Nvidia Fails To Excite, SpaceX IPO Revelations, Booze Firms' Sobering Times

NVIDIA reported an 85% year-over-year sales growth for the quarter ending April, projecting $91 billion in sales for the following quarter — above analyst forecasts of $87 billion. Despite CEO Jensen Huang declaring that 'agentic AI has arrived' and announcing an $80 billion share buyback and dividend boost, shares slipped roughly 1% in after-hours trading. Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Robert Lee attributed the muted reaction largely to broader risk sentiment, particularly tied to a potential Samsung strike in South Korea that temporarily dampened the KOSPI index. Lee also noted growing competitive threats from Google, AMD, and Intel, while acknowledging NVIDIA's expanding addressable market in physical AI applications like autonomous vehicles and humanoid robots — though he cautioned that humanoid robot autonomy remains rudimentary.

SpaceX filed publicly for what would be the largest IPO in history, seeking a $2 trillion valuation despite reporting a $4.3 billion net loss in Q1. Bloomberg's Ed Ludlow noted the filing includes a proposal for Elon Musk to hold special super shares requiring voter approval, and that the IPO filing coincided with reports of OpenAI also preparing to go public, setting up a wave of major AI-related public offerings.

Major bank CEOs weighed in on AI's impact on employment. JPMorgan's Jamie Dimon said the bank would likely hire more AI specialists and fewer traditional bankers. Standard Chartered's Bill Winters said the bank would replace 'lower value human capital' with technology, eliminating 8,000 support roles. Goldman Sachs' John Waldron called back-office operations a 'human assembly line ripe for automation.' Barclays CEO C.S. Venkatakrishnan expressed more uncertainty, suggesting AI could enhance rather than reduce headcount in some areas.

On geopolitics, the US-Iran standoff continued with mutual threats of escalation, with Iran warning of retaliation beyond the Middle East and Trump claiming negotiations are in 'final stages.' Industry players told Bloomberg that oil flows from the Middle East won't fully recover until next year even if conflict ends immediately. In the UK, Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced a cost-of-living package including free bus travel for children and suspended tariffs on over 100 food products, though former Sainsbury's CEO Justin King criticized price controls as ineffective.

Bloomberg reporter Jennifer Creary detailed the deepening crisis in the global alcohol industry. Per capita alcohol consumption has declined at a 2% compound annual rate from 2019 to 2025. Gen Z consumers drink less frequently — only 32% drink weekly versus 45% of older cohorts — and engage in practices like 'zebra striping' (alternating alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks). Companies are responding through cost-cutting (Heineken cutting 7% of workforce, Brown-Forman cutting 12%), production pauses (Jim Beam), and consolidation talks (Pernod Ricard and Brown-Forman, Brown-Forman and Sazerac). Non-alcoholic beverages grew at 8% CAGR from 2019–2024. China's decline is also tied to government crackdowns on gifting of expensive spirits like Baijiu.