Power Lunch - Alphabet stock continues its surge 11/25/25

Episode Date: November 25, 2025

Alphabet stock keeps rallying. Strategas' Chris Verrone joins to give his market outlook. And what should people be expecting from prediction markets during the first Thanksgiving where they have entered mainstream use? Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Another day of gains for stocks, a shifting leaderboard and an AI and a retail rally despite a souring consumer. Welcome to Power Lunch, everybody. I am Brian Kelly. We'll be back on Monday. Google, going from good to great or even greater, at least in the stock market, Alphabet, hitting another record high. Are they about to win the multi-trillion dollar AI race? We take a close, look at what this might all mean for stocks and the market. Plus, some retailers are rocking, even as consumer confidence is dropping two big chains, both up more than 30 percent today. I'll tell you who. We'll tell you why. All right, everybody, we've got a lot to do on this very busy Tuesday. Remember, markets are closed, thankfully for Thanksgiving. So let us jump right in. We'll kill the music, and we'll take a closer look at the miraculous run from Alphabet. It is at a new record.

Alphabet is up 32% this quarter. Oh, an alphabet has almost doubled in a year. We've also got some new news on NVIDIA with a rather odd internal report and a new tweet. We'll hit that in a moment, but let's start with the Alphabet news and a stock that really just doesn't seem to want to stop at all. Christina Parts and Evelis joining out to kick things off from the NASDAQ. Christina, let's start with Alphabet, a lot of news here, and that stock certainly has responded. Yeah, the first bit of news is the information reporting yesterday that META was considering buying, renting, I should say, Google's TPUs, the tensor processing units.

Just think of it as Google's in-house chips that would pose a threat to NVIDIA. The fact that META is considering using Google as opposed to other competitors like NVIDIA-MD speaks volumes to how well these chips perform. The other bit news is just last week, Gemini 3, that would be Google's large language model came out to rave reviews. And it was trained on Google's in-house chips, TPU. So another hit to NVIDIA. And so this big, I guess, rotation into Google right now, you're really seeing it not only reflected in Google shares, but you're seeing it reflected in Google suppliers like Celestica, TerraWolf, and then away from open-A-I suppliers, too, because of how

Gemini 3 performed to Open AIs chat, GPT. So you're seeing some negative reaction in Core Microsoft, NVIDIA as well. And so there's just this dynamic, and it's crazy how quickly sentiment can shift. What is it, just six months ago? Google was, like, so delayed on their whole AI strategy. And today, they're the number one with their TPU chips that are, you know, going to steal market share away from Nvidia GPUs and that whole narrative. And so you're just seeing a little bit of a rotation.

I got a lot of question. Number one, Terawolf. I love it. Paul Prager, the founder and CEO. Maybe we'll get him on the show tomorrow. That stock's up 8% right now. They seem to have nailed it. He's been on many times.

That aside, in like sort of plain English, Christina, because I am not a mechanical engineer, nor do I play one on TV. What is the difference between a GPU and a TPU? Because I know what a CPU is, but that also dates me. Just think that the TPUs perform very specific tasks, whereas GPUs do more with compute. So they're more advanced. That's why they're more expensive.

They have more memory. But the argument is that you don't necessarily need these super advanced chips with even more memory when you need the large language models to do very specific tasks. So why not get very specific chips? And then why not use in-house chips? So that's what Google's doing. It's an argument to lower the total cost, but still have a performance that compares to invidia chips.

Okay. Does that make sense? Yeah, it does. But here's the question. And if meta is thinking about using Alphabet slash Google's chips, is Alphabet now making semiconductors for other people? Because NVIDIA's job is to build chips and then they sell them to everybody. They make ketchup and they sell them to anybody who wants to throw ketchup on it. Google was just its own thing.

Are they now building semiconductors for other people? I should preface that Brotcom is the designer for Google. So that is the peak of all this. connector of all this and brought com CEO hawk tan actually sits on meta's board so perhaps hawk tan is influencing meta to to use some of google's chips the other thing is that meta spent a lot of money also trying to build in-house chips so many are questioning why would meta want to go and get and rent and then possibly buy google chips the one argument that i've seen is maybe this is all about supplies securing more supply at tsmc the world's largest chip

contractor. You have Nvidia that's talking about demand being through the roof. TSM can't keep up. So then you have Google saying, well, look, we just got another customer, meta. So give us more space. So that is also perhaps an argument that could be made for as to why meta would consider Google. Well, it's also explains why Broadcom, which is, as you point it, the builder, the contractor, if you will. I think Kramer referenced it this morning. That stock's up today, but up 16% in the quarter. I want to switch gears. It was another story out. Kind of a weird story. Came out. yesterday afternoon in Barron's. Others picked up on it. I know you've got the note. Apparently, and if I get anything wrong, Christina, tell me, as I know you will. Invidia put out

