Rubrik (RBRK) stock is down near $70 after peaking above $89 — but its subscription ARR is still growing over 30%. Here's the reverse DCF and margin math behind why the recovery has stalled. Rubrik (NYSE: RBRK) is one of the smaller names in the cybersecurity sector, operating in the data storage and backup security niche — a category distinct from network security players like Palo Alto Networks and Fortinet, or endpoint security leaders like CrowdStrike. In this excerpt from our Semiconductor ...
Jul 02, 2026•11 min
The memory chip industry has historically been plagued by vicious boom-and-bust cycles, but Micron is taking aggressive steps to rewrite the rules. In this episode of Chip Stock Investor, we discuss Strategic Customer Agreements (SCAs). We break down the "take-or-pay" contracts, explaining how they protect Micron from the sudden order cancellations and double-booking panics that burned the industry in 2022 and 2023. With competitors like Samsung and SK hynix also completely sold out of capacity,...
Jun 30, 2026•17 min
AppLovin stock posted 59% revenue growth and a 70% free cash flow margin in Q1 2026—numbers that look more like cheat codes than a real business. We break down what makes the Axon 2.0 machine learning ad engine so efficient, why AppLovin can scale without a traditional sales force, and how targeted digital advertising has become the clearest ROI story in AI so far. We also walk through management's 10-year growth roadmap—from mobile gaming to consumer, e-commerce, and connected TV—and what has t...
Jun 27, 2026•13 min
In this episode, CSI is cutting through the social media noise to bring you a vintage Chip Stock Investor breakdown of the semiconductor supply chain. Today, we are putting the spotlight on Oxford Instruments, a small-cap UK company that might be a critical bottleneck in the AI data center networking boom. We explore how the industry is scaling up production for compound semiconductors and specifically look at Coherent's breakthrough with six-inch indium phosphide (InP) wafers. From there, we ma...
Jun 25, 2026•15 min
In this episode of CSI Live, Nick sits down with Simon Erickson from 7investing to unpack the latest breakthroughs in high-tech infrastructure. The conversation kicks off with a look at the massive SpaceX IPO and the ambitious potential for building orbital data centers. From there, the discussion shifts to the primary focus: the rapidly evolving world of quantum computing. Simon breaks down how quantum mechanics could solve incredibly complex problems simultaneously, highlighting the projected ...
Jun 24, 2026•32 min
Micron stock gets the full Chip Stock Investor checklist treatment in this Semi Insider Live session. We walk through revenue trends, operating margin, free cash flow, per-share profit growth, and balance sheet strength—then compare Micron's net-cash position to Broadcom's debt-heavy structure to show how to evaluate leverage using debt-to-equity and EBITDA-to-interest coverage ratios. This is Part 3 of our How CSI Invests series, where we break down the exact quantitative framework we use to ve...
Jun 19, 2026•6 min
In this episode of Chip Stock Investor, Nick and Kasey analyze NextPower (formerly Nextracker), evaluating its transition from specialized solar tracking to broader power generation and distribution. The discussion breaks down NextPower's recent acquisitions in power converters, battery electric storage systems (BESS), and industrial maintenance robotics. We also examine the macro environment impacting the solar market, including international competition from Chinese firms like Architec and Tri...
Jun 18, 2026•10 min
Figma's Q1 2026 revenue grew 46% YoY to $333M, with net dollar retention hitting a multi-year high of 139%. But even after its post-IPO slide, the stock still trades at ~75x next-12-month free cash flow. We break down what's driving the valuation gap, why free cash flow per share is still feeling IPO dilution effects, and what Figma needs to prove on profitability as AI disruption looms over creative software. Topics covered: Why Figma's valuation is still rich despite the stock's decline Figma ...
Jun 16, 2026•12 min
Is memory truly cyclical, or has the AI data center boom changed the rules? In Part 2 of the How CSI Invests series, Nick and Kasey tackle one of the most debated questions among semiconductor investors by walking through the investment thesis checklist step that asks: what kind of business cycle does this company actually have? Rather than labeling companies simply cyclical or non-cyclical, the framework breaks businesses into short cycle, long cycle, and non-cyclical categories based on how cl...
Jun 12, 2026•22 min
Flex Ltd., ticker FLEX, surged roughly eighty percent in a single month — and the company hasn't even completed the spinoff that sparked it. Nick and Kasey cover this electronics manufacturing services giant for the first time at Chip Stock Investor, breaking down what drove the run-up, what the proposed spinoff actually is, and whether there is anything left for long-term fundamental investors at today's valuation. Flex is one of the world's largest electronics manufacturing services companies,...
