to be doing so. Intel has been a massive beneficiary of the US government taking an equity stake, which was later followed by an Nvidia partnership and investment. Rare earths miner MP Materials has gained even more significantly thanks to an investment from the Pentagon. And reports that the government will pursue a similar strategy with Lithium Americas prompted that stock to nearly double in a day last week.

Retail investors are clearly paying attention to this mantra. On Friday morning, Intel had more positive mentions on Reddit’s r/WallStreetBets over the previous 12 hours than any other stock had in overall mentions, per data from SwaggyStocks. And Lithium Americas was just outside the top five in total mentions during that time.

It’s the most stark example of a theme that’s been key for markets in 2025: the power of the Trump administration as a market catalyst. Policy decisions made in the executive branch, ranging from tariff carve-outs, export restrictions and reversals, and personal and ideological relationships with the president, have made a clear mark on market giants like Apple, Nvidia, Palantir, and Tesla.

If you don't own at least some $INTC literally what are you doing. It's irresponsible not to

It's a national emergency to make this company work, and Trump is going to twist every single arm to throw money into the pot or to sign up to be a customer over the next three years
— BuccoCapital Bloke (@buccocapital) September 24, 2025

Well said.

Before getting too giddy over the prospect of “following the feds,” I’d be remiss not to point to China as an example of how:

The long-term performance of companies with a heavy government footprint leaves much to be desired, and
What are seemingly national champions or well-supported industries can see their stocks crushed by the state’s changing whims (e.g. for-profit education stocks in 2021 or tech giants circa 2020).

That being said, for companies like Intel with a top-line profile like this, it’s not hard to see why “I’m from the government and I’m here to help” is something that resonates with investors. If President Trump’s self-professed industrial policy preference is to “Make America[n producers] great again,” well, a sustained inflection higher in Intel’s sales would likely prove to be a massive boon for the stock, even if profits are expected to be lackluster in the near term.

Tasha Matsumoto

16h

Despite a modest rebound in tech, the S&P 500 closes slightly lower

The S&P 500 managed to erase most of its early morning losses through the session.

Matt Phillips17h

Speculative stocks rebound from early sell-off

As we head toward the last hour of a wild week of trading, the buckle-up vibes the market started out with Friday have mellowed into a modestly positive day, with the Invesco QQQ Trust and the SPDR S&P 500 ETF both in the green.

But the volatility was pretty wild for some of the high-beta momentum stocks that have taken some of the worst beatings in recent days.

Shares like Applied Digital and Bloom Energy saw cumulative swings on the day along the lines of 20 percentage points. Even those that haven’t quite managed to stay positive, like IREN and Oklo, have nonetheless erased sizable losses.

Why? Frankly, it’s impossible to say. The same uncertainties that the market was facing yesterday — doubts about further rate hikes, confusion about the state of the economy, jitters about the potential for the AI boom to turn into a bust — are still hovering out there somewhere. Perhaps it will take more than a 2-percentage point drop from record highs for the major indexes — about the extent of the recent sell-off — to dull the retail reflex to buy the dip.

Luke Kawa21h

Micron spikes on report that Samsung hiked memory chip prices by as much as 60%

Memory chip specialist Micron is soaring after Reuters reported that Samsung has raised prices of select memory chips by as much as 60% since September, citing two people with knowledge of the price changes.

Memory chips play a key supporting role in the AI boom by feeding high-powered GPUs with data to process.

Micron, the biggest US memory chip seller, has been on an absolute tear, more than doubling in price since the end of August. Shares recently traded more than 15% above the average analyst price target, a record based on data going back to 2007.

These days, you need a pretty good memory to keep up with all the bullish news flow surrounding memory chip stocks, whether it’s been reports of imminent price hikes for these chips, South Korean memory giant SK Hynix already being sold out of all its 2026 production, or Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang nodding at shortages of these valuable components.

Max Knoblauch22h

Warner Bros. Discovery rises as potential sale boils down to bidding war between Paramount, Comcast, and Netflix

The potential sale of Warner Bros. Discovery appears to have boiled down to three contenders: Paramount Skydance, Comcast, and Netflix.

All three entertainment giants are prepping bids for WBD, with a deadline of next Thursday for first-round offers, according to Wall Street Journal reporting. Warner Bros. shares climbed more than 2% in premarket trading on Friday.

Per the WSJ, Comcast and Netflix are mostly interested in WBD’s streaming assets, while Paramount — which is said to have had three offers rejected already — wants to buy the whole company.

According to people familiar with the companies’ plans, Paramount believes it has the clearest path toward regulatory approval, as it thinks Netflix’s cofounder, Reed Hastings, having supported Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election could be a significant hurdle in getting a deal approved, per the WSJ.

Exclusive | Paramount, Comcast, Netflix Prepare Bids for Warner as Deadline Approaches

Per the WSJ, Comcast and Netflix are mostly interested in WBD’s streaming assets, while Paramount — which is said to have had three offers rejected already — wants to buy the whole company.

Luke Kawa23h

Beyond Meat’s refinancing efforts that spurred meme stock rally now have shares down 67%

Well, with a bit of time and a lot of volatility, the dust is settling on how Beyond Meat’s refinancing efforts have gone.

This morning, management announced that its new 2030 notes could be converted at a price of about $1.7459, or around 85% above where shares are trading in the premarket in the midst of another big retreat.

The twists and turns that brought us here:

On September 29, the company announced its intention to replace $1.15 billion in convertible notes due in 2027 (with an interest rate of 0%) with a mix of stock and up to $202.5 million in new second lien convertible notes due in 2030 (with an interest rate of 7%). Prior to that, its stock closed at $2.85.

Shortly after management reached a deal with 97% of its 2027 noteholders in mid-October, Beyond Meat became a meme stock. Despite massive dilution that raised the company’s share count by more than 300% and made prior noteholders the new corporate owners, retail traders positioned for a potential short squeeze in the shares, thinking the refinancing would give the company a new lease on life.

Shares rose from a closing low of $0.52 on October 16 to an intermediate closing peak of $3.62 on October 21 — a near 600% rally in just three sessions. That propelled shares to well above where they were trading before these refinancing plans were announced. But the true frenzied zenith for Beyond Meat came the next session, when the stock more than doubled intraday on what were then record volumes of above 2 billion, only to ultimately close slightly lower. The air came out of the balloon almost immediately thereafter.

(A fun aside: in calculating the conversion rate for the 2030 convertible notes, management deems that day to have been a “market disruption event,” which removes it from the calculations and makes the conversion price lower than it otherwise would have been.)

Shares tanked on October 23 on heavy volumes, and then interest and trading activity in Beyond continued to wane — along with its share price. Delaying the release of Q3 results as management tried to figure out how big of a write-down to take and then issuing those numbers along with a weak Q4 sales outlook did nothing to change the narrative.

There’s no reason to think those 2030 notes will be converted any time soon, based on where the stock is trading. Because these 2030 notes provide the opportunity for “payment in kind” and Beyond is in a relatively stressed financial position, interest on these notes can be paid not just with cash but also (more likely) through the issuance of more stock or the accumulation of more debt.

In sum: Beyond Meat eliminated about $800 million in debt and all it got in exchange was a 67% decline in its stock price, a longer runway to make processed peas into faux meat, and an entertaining (and for those who bought into the meme rally without exiting at the right time, painful) story.