some kind of internal, seven or eight page internal memo, effectively reassuring their own employees about their accounting? Reassuring sell-side analysts. Okay. Because they wanted to sift through the noise. So they sent us out. Not internally for the company. When they say internally, it's like for semiconductor analysts, so it's external. Yeah, exactly, for the chip guys. And so many of them got it on Friday evening, some over the weekend. Some sheets were shared over the weekend, and you had people saying this is fake, this is a fake memo, but it's true.

Cell side chip analysts did get a seven-page memo, just going over several points that have been raised as of late. A lot of, you know, concerns about NVIDIA's accounting practices, concerns about about NVIDIA's days of inventory that have increased to 119 days well over the 10-year average, just concerns that perhaps Michael Burry himself has brought up. In that seven-page memo that was sent to sell side guys, there was even a link to Michael Burry's tweet who argued that Nvidia might be fudging the books a little bit with its accounting practices,

arguing that the depreciation cycle for these chips should actually be a lot shorter than the six years that NVIDIA claims. And so it's quite telling when a company that's worth over $4 trillion needs to address these issues, like they don't need to. So that's another argument. I think that is the story. And to add to that, and you forgive me for I'm looking down on my phone to read, Nvidia in the last hour put out this tweet.

We're delighted by Google success. They made advances, blah, blah, blah. Invidia is a generation ahead of the industry. It's the only platform that runs every AI model. done everywhere computing is done. Invidi offers greater performance, versatility and fungibility. Basically, invidia is putting out a tweet saying, good job, Google, we're still the leader. I just find it very odd that a $4.5 trillion company, biggest company in the world, would feel the need to defend itself. I think that's the story. But then could just speak to

the PR team or the CEO and their egos, maybe, and not necessarily the quality of their chips. We know that NVIDIA has been working on their chips well in advance of everyone. They're, you know, they're two generations ahead, even before what's being released in the market. And Google has been working on these TPs for a decade. And they've been around longer than all other hyperscalers when it comes to building in-house chips and only now really getting the recognition that they deserve on financial media outlets. But to your point, why is NVIDIA even bothering to reply? The strength is that the PR team is at least provides more.

You know, conversations for you and I, and they're more responsive to journalists, and they give answers, exactly. I'm not sure that's the reason they would do it. Maybe we should quote Hamlet and Queen Gertrude, and me thinketh thou doth protest too much. I don't know. We're going to leave it there. Christina Parts-Nablest, great discussion right off the top. Let's stay on all of this and more with us. His take on AI, tech, the markets, your money.

Chris Verone, partner in chief market strategy at Stratis. He is one of the top analysts on Wall Street. We are glad to have. See, we said that so you don't have to. See, Chris, so you don't have to put out a tweet and said, I'm actually the best. But do you find this NVIDIA stuff a little odd? Listen, what I find maybe encouraging is that we've taken NVIDIA down 15%

and if anything, the market's gotten broader and has acted okay under the surface. I think that's been maybe the most impressive thing of the last two or three weeks, that you've had this almost rotational weakness where they've hit some of the big weights, but it really hasn't hit the market at large. I mean, if anything, some of the real economy stocks that you would think are probably the better factors of AI down the road are actually starting to perk up here. So I welcome that message.

I think when a stock like Nvidia is down, there's so much narrative fitting after the fact where you start to say, oh, it's down because of this or because of that. I mean, maybe it's crowded positions in weekends. I mean, the stock was 80 bucks. Maybe it's up too much, right? Stock was 80 bucks in April.

They traded it to 200. It's made a lot of people multimillionaires. One of the greatest companies in modern history. We're down 15 off the highs. We're still in a long-term uptrend. Let's see how this responds in the 160, 165s. And that is major long-term support. I do think, as you noted, the fact that Broadcom is making new highs here is still pretty

notable. And in fact, when you look at the rest of the Mag 7, I mean, Apple breaking out here, I think is an important message. Meta Microsoft trying to rally. The market's not that bad. I'm going to compare Nvidia to Brad Pitt. I don't think I've ever done that in my life. And the reason I do that is because when you have a star, the level of Brad Pitt, everything he does makes news.

Brad Pitt eats sandwich, right? Like, that's a headline. And People magazine has like a picture of Brad Pitt eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Invidia's kind of that way now. They're so big, they're so important. They're in more than 700 ETFs. They're, what, 8% of the entire S&P 500. Can you blame anybody, including the financial media?

