The Rundown - Stocks Climb After Greenland Tensions Ease, Apple Working on AI Pin

Episode Date: January 22, 2026

Market update for January 22, 2026Follow us on Instagram (@TheRundownDaily) for bonus content and instant reactions.In today’s episode:Stocks rally after tensions around Greenland ease and investors breathe a sigh of reliefApple works on an AI-powered wearable pin and plans a major Siri overhaulWaymo launches its robotaxi service in Miami as expansion acceleratesModerna surges on promising cancer vaccineUbisoft sinks after canceling multiple game projects and shutting studiosSpotify rolls out AI-powered prompted playlists for premium users

Public.com presents the rundown. Your daily market update in under 10 minutes. My name is Zadadmani, and today is Thursday, January 22nd. And today's episode, we'll tell you why the markets are moving past the Greenland drama and now focused on the Supreme Court. We'll also look into Apple's plans to build an AI wearable device and why I'm not a fan. Then stick around to the end of the show to find out the latest AI feature coming to Spotify. We got a great show for you today.

Let's go. Markets had a big time relief rally yesterday and what people are calling the Greenland bounce. The S&P 500 and NASDAQ both jumped 1.2% yesterday after tensions around Greenland cooled off. In a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland yesterday, President Trump said that he would not use military force to take Greenland from Denmark. He followed that up with a true social post. saying that he would not move forward with the proposed tariffs on the eight European countries tied to the Greenland situation. He also said that a framework of a future deal was in place regarding Greenland.

Now, we don't know much details about that framework, but markets didn't really care. Investors were just happy that this Greenland situation didn't turn into a full-blown geopolitical mess. By the way, Trump's speech in Davos was pretty wild, but there was one thing that stood out to me. It's that Donald Trump cares about the Dow Jones. In fact, he basically sees the Dow as the stockman. market. Take a listen. And we have an unbelievable future in that stock market is going to be doubled.

We're going to hit 50,000 and that stock market's going to double in a relatively short period of time. Now, look, to be fair, Trump is almost 80 years old, so I'm not surprised he cares about the Dow. Most boomers consider the Dow to be the stock market. But someone needs to tell him that it's a flawed index with only 30 companies, and then it's price weighted and not market cap weighted and a poor representation of the overall stock market. Anyway, zooming out beyond just stocks, the other thing to keep an eye on is the Supreme Court. The court still hasn't ruled on the legality of Trump's tariffs that were issued under the Emergency Economic Powers Act. Many people thought that we'd have a decision by now, but it looks like that could be pushed into February. On top of that,

though, the Supreme Court is also hearing another case that investors are watching. This one involves Trump's attempt to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook. Oral arguments began this week for this case, and early signs point to the Supreme Court judges citing against Trump and letting Lisa Cook keep her job as Fed governor. So we'll see how that shakes out and that could be an important case when it comes to the Fed's independence. By the way, speaking of the Fed, there is a Fed meeting next week. And while the markets aren't expecting a rate cut, this will likely be a memorable meeting because remember the Fed is facing a criminal investigation by the DOJ, which Jerome Powell famously said is politically motivated. So I'm sure Jerome Powell will get a ton of questions about that.

We'll talk more about that Fed meeting next week, along with all the big time earnings coming up. So it's a great time to get subscribed to the podcast if you haven't already and tune in every day to stay in the loop. Let's run through some headlines. Starting with Apple. Apple is working on an AI-powered wearable pin the size of an air tag that you can clip onto your shirt. According to the information, this pin will have multiple cameras, a microphone and speaker, and wireless charging. I guess the idea here is that the pin would constantly be observing your surroundings and act as an always on AI powered assistant. Now personally, I'm not a big fan of these AI wearable devices. And so far, these devices haven't been a hit. There have been multiple startups that have tried

launching something like this and they've all failed, the most famous one being humane, which was made up of formal Apple engineers. But Apple thinks that they can do it better, which of course they can, but it's not guaranteed to be a hit. Just look at the Vision Pro. I think for Apple, they're trying to fend off competition from Open AI, which is expected to launch their own AI hardware later this year. As for Apple, they're expected to launch their device sometime in 27. Now, for this device to have any shot of being successful, Apple obviously needs to improve their AI tech, which they think they have thanks to their partnership with Google. Apple is expected to release a major Siri upgrade in the spring powered by Google's Gemini models. Apple

is also expected to launch a Siri chatbot similar to ChatGPT and Gemini that'll be built into the iPhone, iPad, and Macs. And then later this decade, Apple is planning to launch AI smart glasses and, who knows, maybe even a robot. You know, as a tech nerd myself, I've learned not to get too excited about this stuff anymore because everything that Apple has been a pretty big disappointment. Apple's lack of AI development is a big reason why they're no longer the most valuable company in the world. Invidia and Google are both worth more than Apple these days.

