Nvidia may shine again when it announces on Wednesday

Nvidia is having a strange fiscal year — Wednesday's report will be for the fourth quarter of its 2024 fiscal year, which ended on January 29. Since a year-over-year comparison of quarterly results would be too extreme, here's a look at the past four fiscal years' quarterly results, along with consensus estimates among analysts surveyed by FactSet for the quarter to be reported on Wednesday. Sales figures in millions.

Nvidia's quarterly sales rose during the quarter ended April 30, and have accelerated since then. For the quarter that will be reported next week, year-over-year sales growth should once again be incredibly high. But analysts expect sequential Quarterly sales growth slowed to 12% from 34% in the previous quarter.

is reading: Nvidia is expected to be the best performer in the S&P 500 through 2025, according to this measure.

Analysts' estimates were conservative, because even “super-scalers” among data center operators were “buying whatever GPUs they can get,” Ken Laudan, portfolio manager of the Buffalo Large Cap Fund BUFEX BUIEX, said during an interview with MarketWatch on Thursday.

He expects 2024 to be another year in which “AI enablers,” or companies that make graphics processing units and related equipment such as Nvidia and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., flourish.

TSM

,
Cloud service providers (Microsoft Corp.

MSFT

,
Amazon.com Inc

Amzn

And the alphabet

Google

) will continue to dominate AI-related investing.

Laudan expects the focus of building AI to shift to “AI adapters” in 2025 or later. He described this group as “software-focused companies that sell a broad AI model in addition to their own vertical software stack to their customers.” These may include companies such as Adobe Inc.

ADBE

,
Service Now Company

now

,
Salesforce.com company

Customer relationship management

,
MongoDB

MDB

And Snowflake Company

snow

,
He said.

More Nvidia coverage:

• Nvidia reveals its positions in SoundHound AI, Arm – and these other stocks
• Barron's: How Nvidia is playing Apple's game so much faster

warning: Bullish bets on Nvidia and other 'Magnificent Seven' members near their busiest levels of last year

A different play for artificial intelligence: Cisco could be a latecomer to significant revenue generation from AI

Lyft's (corrected) numbers look good — and Uber makes a big move

On Tuesday, Lyft.

Lyft

It announced fourth-quarter results, which included a typo in the company's forecast for 2024. An initial rally after the sale sent shares up as much as 60%, but that gain was pared when Lyft issued a correction.

But Lyft shares rose 35% on Wednesday, before rising another 16% on Thursday. The stock is up 27% for 2024 through Thursday, but it's been a very long ride, as you can see in this year-to-date graph of the stock's returns and those of rival Uber Technologies Inc.

Uber

:

Bill Peters analyzed Lyft's results.

Lyft may have made a reporting error due to overuse of terminology, as Therese Politi explained.

Uber also made a big splash this week, announcing a $7 billion stock buyback program, the company's first step in reducing its share count.

more: Uber 'just starting to flex its core muscles': Can other gig economy players keep up?

The alarming estimates underscore the importance of saving, planning and long-term investment

Brett Arends looked at two formal studies and two sets of estimates about how likely people are to develop dementia late in life, and even the most conservative set of numbers was alarming. Here's a look at the estimates and potential financial consequences.

More from Brett Arends:

• Consumer price index? who cares? That's why I like my inflation-protected bonds.
• Do Trump's NATO comments pose a risk to international stocks — and your 401(k)?

Retirement questions

In her Help Me for Retirement column, Alessandra Malito had suggestions for a 60-year-old trying to decide whether or not to withdraw $250,000 from her 401(k) to pay off her mortgage.

More help: I am 58 years old, make $4400 a month and want to retire at 60. Is this possible? Do I really need to replace 80% of my income?

Signs of recovery in the IPO market

High interest rates have dampened the market for initial public stock offerings in the past year, with fundraising by venture capital firms declining. But there are now signs that trading volume is on the rise, as Steve Gelsey reports.

Different way to go public: DWAC rises more than 15% as it moves to buy Trump Media & Technology Group — but there's a potential snag

Big move

In the Big Move column, Aarthi Swaminathan runs through the numbers with readers making decisions about buying or selling homes:

• We rent our $750,000 house at a 2.5% mortgage rate for $4,000 a month, but the tenant is leaving. Should we sell now or later?
• We are in our 60s, retired and making $300k in passive income. We want to buy a house for our daughter. What could go wrong?

Here's more real estate market coverage:

Contrasting play

Mark Hulbert scanned investment letters to determine their favorite industry in the stock market right now — you might be surprised.

Another thing for contrarians: Growth stocks outperform value by the widest margin of all. Why that could change soon.

Moon launch and stock binary event

Intuitive Machines Inc. shares.

Loner

Intuitive Machines shares rose 15% on Thursday, following the successful launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying what is expected to be the first American commercial spacecraft to land on the moon and the first American landing there since 1972. Intuitive Machines built the Nova lander- C, which is expected to land near the moon's south pole next week.

James Rogers has been covering the mission's milestones since launch.

Financial crime – high profile

Lucas I. Albert writes the financial crimes column. This week he told the story of Manny Chulpiev, who managed to continue his criminal activity for many years while working as an informant for investigators and prosecutors.

More from Lucas I. Albert:

• The lawyer who beat up Trump twice will make a fortune doing so
• The checks that led to Trump's first criminal prosecution in the “hush money” scandal.

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