Maybe you can for picking up on when Nvidia does something or makes a small. amount of news, it's going to be a bigger deal because they are effectively the Brad Pitt of the stock market. Well, you certainly can't blame people. What does it reveal? It reveals where the positions are crowded, where maybe the emotion is most heightened. And I think that's been the story with the stock the entire time. What I think people are missing, though, is like, take, for instance, on Thursday and Friday, you know, Thursday's the big reversal. Invita opens up strong post-EPS. We're up two and a half percent. They sell the market pretty hard. Breath actually was not bad.

And then on Friday, you back it up with 10-1 advanceers to cliners on Friday on what was a good day, but externally wasn't a great day. 10-to-one internals versus declanors. That is a market that's broadening out. That's a market that's going to the real economy. And this is the whole thing with the AI story, and Nvidia in particular.

If this is going to have benefits beyond just the chip companies, it's time for it to show up elsewhere. So I think a very important four, five, six weeks here to see if the market can diversify beyond just the big cap tax and into the real economy techniques. Let's go on that because yesterday the markets popped. The NASDAQ did not close above its 50-day moving average. You know what has. Technically, would you have felt better if it did? Of course for NASDAQ, but you know what has what I think is interesting. And this was true even a couple weeks ago. Russell 1,000 value index was making new highs.

Russell 1,000 growth has not. Very different picture than I think the one that we're used to. And think about what's starting to show up here. The move and consumer discretionary the last couple days. I mean, you talked about it from very depressed attitudes. If you look at any of the sentiment work, U.MISC consumer sentiment is in the, I think, third percentile historically. Actually, that's where you want to be leaning into consumer discretionary

and starting to buy those stocks when sentiment is as depressed as it is. I thought the stand that the KRE, regional banks, have put up over the last couple weeks is important. I think the fact that the homebuilders have started to show some life here, equally important. I think this is a market getting away from the myopic focus just on AI, to a broader message, hey, the real economy is probably okay. So that's an interesting take that you referenced home builders and regional banks because

they're both very interest rate sensitive. I want to show you a Twitter poll that we put up last week. Sure. Okay, so we showed this already. But we asked our viewers, what's going to be the most important thing for the market the next couple of months? Rate cuts, the macro economy, this tariff ruling from the Supreme Court or AI spending. I really assumed, Chris, that AI spending would not only be the number one choice, but with a bullet, like way above everything else. Man, I was wrong. I was the wrongest of the wrong. Fed rate cuts, 32% of our respondents said Fed rate cuts. Would you agree with that? I would. And you know what's interesting is, you know,

all this attention in the last four or five weeks of, oh, is the Fed going to miss the December meeting? What does that mean for the economy? If you look out, you know, looking at, say, June Fed Fund futures or even next December Fed Fund futures, so six months or a year from now, they really never moved that much. They've been hanging out in this three, three and a quarter neighborhood. So whether December was live or not live, we think it is. I do think they cut. I think the market has finally started to move there. But whether it was or it wasn't, June 2026 Feth Fund Futures really never moved that much. I think we're on an easing trajectory and we shouldn't forget that. You know, Brian, the other thing I was doing some work this morning that I don't want to forget,

if you look at how some of the great bubbles have ended, whether it was NIC in 89 or even tech in 99,000, I mean, in 89, JGB yields went from four and a half to eight. Japanese government bonds. Went from four and a half to eight and a half, right? In 99, 2000, U.S. 10-year yields went from four to six. These typically don't end with the Fed cutting and rates lower. I think it's a really important distinction from, say, today, to what we saw in those prior to episodes. I love that.

We'll end it there. It's an optimistic note. And the CME's Fed Watch tool. And we've got Leasman coming up as well. It shows an 85% chance of a rate cut now at the meeting. Chris Ferone, bouncing from topic to topic. We love it. Appreciate it. Have a great day. Happy Thanksgiving. Thank you. Well, I've got some breaking news. The latest monthly Treasury statement is out,

and it's a fresh read on the nation's fiscal health. The aforementioned, Steve Leesford, with those headlines and could probably also talk about the Fed. Steve. Yeah, Brian, thanks for that introduction. The Treasury reporting that the deficit hits an October record of $284 billion, but with a bunch of asterisces. I think that's the plural. The expenses were boosted by a calendar change, moving some stuff into October from November of about $105 billion. So that's also an issue, but they were reduced also less than 5% by the shutdown, some payments they didn't have to make. Revenue was boosted by delayed payments from California. Remember, they delayed the requirement that certain payments, corporate tax payments and other payments due because of the wildfire.