But maybe this will be the year that Apple turns things around. By the way, Apple is reporting Erniks next week on January 29th, after the market closed. We'll see if they say anything about their AI strategy on that earnings column. And we'll recap everything on the show for you guys. So definitely make sure you guys are tuning in next week. Let's keep it moving and talk about Waymo, the Google-owned Robo taxi service just launched in Miami,

making it the sixth city where Waymo offers fully autonomous rides to paying customers. Now, this rollout is starting small. There's going to be less than 100 vehicles on the road at first, and Waymo will gradually invite riders off the wait list. of nearly 10,000 people. The service will initially cover a 60 square mile area, including neighborhoods like Winwood, Brickle, and Coral Gables, and Waymo says they plan to expand to Miami International Airport soon,

with testing already underway. I can't wait to see the videos of these Waymos navigating the streets of Miami during spring break. Now, zooming out, this is shaping up to be a huge year for Waymo. The company has said it plans to expand into 10 cities in 26, including Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Las Vegas, Orlando, and yes, my hometown of Houston, Texas as well. At the end of 2025, Waymo was operating in five major U.S. cities, including Austin, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Phoenix,

and the San Francisco Bay Area, where they have the largest presence. Waymo continues to build on their head start over rivals like Tesla and Amazon Zoox, which are still trying to prove that their tech can work reliably at scale. You know, I'll be honest, I was someone that was skeptical about Robotaxies two, three years ago, but after seeing the progress that Waymo has made recently, I've become a believer. and I can't wait to try them out when they launch in Houston. Let's talk about some stocks making moves today. Moderna shares are on a hot streak lately after positive five-year data from a cancer vaccine

trial. The study showed that Moderna's experimental cancer vaccine in Tersmuran, when combined with Merck's drug, Ketundra, significantly reduced the risk of death or relapse in patients with melanoma. Now, this was a phase 2-B trial, but the long time. Long-term data is what really matters here. Five years of results gives investors more confidence that this isn't just early height. And if this vaccine works out, this could be a big deal for Moderna.

The company has struggled since the COVID vaccine boom faded. Profits have dried up and the stock lost more than 60% of its value over the past five years. But investors are starting to believe that Moderna may finally have a second act, one that actually makes money outside of a pandemic. The trial data was released on Tuesday and the stock jumped 16% on Wednesday. And it's up another 5% in pre-market trading today. Now, on the flip side, Ubisoft is getting absolutely crushed this morning. Shares of the video game publisher are plummeting after the company announced a major restructuring that includes canceling six video game projects and shutting down multiple studios.

And they warned that the restructuring will lead to an operating loss in 2026. You know, Ubisoft has been struggling for years due to delays, weak launches, and rising development costs. In fact, the stock has lost over 90% of its value. in the last five years, and it's down another 30% this morning. Now, management says the short-term pain will be worth it, and that the company is refocusing on what actually works, which is big open-world franchises like Assassin's Creed. So I guess we're going to see a lot more Assassin's Creed come out of Ubisoft. Now, I haven't played Assassin's Creed in like five years, though, so let me know in the

comment if Assassin's Creed is still any good. Let's wrap the show with the fun fact. Spotify is rolling out a new AI feature. called Prompted Playlists, and it's basically chat GPT, but for making playlist. Spotify will now let premium users in the U.S. and Canada tell the app what they want to hear in plain English, and Spotify will create a playlist around it. Spotify says the AI will build the playlist around the prompt using your listening history, music trends, and cultural context.

You can even set rules like telling it to avoid certain artists or have the playlist refreshed daily or weekly so it doesn't get stale. Now, I'm looking forward to trying it out. Spotify make me a playlist for a good earnings week and maybe also a playlist for a bad earnings week. But yeah, Spotify is leaning more into AI. And honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if very soon Spotify has tools to allow users to make AI generated music. I'm not really sure how I feel about that. I was pretty anti-AI music, but I've heard some banger AI songs recently and I'm starting to change my mind. Let me know in the comments what you guys think of all of this.

By the way, Spotify stock could definitely use some help. Their stock has dropped about 30% in the last. few weeks. Well, all right, guys, that's the rundown for today. I hope you guys enjoyed today's episode. If you did, and you have like five extra seconds, consider giving us a five-star rating on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you listen to your podcast. If you are listening on Spotify, don't forget to vote in today's Spotify poll. Leave us a comment on Spotify. All that engagement really does help us out and it helps other people find the show. Thank you guys so much for listening, watching, and commenting, shout out to Mike and Connor for all the work behind

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