Jun 11, 2026•18 min
Optical networking has spent years as a niche corner of the semiconductor industry. CSI makes the case that the moment for companies like Coherent may have finally arrived — and NVIDIA's two-billion-dollar equity investment in the company suggests the largest chipmaker in the world agrees. Coherent (COHR), is an integrated device manufacturer and base materials supplier specializing in indium phosphide and silicon carbide wafers. Under CEO Jim Anderson, who pulled off a similar business transfor...
Jun 09, 2026•11 min
Broadcom just delivered another strong earnings report for Q2 fiscal 2026, and the stock fell more than ten percent. CSI breaks down exactly why that happened, what it means for long-term holders, and whether anything has actually changed in the fundamental thesis for one of the most important companies in AI infrastructure. Broadcom has compounded its enterprise value at over fifty percent annually for five years. AI semiconductors now represent roughly three-quarters of the semiconductor solut...
Jun 09, 2026•12 min
Ouster ($OUST) just reported $49M in Q1 2026 revenue — up 49% year-over-year — and crossed the 40% gross margin threshold as it shifts toward a fabless model. But the bigger story is product: the new REV8 LiDAR family and L4 Max chip now integrate native color sensing directly into the sensor, developed in partnership with Fujifilm. In this episode, Nick breaks down what that means for physical AI — autonomous vehicles, robotics, and industrial automation — where today's systems rely on costly, ...
Jun 04, 2026•11 min
While the market chased AI names, communications software stocks like Twilio (TWLO) and Bandwidth (BAND) quietly re-accelerated. Here's what the financials actually show — and whether these forgotten names deserve a spot in your portfolio. CSI breaks down two API-layer software companies left for dead after the pandemic era that are now showing signs of fundamental re-acceleration. We analyze quarterly revenue trends, operating profit trajectory, and free cash flow for both — including the key d...
Jun 02, 2026•9 min
Are the Fab 5 wafer fab equipment companies — ASML, Applied Materials, Lam Research, Tokyo Electron, and KLA Corp — still worth buying at today's valuations? CSI breaks down 20 years of revenue data across the five companies that control roughly 70% of annual global fab equipment spending, and explain why 2026 and 2027 are shaping up to be record revenue years — with a potential speed bump in 2028 worth watching. The conversation also covers the wave of creative M&A reshaping the equipment l...
May 29, 2026•16 min
Amphenol (APH) just reported Q1 2026 earnings and the stock sold off — but the revenue numbers tell a different story. In this episode, Kasey and Nick break down every segment of Amphenol's business and ask whether this "boring" semiconductor supply chain stock is one of the better values in AI infrastructure right now. Amphenol is one of the world's largest manufacturers of electrical connectors, cables, antennas, and sensors. It operates across 350 facilities worldwide and sits at the intersec...
May 26, 2026•15 min
Nvidia just reported Q1 fiscal year 2027. The numbers are extraordinary even by Nvidia's own standards. Free cash flow of $49 billion. A nearly 60% free cash flow margin. Revenue guidance implying over $300 billion for calendar year 2026, with some estimates suggesting $400 billion is possible. Next quarter alone: $91 billion in guided revenue. Vera Rubin is beginning to ship and is expected to generate $20 billion in its first six months. And then Jensen Huang said something on the earnings cal...
May 21, 2026•13 min
On the Q1 2026 earnings call for TransMedics, the CEO said something that stopped everyone in their tracks. Major transplant programs, he said, are going to Home Depot and buying YETI coolers to preserve human hearts before transplantation. None of those coolers are FDA-approved. None are validated for that purpose. That is the status quo TransMedics is trying to replace. This is CSI's update on TransMedics following their May 5th earnings report. TransMedics is not a semiconductor company — it ...
May 20, 2026•14 min
Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet, and Meta just collectively committed to over $750 billion in capital expenditure for 2026. They spent $130 billion in a single quarter. That is a 70% increase from what these companies spent in 2025 — and the spending is still accelerating into the second half of the year. The ROI is showing up. Operating margins are expanding across all four businesses. Google Cloud grew 63% year over year. AWS grew 28%. Microsoft Intelligent Cloud grew 29%. Meta grew revenue 33%. T...
May 15, 2026•19 min
In 2000, venture capitalists funded 200 semiconductor companies. By 2015, that number had fallen to single digits. The cost of designing a chip went from $33 million in the late 1990s to over $200 million today, and it takes four or more years to complete. There are not enough engineers. The timelines are too long. The investment risk is too high. Faraj Aalaei has spent three decades watching this problem build. He co-founded Centillium Communications and took it public on Nasdaq in 1997. He co-...
