Market commentary

U.S. consumer delinquencies jump to highest in almost a decade

As reported by Bloomberg, delinquency rates on loans rose to 4.8 per cent of all outstanding U.S. household debt in the fourth quarter, the highest level since 2017. The rise in defaults was driven by delinquencies in mortgage payments, particularly in lower income zip codes, and student-loan delinquencies. Overall household debt balances climbed 1 per cent from the previous quarter to $18.8 trillion, with the share of credit-card loans at least 90 days delinquent rising to 12.7 per cent. The jobless rate for workers 16 to 24 years old stood at 10.4 per cent in December, near the highest levels since the depths of the pandemic in 2021. continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Global markets, Market commentary.

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The stock market is experiencing a dramatic bifurcation. While traditional sectors surge – energy companies are up over 20 per cent and materials firms 15 per cent – a different story is unfolding in the technology and financial services sectors. Established players are watching their valuations crumble as investors grapple with the answers to a simple question: which companies will survive the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution? continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Market commentary, Technology & Telecommunications.

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Business is like a piano accordion. Sectors and individual companies expand and grow, then contract, necessarily becoming smaller than they once were. If you keep this metaphor in mind when investing, it can help you understand the business’s stage of life. 

There are exceptions, of course – those businesses that rise above the cycle of invention, adoption, scale, saturation, disruption and destruction, but they are few and far between. Most will eventually reach a natural limit to their size, and then they either sit there, churning customers for lower margins, or are disrupted, or their customers move on to the next trend. continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Market commentary.

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Over the weekend, Michael Howell from CrossBorder Capital updated his global liquidity analysis, concluding the sell-off isn’t over for Bitcoin, and elsewhere, accelerating global economic growth will draw liquidity from other asset markets, limiting their upside.

In Bitcoin, while some forecasters eye a rally to $90,000, Howell and the team at CrossBorder Capital have other ideas.

According to Howell, the wind has been knocked out of the sails of the “Everything Bubble”, and if you’re holding out for a vertical move upward, a skid toward $30,000 is the more statistically likely path. continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Market commentary.

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How do you produce a ball of wool? Pull on the thread of a woollen jumper! What was once a fine, handmade piece of clothing can quickly become a jumbled mess on the floor, and all one has to do is pull on the thread.

I wonder whether that’s a fitting metaphor for what’s going on in equity markets right now. continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Market commentary, Technology & Telecommunications.

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Investors around the world are desperately trying to discern the future, and in particular, the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on it.

On the one hand, you have the hyperscalers warning of an apocalyptic future involving mass layoffs, business collapse and the creation of an omnipotent AI god.

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei says we’re nearing “the exponential”, where AI generates trillions of dollars and the economy grows 10-20 per cent a year. At the same time, Amodei says this new force with God-like abilities, requires regulation around “AI safety.” continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Market commentary, Technology & Telecommunications.

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This week on ABC Statewide Drive, I spoke about how artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping sharemarkets, prompting investors to reassess which business models are likely to benefit and which may face disruption.

Major technological shifts tend to reshape markets in unpredictable ways. In times like these, broad diversification and exposure to strategies that are uncorrelated to markets may help build more resilient portfolios. continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Market commentary, Radio.

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It’s a shot across the bow. In recent weeks, short, sharp sell-offs across the largest global artificial intelligence (AI) hyperscalers have woken investors from their technology and AI-inspired slumber. In just six trading sessions, Microsoft fell 18 per cent. Meanwhile, Amazon has declined 14 per cent in eight sessions, and Google parent Alphabet has fallen 8 per cent in just four sessions. Elsewhere, Meta fell 10 per cent, and Tesla has declined almost 12 per cent in 10 trading sessions.

This article was first published in The Australian on 11 February 2026. continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Aura Group, Digital Asset Funds Management, In the Press, Insightful Insights, Investing Education, Market commentary.

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Recognising this isn’t the first time I have expressed concern about the ultimate fate of humans in an artificial intelligence (AI) world, I pondered several AI-related questions over the weekend. 

The first is that if many, and maybe most, of us are using AI already – and some very effectively – with existing infrastructure, how many more data centres do we really need? Flipping the question, if the competition among AI agent providers is driving the cost of AI access down to zero – many use Google’s Gemini daily, and it costs nothing – for what purpose are a thousand more data centres really being built?

The second question is related: AI tools are already so ubiquitous and cheap they amount to a commodity. Consequently, AI infrastructure players may believe that to make any money, they’ll have to race to be the first to create something dangerously powerful. continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Market commentary, Technology & Telecommunications.

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Another week, another artificial intelligence (AI) powered disruption. This time, two big announcements from China that may threaten the valuations of the big U.S. hardware-centric tech giants. 

The news

First, the release of AI-produced hyper-realistic movie-quality video from the Chinese company ByteDance-owned AI Seedance 2.0 has gone viral and simultaneously rocked Hollywood by completely reframing what the movie industry thought was possible. continue…

by Roger Montgomery Posted in Market commentary, Technology & Telecommunications.

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