Good Afternoon. Silver looks like it just jumped out of a plane and Google says you can build a playable world from a prompt. Let’s get into it.

—Rosie, Wyatt, Evan & Conor

🔥 What’s Hot: 🔥

🥶 What’s Not: 🥶

1. Trump Picks Warsh for Fed, and Metals Learn What Gravity Is

The News: Markets sold off on Jan. 30, 2026 after President Donald Trump named former Fed governor Kevin Warsh as his pick to succeed Jerome Powell as Federal Reserve chair. Stocks slid, the dollar jumped, and long-dated yields nudged higher. The loudest move was in precious metals: gold fell ~11% and silver cratered ~31%, both tagged as their worst one-day drops since 1980, after a month of melt-up pricing.

Why It Matters: A stronger dollar and higher yields are basically kryptonite for non-yielding assets, which helps explain why gold and silver got hit first and hardest. The real takeaway is policy uncertainty: Warsh is viewed as more hawkish on inflation and especially critical of the Fed’s balance sheet, and that shifts expectations for how quickly (or how far) the Fed might cut. When the “future Fed” changes, everything with duration risk gets re-priced—sometimes violently.

What to Watch: Next up is the confirmation path and timing: Powell’s chair term is set to end in mid-May 2026, and any Senate friction could keep markets guessing about the handoff. Watch what Warsh signals on rate cuts vs. balance-sheet shrinkage, and whether the Powell investigation becomes a real procedural roadblock (Sen. Thom Tillis has publicly threatened to oppose confirmation until it’s resolved). Also watch whether gold and silver stabilize after the positioning unwind or keep trading like scooby and the gang when they accidentally step on a trapdoor.
Source: wsj.com

2. SoFi Breaks the $1B Barrier

The News: SoFi Technologies reported Q4 results for the period ended Dec. 31, 2025 with adjusted net revenue of $1.013 billion—its first $1+ billion quarter—up 37% YoY and ahead of Wall Street’s estimates. SoFi added a record 1 million members (to 13.7 million, +35% YoY) and posted record loan originations of $10.5 billion (+46% YoY). Shares popped early and then reversed as the market digested valuation and guidance.

Why It Matters: SoFi’s record originations are a signal that demand for personal loans and mortgages is still there—especially for borrowers looking to refinance or consolidate higher-cost debt. The mix shift is the story: faster-growing fee-based lines (platform fees, interchange, brokerage, etc) can make earnings less rate-dependent and less “lending-cycle fragile” than pure balance-sheet growth. The flip side is what the stock’s intraday mood swing hinted at: once a fintech gets priced like a growth darling, it has to keep printing big quarters to justify it.

What to Watch: SoFi forecast Q1 2026 and also watch any policy momentum around a proposed U.S. credit-card rate cap—management has suggested it could push borrowers toward personal loans, which would reshuffle winners and losers across consumer credit.
Source: businesswire.com

3. Ethos Technologies IPO Priced for a Pop, Traded for a Discount

The News: Nasdaq newcomer Ethos debuted on Jan. 29, 2026 under ticker LIFE after pricing its IPO at $19 (midpoint of the $18–$20 range), selling about 10.5 million shares and raising roughly $200 million. The stock finished its first session at $16.85, down 11% from the IPO price, valuing the company around $1.1–$1.2 billion—well below the roughly $2.7 billion private valuation set in July 2021 when SoftBank led a round. In its filing, Ethos reported $277.5 million in revenue for the nine months ended Sept. 30, 2025 (+47% YoY) and $46.6 million in net income (vs. $39.3 million a year earlier), giving it something many insurtech peers lacked: profitability before going public.

Why It Matters: First-day downswings like this are a reminder that “IPO price” is often just the opening bid in a tug-of-war between bankers and public-market reality. Ethos’s model—fast digital underwriting and agent distribution—signals the life-insurance buying process keeps moving toward quicker, lower-friction checkout (good news if you’d rather not schedule your life around paperwork). For investors, the message is cleaner: even profitable insurtechs are getting graded hard on valuation.

What to Watch: Watch how LIFE trades through its first few weeks as liquidity builds, plus any updates on growth versus profitability in its next public results, now that the comps get real, fast. Sometimes the market’s welcome mat is actually a scale.
Source: techcrunch.com

4. Google Drops an AI World-Builder

The News: Google rolled out Project Genie on Jan. 29, 2026, an experimental tool that generates explorable 3D environments from text prompts or images. On Jan. 30, 2026, the market treated that as a competitive warning shot: Unity Software fell 21%, Take-Two Interactive dropped 10%, and Roblox was down 12%+ in afternoon trading. The tool is powered by Google DeepMind tech designed to generate the “path ahead” in real time as users move through a scene, rather than producing a static 3D snapshot.

Why It Matters: If AI can spit out navigable worlds from prompts, the cost and time to prototype game content could plummet and that threatens anyone positioned as a paid gatekeeper for creation tools. For consumers, this points to more user-generated and “custom” experiences, but it also raises the odds of a messier discovery landscape where the supply of playable worlds grows faster than quality control. For investors, the selloff is less about what Project Genie ships this quarter and more about what it signals: big tech wants a bigger slice of game creation, not just game distribution.