So we got a bunch of that in, so that changed the numbers. Custom duties, I don't think there's an asterisk on this one. They reached an all-time record for any month at $33 billion. So do the math, that's about $400 billion per year in tariff revenue coming in. The previous high was last month of $29.6 billion. Now, another thing on the other side grossed interest on the public debt, increasing by $22 billion to $104 billion in October compared to $82 billion last October. It was an all-time record for an October, but not for any month due to increased debt outstanding

as well as higher inflation accrual. Brian, just a little note. This report itself was delayed by the shutdown. It should have been out a couple weeks ago. Okay. Can I pivot quickly? You just heard our conversation? How much have expectations?

Just keep your one foot, keep your foot down and then pivot so you don't get called for traveling. I get called for everything, mostly double dribble and ups and downs because I've got a four-inch vertical. Steve, how much has the Fed rate cut check? chances. How much have they pivoted in the last couple of days? See what I did there? Okay. So before John Williams spoke, the probability of a rate cut was 33%. And we had been talking to a lot of the Hawks out there. They had been talking a lot. And then John Williams came forward and said he thought the Fed needed to cut in the near term, which everybody took to mean December. And also everybody took to mean, hey, that was reflecting the view of Fed Chair Powell because, hey, he's the

president of the New York Fed, and oftentimes there's no daylight between them. So now I'm at 76%. I don't have the 85 that you were talking to, but we use the definitive numbers. You can be talking about CME, but yes, it's a big deal. It has moved substantially and very forcefully in favor of a rate cut. Substantially and forcefully, yeah, whatever the numbers are, they've certainly gone up. Steve Leesman, appreciate it. Thank you very much. And folks, with that change in forecasts, comes a move in the bond market as well. The 10-year yield earlier today briefly below 4%.

It's exactly at, well, that's the two years. The 10 years, look at that. It's exactly if you're on the radio, it's 4.000%. Not exactly counting out to pie, all the digits, but a lot. It's exactly at 4%. First time in nearly a month we saw a brief drop below 4%. that little drop that we've seen, reverberating kind of across Wall Street, shaping everything from mortgage rates, tech valuations, regional banks.

You heard Chris talk about it, home builders as well, inflation, the Fed's next steps, all that stuff kind of now in play with that expectation for a rate cut on the December 10th meeting. Again, kind of circle with a red sharpie that meeting. Oh, by the way, one also wonders, when will we get a full announcement of a Federal Reserve chair candidate. Kevin Hassett, according to some reports, maybe leading now. We've got Michelle Bowman, Rick Reader of BlackRock, Chris Waller, who's a Fed governor now, Kevin Warsh. We've got two Kevins. So you're Kevin one, Kevin two, whatever alphabetical order, former Fed governor. Could also be a surprise candidate, but Kevin Hassett, maybe the leading candidate right now

could get that announcement prior or at the meeting from the president. All right, coming up. this mystery sector is hopping, even as the data around it is dropping. All right, this may be one of the weirdest moves all day. Retail stocks, most of them, rocking today. The XRT, big retail ETF, soaring over 4%. You got coals, Abercrombie and Fitch, they are soaring. They're both over 30% today after reporting stronger than expected results for the third quarter. Coles, a 52-week high, posting a surprise profit there.

Abercrombie and Fitch, apparently their Hollister sub-brand doing well. I don't know, even as consumer confidence didn't come in well. Let's talk about it all with Courtney Reagan joining us on set. I think it's, I'm not saying it's a weird move because the stocks are up because they posted good results. it's that the consumer confidence number came in lousy, and retail's rocking. I know, because it's always a consumer say one thing, but what they do is something different. If you ask someone, how do you feel about your finances? How do you feel about the economy?

They always say terrible, awful. Right. But when you say, are you going to buy Christmas presents for your kids for Christmas? Of course. Christmas always comes. And so when you look at what the CEOs of all these companies are saying, very specifically, the Cole CEO, Michael Bender, says, consumers are choiceful. This is a word they're all using.

But he said, they're value-seeking beyond price. So it's not just about what something costs, but you have to provide me value. Is that item going to fit my needs? And the Dix executive chairman, for instance, says, you have to, consumers are willing to pay up if that product improves my performance. If it's a bat that's going to make the ball go further. Some of those bats of Dick's sporting goods, by the way, hundreds of dollars selling like hotcakes. Yes. You know?

