Market Report.
🔴 Markets are showing a bright red color as AI advances and its impact on other businesses and sectors.
🤖 The advance of AI continues to put increasing pressure on multiple sectors of the economy. Earlier this week, we highlighted how specialised financial services and audit firms came under pressure following the announcement of new AI applications in tax planning and advisory services — you may recall.
📈 Well, the trend is broadening. Sectors once considered immune are now being affected. No one appears to be entirely insulated from this technological shift.
🚚 Investors had previously seen the transportation/logistics sector as relatively “AI-resistant”, particularly as they sought to diversify away from volatile technology names. However, this development has proven that the “old economy” is not immune to AI-driven disruption
📦 The rout in trucking and logistics stocks was sparked by an update from the small AI logistics firm Algorhythm Holdings (previously known as Singing Machine Co.).
🚛 Algorhythm announced that its SemiCab platform was helping customers scale their freight volumes by 300-400% without a corresponding increase in operational headcount. This sent Algorhythm’s own stock soaring 12%.
💻 The tech sector is also being hit.
💾 The rapid build-out of AI infrastructure by tech firms has absorbed much of the world’s memory chip supply, leading to a global memory price increase that has impacted Cisco’s margins.
🌐 Cisco provides the essential networking infrastructure, including switches and routers powered by multiple memory chips, that underpins data centers running AI applications.
📉 Cisco reported quarterly adjusted gross margin below market estimates, sending its shares down 7% in extended trading.
📊 Despite the margin pressure, Cisco reported strong demand and accelerating revenue, with the company now expecting over $5 billion in AI orders and $3 billion in AI infrastructure revenue from hyperscalers in fiscal year 2026.
🏢 On the other hand, the real estate services industry has already been struggling to regain its footing since the pandemic, and the boom in AI has fueled pockets of strength in areas like data centers and high-end office leasing.
🏬 Shares of major real estate services companies like CBRE Group, Jones Lang LaSalle, and Cushman & Wakefield plunged on Wednesday, with CBRE and Cushman & Wakefield seeing their biggest drops since 2020.
🔄 Investors are “rotating out of high-fee, labor-intensive business models viewed as potentially vulnerable to AI-driven disruption” in the real estate services industry.
₿ Bitcoin continues to weaken and has fallen below £65,000 again in the last few hours. The impact this may have on institutional and retail investors is not yet fully apparent.
💰 Coinbase reported a net loss of $667 million in Q4 2025, compared to a $1.3 billion profit in the same period last year, as the cooling crypto market pressured trading activity and revenue. Coinbase’s revenue declined 20% to $1.8 billion, as falling token prices drained trading activity across digital assets. This was worse than expected.
📉 The results reflect the broader downturn in the crypto market, with Bitcoin down nearly 50% from its October 2025 high, leaving many retail traders on the sidelines.
🏦 Rival crypto exchanges like Gemini Space Station and Kraken have also seen operational pressures, with Gemini planning to cut up to 25% of its workforce.
🪙 A key shift has been Coinbase’s revenue-sharing tied to the stablecoin USDC, which analysts view as higher margin and more predictable than trading fees. However, this revenue stream could be threatened by proposed stablecoin regulations. For instance, the EU ban and the introduction of the digital euro.
🍎 Apple’s stock had its worst trading day since April 2025, dropping 5% and wiping out its gain for the year so far.
🗣️ On one hand, reports that Apple’s long-awaited AI update to its Siri personal assistant has been internally pushed back to May or later, rather than launching within a couple weeks as expected.
⚖️ On the other hand, the Federal Trade Commission Chair Andrew Ferguson sent a letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook, pressing for a review of Apple News after reports of bias against conservative news outlets.
📰 The FTC chair’s letter cited “reports” that Apple News was promoting left-leaning news outlets while suppressing conservative content, raising regulatory scrutiny.
📉 The stock decline also reflects broader investor concerns about big tech companies spending heavily on AI, with UBS recently downgrading the U.S. tech sector to neutral.
