| | Good morning. Was it the weather or the price tag? The National Association of Realtors (NAR) said Thursday that sales of previously owned homes in January tanked 8.4% from a month earlier, considerably worse than expected. Meanwhile, the sales slump did nothing to halt a 31-month run of rising home prices, with the median price rising 0.9% on an annualized basis to $396,800. That's easily explained by tightening supply, as unsold inventory on the market fell 0.8%. What's tougher to explain is what's causing the slowdown in transactions. NAR said in a release that, because wage gains have been outpacing home price growth, housing is actually the most affordable it's been since March 2022. "The below-normal temperatures and above-normal precipitation this January make it harder than usual to assess the underlying driver of the decrease and determine if this month's numbers are an aberration," said NAR chief economist Lawrence Yun. And, let's face it, your open house may feature the best cheese dip in Arkansas (making it the best in the world by default) but nobody in Little Rock is putting on snow shoes to sample it. | | | | | They may look like Plain Jane utilities to you and me. But to the AI industry, they're Helen of Troy: the faces that launched a thousand server racks. In respective earnings reports on Thursday, utilities giants Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) and American Electric Power (AEP) both reported a surge in power demand due to the massive and ongoing expansion of the energy-starved data centers fueling the artificial intelligence boom, following similar earnings reports featuring bumper profits from Duke Energy and Ameren earlier this week. But the good times may not last, and the reason has nothing to do with the AI panic attacks gripping investors every other day lately: the dynamic between AI firms and utility companies is drawing bipartisan scrutiny. Gridlocked Utilities are matching Silicon Valley's capex boom to keep pace with Big Tech's big power demands. Last year, PG&E said it planned to invest $73 billion by the end of the decade to match the surging power demand. AEP said on Thursday it is expanding its own capex plans beyond the $72 billion it had previously announced it would spend by 2030, by as much as $8 billion. Those costs, however, are often passed down to the consumer — and if you haven't felt the pinch of rising electricity prices yet, consider it a stroke of mere geographic luck. In the aggregate, electricity prices jumped 6.9% in the US last year, according to a Goldman Sachs note. That's more than double the headline inflation rate of 2.9%. Goldman also said that consumers can expect another 6% rise in electricity prices in 2027, and another 3% by 2028. Over the next decade, data centers will account for 40% of all electricity demand growth. So far, it's been mostly great for utility firms. Duke Energy, for instance, reported full-year net income of $5 billion in 2025, up more than 9% year-over-year and more than 43% since 2023. It's been less great for inflation-lashed consumers, however, and lawmakers have noticed: - A bipartisan bill introduced in the US Senate on Wednesday called the Guaranteeing Rate Insulation, or "GRID" Act, seeks to ban all data center-related bill increases for US households and ensure priority grid access for regular consumers. It also would require data center owners to power their operations via off-grid sources; current data centers would have 10 years to transition off-grid.
- The federal bill follows several state-level fights. Newly elected New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill, for instance, declared a "state of emergency on utility costs" in a move that curbed utilities' ability to hike rates; in New York, utility regulators successfully decreased Con Edison's planned rate increase by 87%.
  On Your Own: It doesn't stop there. The White House has similarly struck deals with tech giants, forcing the AI players to pay for their own new energy generation. Taking the hint, Anthropic on Wednesday announced it is working with utility companies to "estimate and cover" consumer electricity price increases related to its data center buildout. Consider it just another industry disrupted by AI. Written by Brian Boyle | | | | | | Love is in the air. But, not for equities. As 2026 volatility bites, 44% of Family Offices are aggressively increasing real estate exposure (Knight Frank). Their primary target? Residential assets. To hit these allocations, sophisticated capital is quietly moving into mogul. Founded by ex-Goldman Sachs real estate veterans, mogul lets you co-invest alongside the smart money in vetted residential properties. You no longer need a nine-figure net worth to access institutional-grade deals. Here's what you get: Offerings often sell out in hours. Join 15,000+ investors hedging their portfolios with hard assets. Invest like a Family Office now.  | | | | | | | | Masayoshi Son, the billionaire investor known for making risky bets that sometimes turn out so poorly Hollywood makes movies about them, made his biggest bet yet on OpenAI. Son, who's called AI "humanity's future," has led SoftBank to pour $34 billion into ChatGPT-maker OpenAI so far — with a plan to add as much as $30 billion more to the pile during the AI company's next funding round, the Financial Times reported. Boosted by OpenAI returns, SoftBank swung to a $1.6 billion profit in the winter quarter after losing $2.4 billion in the same quarter a year ago. OpenAI by Proxy As SoftBank ups its investment in OpenAI, investors could see the holding company as a way to gain exposure to the private AI company, which is expected to be valued at as much as $750 billion after its next raise. SoftBank's shares have nearly doubled over the past 12 months. SoftBank made $4.3 billion on its OpenAI investment last quarter, for a total of $17 billion last year. Its returns on OpenAI last quarter made up the bulk of its $6.6 billion gain in its second Vision Fund, offsetting losses in its first fund, which took a hit in part from Korean retailer Coupang's stock suffering after a data breach. At the same time, SoftBank is investing in the wider ecosystem that could pave OpenAI's road to success: - SoftBank's CFO said Thursday that 60% of the company's assets are tied to "ASI" or "Artificial Superintelligence" (future tech that Son's described as 10,000 times smarter than humans). In addition to OpenAI, SoftBank has a majority stake in chip-maker Arm and has bought other companies in the semiconductor industry including Ampere and Graphcore. Last quarter, SoftBank scooped up a robotics company and an asset manager that specializes in AI.