May 14, 2026•47 min
Over a year ago, CSI did a three-part deep dive on co-packaged optics after Nvidia dedicated an entire segment of its GTC keynote to the technology — naming Lumentum and Coherent as the primary beneficiaries. The analysis was right. They did not buy. That mistake is now worth talking about directly. Lumentum just reported fiscal Q3 2026 revenue up 90% year over year. Q4 guidance implies triple-digit year-over-year growth. Nvidia made a $2 billion investment in both Lumentum and Coherent, and sep...
May 13, 2026•10 min
Intel stock is up big over the last year. On the stock price, CSI was wrong — and they are saying so directly. On the business analysis, they are standing firm. AMD is steadily taking data center CPU market share from Intel. The driver is availability — both companies rely on TSMC for their most advanced chiplets, but AMD has used that availability more effectively in a CPU shortage environment where demand is outpacing supply. After AMD's most recent earnings, the trajectory is clear: if things...
May 09, 2026•9 min
Almost nothing in semiconductor land is cheap right now. First Solar might be the exception — and that is worth paying attention to, even if you have never thought of a solar panel manufacturer as a chip stock. First Solar trades at 12.7x forward earnings and 12.7x forward free cash flow. It carries over $2.4 billion in cash with almost no debt. It just reported record Q1 2026 revenue of just over $1 billion, up 24% year over year, with expanding profit margins. It manufactures domestically in f...
May 08, 2026•15 min
Prediction markets have been easy to dismiss as a gambling product dressed up in financial language. That became harder to do when Intercontinental Exchange — the company that owns the New York Stock Exchange — quietly took a 25% stake in Polymarket. And when Robinhood partnered with Susquehanna to acquire a MIAX exchange platform that is already regulated and cleared specifically for prediction markets trading. The finance industry has a long habit of showing up wherever money is moving and tak...
May 07, 2026•9 min
Seagate just reported its best free cash flow in a decade. EPS is up 115% year over year. Revenue grew 44%. Management is calling it a structural shift — the idea that nearline hard disk drives have permanently broken out of their long secular decline thanks to AI data center demand. The numbers are real. The demand from hyperscalers is real. The Mozaic 4 platform shipping at 40-plus terabytes per device is real, and the Mozaic 5 roadmap targeting over 50 terabytes in late 2027 is genuinely impr...
May 05, 2026•14 min
Many investors were not aware of Advantest. This Japanese company quietly controls roughly 70% of the global semiconductor test equipment market — the quality assurance layer that every AI chip, every HBM memory module, and every packaged GPU must pass through before it ships to a customer. As AI chips have gotten more complex and more expensive, the cost of shipping a faulty one has risen dramatically, and the demand for Advantest's equipment has followed. The stock reflects that. Up 450% in th...
May 01, 2026•10 min
Two years ago, Nick called out GE Vernova when the profit margin was still near zero and the company had just been spun off from GE. The thesis was straightforward: free of the conglomerate, management could finally allocate capital productively, margins would expand, and the company would be perfectly positioned for the AI-driven build-out of the electric grid and data center power infrastructure. That thesis has now fully played out. GE Vernova just reported Q1 2026 earnings — nearly $5 billio...
Apr 30, 2026•11 min
Lam Research just reported its best quarter ever — and then guided the next quarter to $6.6 billion in revenue. Wall Street was expecting $6.1 billion. In this episode, Nick and Kasey break down everything that matters from Lam Research's Q3 fiscal year 2026 earnings: the headline numbers, the mix shift toward memory, the advanced packaging growth story, what management's $796 million share buyback at all-time highs is actually communicating, and why Lam has quietly become CSI's largest semicond...
Apr 23, 2026•10 min
Amazon just agreed to acquire Globalstar for somewhere between $11 and $12 billion. The catch: Globalstar did $273 million in revenue last year and has never been consistently profitable. So what exactly is Amazon buying — and why now? In this episode, Nick and Kasey work through the full strategic logic behind the deal, explain what Amazon Leo actually is, and then reveal the small-cap satellite manufacturer sitting directly in the supply chain that some investors haven't found yet. The short a...
Apr 23, 2026•16 min
We've been following Aehr Test Systems since late 2022. We watched it run from a micro-cap to a $3 billion market cap on the back of AI accelerator hype — and we called what was coming next.In this episode, Nick walks through the full picture on Aehr Test Systems (AEHR): what the business actually does today, why the valuation has dramatically outpaced the fundamentals, and why management issuing $60 million worth of new stock into the market is exactly the signal investors needed to see.The cor...
Apr 22, 2026•8 min