My son plays a little league. Right, exactly. So you know, right? I mean, if you need a product like that, there's innovation. and it gives you value. Whatever value means to you beyond price, you're going to pay. The point you made is so important because all these surveys, like when people ask about their economy, they say it stinks

because most people always say that. Right. They would almost everybody except for like seven billionaires would like to have more money than they have right now. So I get it. More important question, what does choiceful mean? Is that a new word? Yes, it's a word that retail executive.

How are you feeling this holiday season? Well, I'm choiceful. I know. It's a word retail executives have been using for maybe about a year now. Pretty frequently target uses it. Coal's CEO is using it. It basically means discerning. Sort of, you know, I'll buy when it works for me.

So I'm not just going to spin frivolously. I'm not going to buy anything. What are you going to have for dinner? I don't know. I'm being very choiceful. I know. We all kind of laugh at it. You know what coal should use? They can use this.

And they should, Coles, if you're out there, you're welcome. What do you do? I'm getting coals in my stocking. Oh. That would be a good thing. So if they're doing so great, and I thought Abercrombie was struggling, I guess. No, to be fair. To be fair.

Coles is doing better than they had been. They've had three quarters of progressive growth. They're still struggling, right? Their comparable sales are still down year over year. But under CEO Michael Bender, who is now permanent, he was interim as of May 1st, shares are up something like 215%. Some of that is, as you know, hedge fund stuff, short selling. We did have.

That's not the core business. And over the summer, there was one day that was a little straight. with retail activity, really showing that the stock was surging. But my point is, yes, they're doing better. They're not doing great. And Michael Bender told me this morning, he's pleased, but he's not satisfied. He's got some progress. To your point, Abercrombie, Hollister doing great.

The Abercrombie brand is struggling, had some inventory missteps. They're working through that. Is the teen back? I guess the baggy clothes look is back, right? Is at leisure dead? No. Because I see a lot of people wearing baggy clothes, which as a, you know, a husky individual, I prefer. Yes, so Athlete is not dead

I'm not going to comment about that That's dangerous territory But yeah, the younger kids often You see pretty low-rise, baggy pants It's like the vanilla ice look I have to correct you in one small way Abercrombie, the main brand Is actually not geared at teens anymore

Hollister is okay Abercrombie is not It's actually more upper 20s Lower 30s Those are teens to me Oh The point is It's really gone under a really big

transformation under Fran Horowitz. And it's very different that it was when he was in the 90s. So I just have to clarify that. Yeah, when they used to have like shirtless models. You said it. I mean. What shirtless models? Did you notice the shirtless models then?

The male model. I had a boyfriend or two. Shortless male models. I want to make sure. A boyfriend or two that was employed by that retailer. What's the mall in Dayton? There's several. Dayton malls.

What was like the big one? Dayton Mall, the Fairfield Mall that opened. Courtney is from Dayton, Ohio. if you did not know, Centerville High School, my wife, until competing high school, named Oakwood. Setterville, go Elks. Go Lumberjack. End of story. Courtney Reagan.

By the way, blessed Thanksgiving and a great Black Friday. I'll enjoy watching you for the comfort of my baggy pants. I was just one. Sit at home doing nothing. Oh, Courtney, thank you. Thanks, Brian. All right, coming up, let's just say you think parts of this market are in an AI bubble or maybe overvalued.

Where do you put your money right now? We'll talk about that in Market Navigator. All welcome back time now for your market navigator. And let's talk about what to do with your investments. If you think we may be in some kind of AI-related stock bubble or maybe just a little bit overvalued on the tech side. Well, Chris Burgatti has some ideas. He is chief investment officer at SWBC. And he joins us now.

Chris, great to have you on. See, I said that. I need disappeared. It's like I'm a, I feel like David Blaine. I just do it and they vanish. This is a stock that we don't talk about a lot, but we should talk about more because they're kind of big and well known in every nation. Coca-Cola.

What does Coca-Cola's play with you? Well, it's kind of basic in terms of sometimes the best offense is a good defense. And Coca-Cola sits right in the middle of the defensive sector of consumer staples. So if you want to look at what's happened over the past month when the bubble concerns started to rise. We've seen that the tech sector and the S&P 500 is dipped. Coca-Cola has actually gone up in price over the past month. Yeah, it's up about 15% so far this year, 16% as of today to be specific. Our graphics has the anti-AI playbook. Is this only sort of an inverse AI play, Chris,

or is it possible you buy Coca-Cola along with the other stuff? Oh, I certainly think it's an along-width play. I mean, Coca-Cola is a great stock to have in your portfolio. You got a nice just below a 3% dividend, which is a great thing to have in a portfolio. And if you're going to kind of marry that with a little more techie play and get a little more boost from tech, you really have a balanced portfolio structure if you're looking at something like that. It's just a smart way to play the market. Yeah, it's the most drunk or I think soda or one of in the world.