♟️ Meanwhile, Trump’s chess pieces continue to move and never rest. A new, unthinkable twist surprised us yesterday, once again boosting a dollar that has shown volatility in recent weeks. This time, you won’t believe the latest news.
🇷🇺 The Kremlin has drafted an internal memo outlining a potential economic grand bargain with U.S. President Donald Trump after a peace agreement in Ukraine. The memo assumes a peace deal in Ukraine and suggests that the U.S. would gradually lift sanctions on Russia as a precondition for restored dollar access, going beyond simple sanctions relief towards a deeper economic partnership.
💵 Russia would reverse its de-dollarization efforts and re-enter the U.S. dollar settlement system, potentially including energy trade in dollars again. This would expand Russia’s foreign exchange market and further entrench the dollar’s role as the world’s reserve currency.
🛢️ Russia would offer large energy and investment concessions to U.S. firms, including joint ventures in Siberian gas and other projects, as well as favorable conditions in Russian consumer and raw materials sectors.
🌍 It also proposes that the U.S. and Russia work together to champion fossil fuels over “climate-friendly ideology”.
🔄 This would represent a significant reversal from Russia’s recent push to move away from the dollar and deepen its economic ties with China as part of a broader de-dollarization effort.
🎩 And another magic trick in the style of Donald Trump’s The Art of the Deal. How can you stimulate consumption and reduce financial costs if the Fed ignores you and does not cut interest rates?
💳 Trump has proposed a one-year nationwide cap of 10% on credit card interest rates, arguing that lenders charging 20-30% are “ripping off” Americans and that a temporary ceiling would ease cost-of-living pressures.
📢 White House trade adviser Peter Navarro is publicly pressuring JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon to cut credit card interest rates, reflecting Donald Trump’s push for a temporary cap of about 10% on card APRs.
🏛️ Navarro directly called out Dimon, saying he is “a criminal” for charging American consumers credit card interest rates of 22-30%, and that Dimon should “lower your friggin’ credit card interest rates” until he does so, he should “refrain from commenting on other public policies.”
🗳️ This is part of a broader political strategy by Trump to show he is tackling household affordability issues ahead of the midterm elections, even as it puts him at odds with major banks.
📂 For those who think that the Epsetin case only applies to wealthy, straight men, well, not exactly.
⚖️ Kathy Ruemmler, the top lawyer at Goldman Sachs, is leaving the firm following the release of Department of Justice documents showing her links with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
📑 Ruemmler previously disclosed to Goldman’s leadership that she had dealt with Epstein, who had offered to use his network to help build her private practice.
📧 Ruemmler’s name has continued to appear in batches of documents tied to Epstein, including emails where she criticized former President Donald Trump, and revelations that she had a nickname for Epstein (“Uncle Jeffrey”) and may have accepted gifts and travel from him.
💼 The documents also show Ruemmler was once accused of having an affair with one of Epstein’s top lawyers, who was married at the time.
Market View.
📉 US equity futures are under renewed pressure.
📊 S&P 500 futures are down more than 2% since yesterday’s session, currently trading around 6,840 points. Meanwhile, Nasdaq 100 futures have fallen by as much as 3%, standing at approximately 24,725 points.
💵 The US Dollar Index (DXY) has strengthened again, moving back above the 97 level, prompting EUR/USD to retreat below 1.1860.
🇪🇺 Interestingly, despite the ongoing weakness in the European economy, losses across European markets have remained below 2%. The DAX 40 has slipped back below the 25,000‑point mark, currently trading around 24,922 points, while Euro Stoxx 50 futures have pulled back from recent highs near 6,100 points to around 6,025 points.
🛢️ The oil market has declined by more than 4.5% since Wednesday, likely driven by progress in negotiations with Iran, with spot Brent crude currently trading near $67.40 per barrel.
🥇 Gold futures have also cooled, briefly falling below the $5,000 per ounce level during yesterday’s session and now trading around $4,995 per ounce.
₿ Finally, Bitcoin continues to weaken, dropping below $65,000 for the second time this February, before staging a modest rebound to approximately $66,100.