- On a larger stage, SoftBank is a leading investor in Stargate, the $500 billion Trump-backed initiative to build and scale AI infrastructure in the US. SoftBank is also reportedly involved in a project that's short-listed to be backed by Japan's $550 billion planned investment in building AI in the US. On its home turf of Japan, the election of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi on Sunday has boosted hopes of continued AI investments from SoftBank's home country.
Eggs in One Basket: SoftBank nixed Nvidia from its roster for $5.8 billion and pared down its T-Mobile investment for $12.7 billion as it beefed up its stake in OpenAI. It also took out $27 billion in debt in the winter quarter. Son is known for taking risks … not all of which pay off. He famously lost fortunes when the dot-com bubble burst and WeWork's cold-brew taps ran dry, though Jared Leto did play its bong-hitting founder in an eight-part mini series. As fears of an AI bubble loom over the industry, Son is betting that OpenAI can beat its competitors. Written by Jamie Wilde | | | | | | | | | Photo via Fisher Investments | | | | | | An iconic symbol of New York's old money scene that Cole Porter, Frank Sinatra and Marilyn Monroe once called home is about to be plastered with a "for sale" sign, offering the commercial real estate market its ultimate test case. The Chinese state-run company that owns Manhattan's Waldorf Astoria is preparing to sell the hotel, The Wall Street Journal reported this week, citing people with knowledge of the plans. The Waldorf, where Grace Kelly held her engagement party, was sold to China's Anbang Insurance Group for $1.95 billion in 2014. The Chinese government later took over the company and appointed the state-run Dajia Insurance Group to handle Waldorf and other assets, which included a makeover of the hotel that went more than $1 billion over budget. The sellers are expecting a billion-dollar-plus sale, per the WSJ, meaning Beijing would take a major haircut. Real Estate Recovery The Waldorf's reported sale comes amid a slew of challenges for the commercial real estate market, including the impacts of inflation, tariffs and the 43-day government shutdown late last year. But there are now signs that the market is stabilizing. Recent research from the commercial real estate development association NAIOP found that in 2025, new commercial development and operations of commercial, residential, institutional and infrastructure real estate contributed $3.5 trillion to US GDP. Hopes are high: - Experts at JPMorgan recently forecasted a bright 2026 for the market. "In 2025, we saw improvements in real estate equity fundraising and transaction volume," said Michelle Herrick, JPMorgan's head of commercial real estate. "The 2026 market is strong from both a capital and fundamental standpoint — we anticipate more transactions in the coming year."
- CBRE predicts the market will "thrive" this year, with commercial real estate investment activity growing an estimated 16% to $562 billion, which would nearly match the annual average in the four years leading up to the pandemic.
Automation Alarm: Meanwhile, real estate service stocks are the latest victims of artificial intelligence fears. Shares of CBRE Group, Jones Lang LaSalle, Hudson Pacific Properties and Cushman & Wakefield struggled this week as investors continue to jump ship from industries AI threatens to disrupt. Software and Big Law can relate. Written by Mallika Mitra | | | | | - Another Round: Anthropic announced a $30 billion fundraising round that more than doubled its valuation from September to $380 billion. It comes three days after an AI safety researcher, concerned the "world is in peril" in part because of AI, resigned from the startup to write poetry and "become invisible."
- Import-ant: A new report from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York says American consumers and companies are bearing nearly 90% of the costs of the Trump administration's tariffs.
- Is This The Next Evolution Of Stock Research? Wall Street has analysts. Traders now have predictive A.I. that spots market trends before they hit traditional charts, helping you catch setups earlier. Ready to beat Wall Street at its own game? Download VantagePoint's free guide. See what A.I. spots first.**
** Partner | | | | Disclaimer *Past performance does not guarantee future results. Historical, hypothetical, or simulated data is for illustrative purposes only. Investing involves risk, including loss of principal. This is not an offer to buy or sell securities. See important Disclaimers. | | |
|
|
|