It's kind of the, I don't know, the Nike of sodas, if you will, for lack of a better term. And I don't mean in terms of performance, I just mean in terms of name brand. brand. Why doesn't Coca-Cola get more attention? Why doesn't it get more love? Why isn't Coca-Cola a stock that we and others talk about more than we do? I think it comes down to the fact that it's just kind of plain vanilla. I mean, it's a great brand. It's great marketing strategy. They're the market leader in their segment. So it's just not sexy. It's not exciting to talk about Coca-Cola from that standpoint. But if you're looking for excitement in terms of just steady gains in your portfolio, Coca-Cola can deliver that. Coca-Cola can deliver. It has delivered this

year. By the way, does anybody, is there a vanilla Coke? I think there is a vanilla Coke. Is there not? Chris. I think there is. So it's the double entendre's well taken. Chris Burgatti, SWBC, Chris, have a great Thanksgiving. Thank you very much. Meantime retail traders, they're pacing

for a record year of buying, but where exactly are they putting that money? Gunjin Banerjee of the Journal is up next on set with just that. All right. We have got two days, a day and a half, really, until the Thanksgiving holiday. We had a big day yesterday in the follow-through buying. It's coming through today, particularly in small caps. The Russell 2000 up another 1.7%. It was up 3% the other day. And in fact, the small-cap stocks have been the greatest performing subsector of the market in the last couple of days.

Again, just a couple of days. Doesn't make a trend. But the buyers have broadened out. what they are buying. We talked about at the top of the show with Chris Verone, and we're seeing people sort of spread out their trades. It's not just seven or eight tech stocks they're buying. They're now going in to small caps. We'll see if that continues. The other trend the last couple of weeks has been crypto, contripto,

really the last six weeks or so, kind of out of favor with investors. Black Rock spot Bitcoin Exchange traded fund. It's having its worst month ever, according to facts that data. The I shares Bitcoin Trust ETF saw more than $2 billion in outflows. So far this month, all this is Bitcoin is down about 20% in that time. But even as crypto outflows are going up, it has still been a record year of buying by so-called retail investors. Those are investors that are buying for their own money, they're not big investment firms, or hedge funds are doing it for themselves.

Let's talk more now about what is going on. Gunjin Banerjee is the lead writer for Markets Live at the Wall Street. Journal and, of course, a CNBC contributor. Gungent, great to have you on. Happy Thanksgiving, by the way. Happy Thanksgiving. What are the retail investors investing in? I think it's really been the year of the retail investor.

We have never seen them quite as active as they are in markets this year. Everyday Americans, mom and pop investors, they've been pouring into broad-based ETFs, think spy, right, the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF. They've been buying gold. They're even sticking with the A&PHA. trade, which I think is really interesting because we are seeing some doubts creep in among institutional investors about how long this AI frenzy can continue. But individual investors, they are sticking with the AI trade, and they're sticking with

the stock market. We are seeing purchases track 50% above levels last year. I'm afraid to ask this question because I think I know what you're going to say. Are retail investors leveraging up? They are. And I feel like every time I talk to you, there is more and more leverage in the system. And we saw the downside of that in the market over the past few weeks, right, where a lot of these crypto leverage trades started rippling into the stock market and causing volatility there. But leverage take at brokerage accounts crossed $1.1 trillion recently.

That's the highest level in records going back to the 1990s. And I want to be clear, if you, and I'm not advocating anybody, borrow money or take leverage to buy equities or whatever, but they've made money. They've worked. I mean, these people, for the most part, with the exception of the April tariff lows and the recent, rattling we saw, would imagine these highly leveraged retail traders have done very well. And I think that's why a lot of them have stuck to these leveraged ETFs throughout the recent volatility. Assets in those funds crossed $140 billion recently. However, that's a trade that works until it doesn't work, and we saw it blow up with crypto recently. And for stocks,

we just haven't quite seen that test yet, but those leveraged crypto trades have not fared well over the past month. Do we know, and I hate to put you on the spot, but do we we know if the people buying crypto are the same people buying specific stocks? Do they overlap? Well, crypto is popular with a lot of individual investors, right? And they're feeling the brunt of that right now. However, if you've stuck to the stock market, I think individual investors walking into Thanksgiving weekend with their families, a lot of them are feeling pretty good about the market, right? If they've been careful about the level of speculation they're doing in markets this year, they're up, what, 15% on the S&P 500? Yes, and that is great. And we want everybody to

make money, not lose money, and you can sit around the table at Thanksgiving. You can brag to your family how smart you are. But if you had bought most other global markets in the world in U.S. dollars, you've actually done better than just buying the S&P 500 here. That's fair. It's been a global reflation. It has. But take a look at the returns in the U.S. market the past two years. I mean, we're at 15% this year. That's after two years of blockbuster returns. That was the best two years for markets in a quarter century. So if you've owned the U.S. market, I don't think you can complain. A lot of individual investors do. So I think the shorter Gungian headline is a lot of people are going to be bragging around

