Observations on sectors, markets, and themes — updated weekly.
28 March 2026
The Hormuz closure is not just an oil event — it is a central bank stress test. Japan buys 254 days of oil. India buys 45. That gap is the investment thesis. A framework-first collaboration piece by C Koh & Wong: the SPR buffer table, economy × CB implications matrix, Japan’s strategic position, and asset allocation overlay. Strategy: find the economy that can raise rates slowest.
25 March 2026
Circle listed in February 2025 and ran 150% in six weeks on a massive earnings beat and higher-for-longer rate expectations. Then on 24 March 2026, a Senate draft banning stablecoin yield payments sent it down 20% in a single session. A full post-selloff assessment: the Coinbase trap, the CLARITY Act risk, a multi-scenario DCF, and why the stock is fairly valued at $101 — not cheap.
25 March 2026
The New Mexico jury verdict ($375M) is the first in America to find that Meta knowingly harmed children. The dollar amount barely registers against Meta’s $62B free cash flow. What matters is the precedent — and what comes next. A structured breakdown of the four active legal tracks, a $10–25B aggregate exposure estimate, and where the real unpriced risk actually sits.
23 March 2026
Three weeks into an active US–Iran war, the Strait of Hormuz is effectively closed and Washington is debating seizing Kharg Island — Iran’s primary oil export terminal. I found this ChinaTalk panel sobering: five practitioners (a former NCTC analyst, a Hudson Institute naval strategist, and two operationals with pseudonyms for a reason) lay out why the coercive options don’t work, why Iran has no incentive to negotiate, and why the commodity cascade is already running. No clean exit visible.
22 March 2026
SAP is the world’s largest enterprise application software business — embedded in the financial close, supply chain, and compliance reporting of most Fortune 500 firms. On 29 January 2026, it fell 17% in a single session after missing one cloud backlog metric. The stock is now down 42% from its highs. Was that a rational reassessment, or did the market measure the wrong thing and panic? A full contrarian analysis: moat assessment, financials, AI angle, and conviction scorecard.
21 March 2026
Visa built a $500 billion empire on a deceptively simple chokepoint: the human being in every transaction. The 2–3% interchange fee is not a processing charge — it is a tax on human irrationality. AI agents possess none of those qualities. They will route to the cheapest rail, automatically, every time, at scale.
A full moat assessment applying the Raisini Chokepoint-to-Moat Framework: six dimensions scored, risk register, financial quality snapshot, and investment verdict.
18 March 2026
Around March 17–18, 2026, Publicis Groupe — one of the world’s largest advertising holding companies — sent a memo to its clients announcing it would no longer recommend The Trade Desk (TTD) as a demand-side platform (DSP) for programmatic media buying. This followed a third-party audit of The Trade Desk conducted by FirmDecisions, an independent auditing firm commissioned by Publicis.
Publicis cited several alleged breaches of its master service agreement with The Trade Desk:
Publicis stated: “We engaged the highest levels of leadership at TTD and have been unable to come to a satisfactory resolution… Accordingly, we can no longer recommend The Trade Desk for our clients.”
TTD pushed back forcefully, denying it failed any audit. Its regional spokesperson James Bayes argued the dispute was really about audit scope, not billing misconduct — specifically, that certain data TTD was asked to provide would have violated its confidentiality agreements with other customers and partners, and that it offered workable alternatives. TTD pointed to its independent SOC 1 compliance certification as evidence of its billing integrity.
CEO Jeff Green then took to LinkedIn, framing the dispute in broader industry terms. He argued that some agencies “wave the flag of transparency publicly, but run from it in practice” through practices like programmatic arbitrage and principal-based buying (where agencies buy media as a principal and resell it to clients at a markup, without full disclosure).
The news triggered a significant stock sell-off: TTD shares dropped approximately 13% over two days (about 7.4% on Tuesday and another 5% on Wednesday), and multiple Wall Street analysts issued downgrades. TTD’s stock was already down more than a third from the start of 2026 before this news hit.
In short, this is both a contract/billing dispute and a proxy war over the soul of programmatic advertising — with transparency, agency economics, and platform power all at stake.
Disclaimer: This analysis is for informational and educational purposes only. It does not constitute investment advice, a recommendation, or a solicitation to buy or sell any security. The author may hold no position in the securities discussed.
17 March 2026
Muddy Waters Research published a short report on SoFi Technologies (SOFI) on 17 March 2026, alleging manipulated charge-off rates, unjustified fair value gains, seller-financed sales disguised as asset disposals, and $312 million in unreported borrowings. This is an accusation-by-accusation assessment — testing each claim against US GAAP, accepted neobank practice, and the documentary evidence presented.
14 March 2026
Tower Semiconductor is the world’s leading independent specialty foundry for silicon photonics — the technology moving data at light speed inside AI data centres. As hyperscalers race to deploy 1.6T optical interconnects and co-packaged optics become standard, Tower sits at the critical manufacturing choke point. A deep dive covering business model, competitive moat, DCF valuation, and key risks across three scenarios. Rating: Accumulate. Base case: US$138 (+16%). Bull case: US$193.
13 March 2026
FICO shares are down 48% from May 2025 highs after regulators opened the door to VantageScore competition in mortgage markets. A seven-module contrarian analysis covering business quality, management alignment, sentiment extremes, balance sheet risk, and technical signals. Overall verdict: contrarian case is forming but not yet confirmed. Starter position warranted; full deployment requires technical stabilisation.
March 2026
A structured review of the multi-decade nuclear energy supercycle — the single most compelling infrastructure theme at the intersection of AI power demand, energy sovereignty, and electrification. Three temporal phases, full value chain analysis from nuclear operators through uranium miners to SMR developers, scenario-based valuations, risk framework, and a suggested thematic portfolio construction. Primary source: Ozeco & Felix (Substack, March 2026).
20 March 2026
Welcome to the market notes section of Curious Onlooker. This is where I'll be posting weekly observations on what's moving across global equity sectors — what's rotating in, what's fading, and what the macro backdrop is telling us.
The format will be informal and concise: a few paragraphs on the key themes of the week, which sectors are catching a bid, where risks are building, and anything that's caught my eye from the flow of earnings, data, and central bank commentary.
Check back next week for the first proper note. In the meantime, have a look at the podcasts and reading list.