What to Watch: Watch whether Google expands access beyond U.S. AI Ultra subscribers and whether developers start treating prompt-built worlds as a workflow layer rather than a novelty demo. Also track the tooling arms race: as “world models” improve the pressure rises on engines and platforms to show what they do that a prompt can’t—yet.
Source: blog.google.com

5. Impossible Foods’ CEO Exits as Plant-Based Hits a Rough Patch

The News: Impossible Foods said Peter McGuinness will step down as CEO on Jan. 30, 2026, ending a nearly four-year run and handing day-to-day leadership to a three-person team: Jason Gao (chief legal and operating officer), Meredith Madden (chief demand officer), and Robert Haas (chief supply officer). McGuinness will stay on the board. The change lands as U.S. plant-based meat and seafood retail sales fell 7% to $1.2 billion in 2024, and plant-based meat sales slipped 7.5% to $1.13 billion in the 52 weeks ended April 20, 2025.

Why It Matters: This reads less like a victory lap and more like a category reset. The plant-based pitch is still wrestling with the basics—price and repeat purchases—so leadership shakeups can translate into slower new-product cadence or a sharper focus on fewer “must-win” items. For investors, the bigger signal is strategic: a three-exec operating structure often means the board wants tighter execution (and maybe tighter costs) while the market is shrinking.

What to Watch: Watch whether Impossible doubles down on core meat alternatives or accelerates its move into adjacent protein products (it recently partnered with EQUII for protein-enriched breads and pastas). Also keep an eye on category data in 2026, if units keep sliding, expect more consolidation and more brand repositioning across the aisle. Plant-based doesn’t need more hype; it needs to be more affordable for more people to “add to cart.”
Source: wsj.com

1. South Africa’s Market Got a Reality Check as Metals Hit the Trapdoor

The News: South African equities sank on Jan. 30, 2026, logging their worst day since April as a sharp selloff in precious metals hammered resource-heavy shares. The FTSE/JSE All Share Index dropped as much as 4.2%, after the market had recently notched record highs fueled by surging metals. Big miners were the epicenter: Valterra Platinum, Northam Platinum, and AngloGold Ashanti each slid 12%+ as the mining complex dragged the broader index lower.

Why It Matters: For investors, this is the reminder that South Africa’s market can behave like a leveraged bet on commodities: when gold and silver reverse, equity “diversification” can suddenly look like “same trade, different wrapper.” It also underlines how quickly positioning can unwind when rates and the dollar narrative changes.

What to Watch: The near-term catalyst is Washington, not Johannesburg: markets are recalibrating after President Donald Trump’s Jan. 30, 2026 nomination of Kevin Warsh to succeed Jerome Powell as Fed chair, a move some investors read as more dollar-supportive—typically a headwind for precious metals.
Source: bloomberg.com

2. Europe’s Gas Prices Jump

The News: European natural gas prices climbed sharply in January 2026, with benchmark Dutch TTF contracts up about 38% on the month as colder weather sped up withdrawals and tightened the market. The rally also got a push from U.S. freeze-driven disruptions: an Arctic blast harmed gas production, underscoring how quickly U.S. weather can ripple into European pricing.

Why It Matters: Low inventories + weather volatility is the classic setup for price spikes, margin pressure, and policy headaches—especially as Europe leans harder on Liquified Natural Gas. And the refilling math is ugly: if storage ends winter low, Europe needs a bigger summer buying spree, which can keep prices firmer for longer and raise the odds of governments stepping in if markets won’t.

What to Watch: Watch end-of-winter storage levels in March 2026 and whether the market keeps pricing summer gas above winter (a backwardation that discourages commercial stockpiling). Also track LNG flows after U.S. cold snaps: they’ve become a direct input to European volatility. Everyone is looking forward to Spring and warmer weather.
Source: reuters.com

3. France Taps French Guiana

The News: France’s Senate voted to pass a bill that would allow oil and gas exploration in France’s overseas territories, defying the government and potentially rolling back a flagship climate policy. The measure—championed by French Guiana lawmakers—now heads to the National Assembly, where it can still be amended or stalled. France banned new oil-and-gas exploration and production licenses in 2017 and set an end-date for domestic production by 2040.

Why It Matters: This is a live test of what “energy security” means in a post-Ukraine, LNG-heavy Europe and how quickly climate policy can get politically negotiable. For consumers, any meaningful new supply from French territories would be years away (and far from guaranteed), so this doesn’t lower near-term energy bills but it can influence longer-run investment, permitting, and Europe’s confidence in supply. For investors, the bigger signal is regulatory: if France backtracks on a world-first ban, it could embolden other jurisdictions to revisit restrictions.

What to Watch: The next catalyst is the National Assembly’s calendar—whether leaders fast-track the bill, rewrite it, or let it die quietly in committee. Also watch the government’s posture: if it stays firmly opposed, expect procedural pushback and a louder fight with environmental groups over France’s climate commitments versus “energy sovereignty.”
Source: reuters.com

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