Thanksgiving. And maybe rightfully so, around the Thanksgiving table, right? I think so. I think so. Because they've done well. When you see a change, let us know. We'll get you back on because we want to know if people are starting to dump out of certain things. Well, I think they are dumping some of those hot momentum stocks. Think micro strategy. right? Think Robin Hood stock. Think Palantir. Those are down double digits in November. So a lot of those retail favorites have gotten crushed. But that buying in broader ETFs has persisted. There have been 10 consecutive weeks of inflows into U.S. ETFs. 10 consecutive weeks of inflows. We love it.

Goingen. Thank you very much. Have a great day. All right, let's get now to Contessa Brewer for a CNBC News Update. Hi there, Brian. President Trump said today a deal to end the war on Ukraine is getting very close. U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll met earlier today with Russian officials in Abu Dhabi to discuss a U.S. Pact peace proposal. The President of the European Commission said Secretary of State Marco Rubio participated in a call with the Coalition of the Willing today. Coalition of the Willing. He says that was to discuss negotiations. And she says countries called for continued financial pressure on Russia through sanctions. A group of 20 mostly Democratic-led States are suing the Trump administration to reinstate more than $3 billion in funding to

homelessness programs. They argued the Department of Housing and Urban Development changes could jeopardize housing for some 170,000 people. HUD did not immediately comment. Brazil's top court rejected an appeal from former President Jair Bolsonaro today and ordered him to begin serving his 27-year sentence while in police custody. He's convicted of plotting a coup after losing the 2022 presidential election. Bolsonaro was arrested this weekend for tampering with his ankle monitor while on house arrest. We'll continue to watch that story unfold, Brian. All right, Contessa Brewer, thank you very much. All right, on deck, the insane, eye-opening amount of money now flowing into the so-called prediction markets.

Let's talk about sports because, you know, on Thursday, it's going to be about family and friend and Thanksgiving and turkey and, oh, yeah, sports betting. In fact, there are three big games. You've got the Packers at the Lions, the Chiefs at the Cowboys, and the Bengals at the Ravens. Actually, all these games really, really matter. So let's talk more about sports and betting and also the prediction markets, kind of the NKOTB. new kids on the block in sports betting. Alex Sherman, Sports and Media Reporter, on set with us here. Big games.

How much of this money is now going to some of these prediction markets? And not the fan duels of the world. It's growing, and it's growing by the month. So this really was a category that was started earlier this year by Kalshi. And Piper Jaffrey just came out with an analyst. You can see it on the screen here. 9.75 billion dollars in volume estimated for this month, which would be 15% month over month,

driven in large part by the estimation of what is about to happen this weekend with those three football games you saw. And there's an interesting wrinkle about why this particular Thanksgiving is going to be so popular in the prediction markets beyond just the newness of this category. Take a listen to what Piper Sandler's Patrick Molley said about his expectations for this weekend.

This is going to be a big week for prediction markets. You have three NFL games that are going to be played on Thanksgiving. Three of the teams that are playing are in states where sports betting is illegal. And what we've seen so far in the NFL season is that when you have a team that's in a market where sports betting is illegal, we see a volume bump. So there are 30 states today that have legalized sports online betting. So that means 20 states have not. Well, guess what two of those states are? Missouri and Texas, and the Kansas City Chiefs play the Dallas Cowboys in that middle game.

Also, by the way, Wisconsin hasn't legalized. And the Chiefs actually play Missouri, do they not? They do. Despite being called the Kansas City, the Kansas City, Missouri. Yes, a lesson on Kansas City. I know, it's a geography lesson as well. So let me ask you this, if sports betting is illegal, I can't access Fandul or Draft Kings or Golden Nugget, whatever it is. Can I bet on the game via Kalshi or Polymarket?

Don't call it betting. But yes, you can. Wager? You can invest in a category. It's funny, you know, the Kalshi CEO, Tariq Mansour said earlier this year, if you call this gambling, then you've got to call the whole financial system gambling. What we're doing is more like zero-dated options. It's a yes or no.

