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Hey Snackers,
As we reported last year, users saying “please” and “thank you” to AI tools is wasting millions in computing power. In an attempt to curb AI’s soaring costs, 404 Media has reported that developers at Nvidia, OpenAI, and GitHub are using a caveman plugin to make their AI tools speak like cavemen, which can cut Claude Code token consumption by ~75%. Users can pick their level of “grunt”: lite, full (which is the default setting), ultra, or Wenyan, which translates the output into classical Chinese characters for extreme compression.
(Maybe this is the magic, unidentified method that OpenAI engineers claim has cut inference costs in half?)
The S&P 500, Nasdaq 100, and Russell 2000 all gained yesterday, led by tech stocks. Stocks posted their best quarter in six years, and semiconductors had their best quarter ever.
🇺🇸 We’re taking an Independence Day hiatus on Thursday and Friday, but we’ll be back in your inbox on Monday.
Magnificent Seven? Lame. Let’s talk about the Terrific Ten.
For years, the markets have been obsessing over the Magnificent Seven, that loose grouping of seven stocks — Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet, Tesla, Nvidia, and Meta — that have served as the lodestars of the AI revolution. But take a look at the top-performing stocks in the S&P 500 year to date, and you might notice that it’s not those stocks topping the list, but rather the companies that sell to them.
Per estimates from Bloomberg’s Supply Chain function:
Sandisk has Nvidia among its top five customers, Seagate has Microsoft, Dell’s tenth-largest customer is Amazon.
Micron counts both Nvidia and Microsoft among its top five customers, Corning’s got Apple (and, though not in the Mag 7, Samsung, too).
Western Digital is enmeshed with Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft; Flex counts Microsoft, Amazon, and Google among its top five customers.
Marvell’s top five customers include four of the Magnificent Seven and all of its hyperscalers: Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and Meta.
Applied Materials and Intel are the outliers here among the top ten YTD; Intel’s seventh-best customer is Microsoft, though, and Applied Materials’ top five customers include SK Hynix, Samsung Electronics, Micron Technology, TSMC, and Intel, all of whom are part of this web even if they’re not among the Mag 7.
The Takeaway
A consistent drum we have been beating over here at Snacks is the phenomenon that “your massive capex are someone else’s massive sales beat” and these just so happen to be a who’s who of Someone Elses.
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Baseball lends itself to the weird and unprecedented, for the simple reason that there are so many teams and players playing so many games — inevitably, you witness something you’ve never seen before. (A thousand monkeys at a thousand keyboards, and all that.) We got another on Monday night when the LA Dodgers and Sacramento A’s faced off, with both teams penciling in a guy named “Max Muncy”, who was born on August 25, playing third base and batting in the No. 7 spot in the order. It’s not the only time we’ve seen same-name players facing each other; MLB had two Álex Gonzálezes for years, the NHL has two Sebastian Ahos, and the NBA has had so many same-name combos they needed to be distinguished via nicknames. One baseball Will Smith even hit a huge postseason HR off the other Will Smith in 2021.
Snacks Shots
⚽️ Wednesday, July 1
Noon ET: 🏴 England vs. 🇨🇩 Congo DR: It’s a perennial contender in England up against a team making its first appearance since 1974. The markets favor experience; England’s an 88% chance to win it.*
4 p.m. ET: 🇧🇪 Belgium vs. 🇸🇳 Senegal: Belgium’s got a 60% chance of beating Senegal.
8 p.m. ET: 🇺🇸 United States vs. 🇧🇦 Bosnia-Herzegovina: The hosts take on a team that has managed to pull off miracles this tournament. The USA is an 84% chance to win and make it to the Round of 16.
⚽️ Thursday, July 2
3 p.m. ET: 🇪🇸 Spain vs. 🇦🇹 Austria: It’s a Habsburg vs. Habsburg battle royale! Spain’s got an 87% chance of the win, having entered the tournament a heavy favorite.
7 p.m. ET: 🇵🇹 Portugal vs. 🇭🇷 Croatia: Portugal is favored here, with a 70% chance of the win.
11 p.m. ET: 🇨🇭 Switzerland vs. 🇩🇿 Algeria: This is going to be one of the closer games of the round, with the Swiss coming in as just 66% favorites.
⚽️ Friday, July 3
2 p.m. ET: 🇦🇺 Australia vs. 🇪🇬 Egypt: The Socceroos and the Pharaohs will fight to advance, and Egypt’s got the edge with a 57% chance of the win.
6 p.m. ET: 🇦🇷 Argentina vs. 🇨🇻 Cape Verde: Cinderella story Cape Verde faces down the most frightening team in the entire tournament, a squad that has some of the best chances of winning it all and with the GOAT players starting: Argentina’s got a 91% chance here, per the markets.
9:30 p.m. ET: 🇨🇴 Colombia vs. 🇬🇭 Ghana: Colombia enters the Round of 32 with a ton of momentum and is an 81% favorite to beat Ghana.
*Event contracts are offered through Robinhood Derivatives, LLC — probabilities referenced or sourced from KalshiEx LLC or ForecastEx LLC.
What else we're Snackin'
Despite beating Wall Street’s expectations in yesterday’s postmarket Q4 earnings, Nike sank to its lowest level since August 2014 in postmarket trading as its CFO warned that sales “remain challenged.”
Yesterday, the FDA announced that Zyn can be marketed as less harmful than cigarettes.
Visa, Bank of New York Mellon, BlackRock, Klarna, Chime, Alphabet, Coinbase, Stripe, and others are joining forces to launch a new stablecoin.
The UK is leaning toward intervening in Paramount Skydance’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, setting a July 6 deadline for companies to address concerns.
Snack Fact of the Day
In a poll Bloomberg conducted of its clients, which include traders, portfolio managers, and strategists, 45% said that it can be appropriate to wear shorts to work.
Wednesday
Premarket expected from General Mills.
Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh due to participate in a panel discussion.