Kansas City wins. Kansas City loses. It's a binary. It's a coinflip. You need a buyer and a seller for every contract. They're not like a bookmaker. There is no odds that they're setting, but there are a few different of these contracts

that you can buy with yes, no outcomes, such as an over under. In other words, will 51.5 points be scored in this game higher or lower, yes or no, above or below? Same deal with the spread. Because that's so much different than Fandul's. Will 51.5 points be scored? I mean, what's the damn difference?

Darn. Does this sound like a loophole to you, Brian Sullivan? I think it may be a little. loophole. But guess what? It is a currently legal loophole that is now a natural product. I think this loophole shall be closed at some point. Well, in the meantime, all of

the books themselves are losing volume. There's a good chart we have. Just take a look at the Robin Hood graph of Stockchard over the past year versus the Draft Kings stock chart. You will see Robin Hood spiking forward and Draft Kings pretty much

has plateaued. Why? Because you can bet on Kalshi through Robin Hood. So that stock has soared. So if I, and I'm just speculating wildly here, because why not? If I'm the lobbyist or one of the lobbyists for Fandul, for MGM, for Draft Kings, for the sports gaming industry, I am on Capitol Hill right now. I'm having lunch with a senator or congressperson's chief of staff's assistants, Butler, to try to convince that person to make a law that changes that loophole that you just referenced. And there's certainly people doing that. In the meantime, the draft kings, the fan duels, the fanatics themselves are saying

we want in to the prediction market. So all of those companies are planning on launching their own versions of this in the next month, two months coming up. I mean, it's happening soon, real time. So right now, Kalshi is the only game in town in the United States. Polymarket is legal in other countries. So polymarket wants in here too. So as the legality of this gets tossed around and the CFTC decides whether or not they want to weigh in on it because it's technically a futures contract market. The betting companies themselves say, we're not just going to sit here on our hands and do nothing. We want into this too because all you need to do is look at where the volumes are going. I'm looking right now. Do you know Kalshi, pro football champion, two choices.

The Los Angeles Rams at 19% or the Eagles of Philadelphia at 14%. This is interesting. Right. So yes or no. And they'll say this is not gaming. This is just. a zero dated option, zero dated option. Or something like that. Something like that. I love that. But great games on Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving, Alex, even though I might see tomorrow. Who knows? Yeah. We're on the term pike. All right, we're heading into year-in, and Wed Bush's Dan Ives out with his top 10 tech names to own a lot of tease. We're back right after this. All right, Wed Bush's Dan Ives out with a new note arguing that we are not in an AI bubble. We're actually in the very early days of the AI Revolution, and him and his firm remaining firmly bullish on tech stocks heading into year-end,

despite, of course, some bearish views. So Dan and his team coming out with 10 different names that they say are sort of must-own for the AI Revolution. There's a lot of well-known names on the list, but let us walk you through it. All right, here we go. Top 10 tech stocks to own for the AI Revolution. Should we go backwards? Let's do it.

10 to 9, right? Palo Alto is number 10. crowd strike is number nine, alphabets number eight, it's been the hottest stock in the world the last couple of months, meta up seven, apples at six, Tessels at five, advanced microdevices at four, Nvidia, only coming in at three on Wed Bush and Dan Hives list, Palantir, number two, and number one, not Nvidia, top 10 tech stocks to own for the AI revolution is Microsoft. I think Microsoft, maybe the best position. best name tech stock, certainly out there.

So there is your top 10 list. Again, Microsoft Palantir, NVIDIA, MEPT, Tesla, Apple meta, alphabet, crowdstrike, Palo Alto, some ladies jumping, maids milking, partridges and pear trees. And don't miss Dan Ives. He's coming up on closing bell overtime. No doubt, diving more into that list as well. Dan, coming out of a shell and coming on closing bell overtime today. All right, 2025, shaping up to be a very good year.

for stocks and hopefully your money. But what do you need to watch out for in 26? We're not done with our lists. We've got J.P. Morgan's big risks for next year. Next. Before we let you go, I want to highlight one of the top stories on CNBC Pro because while this year's been a great year for stocks here and around the world, J.P. Morgan Chase says next year, much murkier.

One reason escalating tensions between the U.S. and China to find out some of the other big risks from JPM. You can scan that QR code on your screen right now or take advantage of CNBC Pro's special offer. Scan the QR code on your screen or head over to CNBC.com slash pro for a limited time opportunity, folks. Markets are doing well.

We'll see what happens at the final hour of trading. But I'm going to leave that closing bell, which begins right now.