ChainLink: The Amazon Web Services Collaboration Could Accelerate Growth

In the two decades that I've been writing about stocks and finance, the main thing that I've learned is that readers just want a hot stock tip. I've also learned that I'm not qualified for dishing out short-term price targets. That's because they don't work for me, or most prognosticators. The only sources that are backed up by successful outcomes in the momentum tranche of investing are Seeking Alpha's Quant Ratings and Investor's Business Daily's CANSLIM method. Both have terrific track records. The caveat with both of these techniques is that you must be tethered to your smartphone or computer to be able to fully capitalize on their investing suggestions. Although the majority of people are online 24/7 these days and may be able to take advantage of these services, I've been schooled in value investing and tend to take a less active approach to my finances.

A few months ago I wrote about cryptocurrency ChainLink (LINK-USD) and how I believed that the depressed price was great for accumulation. Here's a link to that article which covers a lot of background information about the company and crypto in general. The price has hovered around $9 for almost three months and I've been adding to my position in the Grayscale ChainLink Trust ETF (GLNK), a spot price ETF, to dollar cost average down. It was selling for $30 six months ago.

I'm slightly underwater on the investment and lag the S&P 500, but believe that if I'm patient, I'll reap the rewards. At the worst, I'll double my investment in four years which will be better than an investment in the S&P 500 based on historic trends. If the development of WEB 3.0  continues, and the tokenization of everything financial accelerates, then I've got a potential ten bagger on my hands. With the advent of social media forums such as Stocktwits and Reddit's Wall Street Bets (RDDT), ChainLink could even become a meme crypto. It happened five years ago, and lightning could strike once more.

In the altcoin bull market five years ago, it was all crypto hype. Now we're talking about real world use cases. Two weeks ago, Amazon Web Services "AWS" (AMZN) adopted ChainLink for their cloud service. Although many small and bootstrap organizations utilize AWS, it's the corporate behemoths that are the big game for ChainLink. The partnership legitimizes DeFi applications much the same way that AOL's purchase of Time Warner in the 1990s solidified the Internet era. It's not an apples to apples comparison, but you get the drift. 

Industry experts believe that other hyperscalers such as Google Cloud (GOOG) and Microsoft's Azure (MSFT) will offer similar decentralized data solutions. This could propel market wide adoption of Decentralized Finance. It's only good news for ChainLink. ChainLink is secure. AWS is secure. It's a nice combination. It's also primarily what the Fortune 500 looks for when deciding on a software package. I am not alone in my belief in this, but we are in the midst of the fourth industrial revolution. The current era amalgamates  A.I., robotics and Web 3.0 which is the tokenization of all things analog to digital. ChainLink is the bridge that converts off-chain assets into digital assets. Stocks, bonds, options and real estate are all becoming tokenized at an accelerating rate. 

The graph above (provided by Wiseway Tec), gives you a ballpark figure of the type of growth we are dealing with. If you search for tokenization of real world assets, the Internet is rife with charts and graphs all coming to the same conclusions - this is where the action is going to be for growth investors. Right now, we have a unique opportunity to buy ChainLink as a token or as a spot-price ETF as a value investment. Value investments tend to sit, then run. Currently, ChainLink is in neutral. I'm taking a page from the Warren Buffett playbook and accumulating while the price is down. It's a Mr. Market situation if you follow the teachings of Benjamin Graham. Prices are low right now so Mr. Market is in a bad mood and gives a great price to purchase the shares. I don't think it will take more than a year for ChainLink to get in gear. It's not if, it's when. I'm prepared to wait. 

Under the Bridge

There's an old Rodney Dangerfield routine that goes something like this:  "He worked for the bank for 30 years, Vice President - very adjusted man...church goer, never smokes, drinks or, gambles. Then you read about these guys. One day they pick up an axe, and wipe out the whole family. The next day the cops come around, 'What happened here? What kinda man was he?' 'He was a quiet man, a very quiet man'."

Because of the political dichotomy in the country, the majority of Americans stay silent, yet boil under the surface, ready to explode. We're in an environment where the preponderance of people can't say anything anymore without getting shouted down by the fringe minorities of both sides. The politically correct Left will shut you down if you aren't woke enough. The MAGA (Make America Great Again) Right acts like guests on the defunct Jerry Springer Show. Although many members of the GOP aren't "deplorables" as Hillary Clinton referred to them, some MAGA are. The same could be said about ANTIFA. Both sides are confrontational with no room for discourse, in person or online. It also seems as if everyone talks relentlessly about politics these days which is much different than thirty years ago. It puts me on the defensive. 

If somebody tells me that they're a Democrat, I wonder if they vote for candidates that represent the Squad's values. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the shining light of the movement. She doesn't characterize my values nor does Bernie Sanders, although they have some good ideas such as Universal Health Care and make the billionaires pay their fair share of taxes. They are Socialists. It says so on Bernie's party affiliation. Conversely, if somebody tells me that they're a member of the GOP, I wonder if they're RINOs (Republican In Name Only), or, MAGA. Either or, it doesn't make me happy that out of over 300 million people, we can't get better candidates running for higher office. Like the presidency. 

I hated the 1990s. I was in my thirties for most of it, and as the country went through radical transformation culturally, so did I personally. As the dominance of three media networks with all of their influence on society eroded into the niche broadcasting environment we have today, I too was morphing from early adulthood to something that was supposed to be more mature. At almost 70, except for the aches and pains, I still feel like I'm in my teens mentally. But in my thirties, I was tired of myself, especially my career as a scribe, and needed a break. If you didn't live through the 1990s, or want a retrospective of it, look no further than Chuck Klosterman's The Nineties. It's an outstanding book. 

Bill Clinton was the 42nd President from 1993-2001. Except for a few peccadillos, I thought he was an excellent Commander in Chief. Especially the way in which he balanced the budget. He was a fiscal conservative while ushering in a centrist political agenda. In the early part of the decade, MTV in the classic music video format was dying. So was I from self-inflicted psychological and financial wounds. My friends were moving on and I wasn't because of poor choices. What always kept me going was listening to music. A year before Bill and Hillary moved into The White House,  Red Hot Chili Peppers released their fifth studio album, Blood Sugar Sex Magik. I had the Compact Disk and used to listen to it while on the Stairmaster.

One track on the album is "Under the Bridge", written by frontman Anthony Kiedis. It's a song about loneliness, homelessness and drug abuse. Despite its dour subject matter, it's a great song. Kiedis has been significantly influenced by writer Charles Bukowski, and I don't know this for a fact, but he may have created the song title from a Bukowski line from his novel Women: "Many a good man has been put under the bridge by a woman." It sounds like something "Slick Willie" should have written. Although I liked President Obama, I preferred the leadership of Clinton. I didn't mind Bush the Elder either, but never voted for him. I've never voted for a Republican, and the way things are going, I doubt I ever will. 

Walk on the Wild Side

I still use AOL as my primary email provider. I'm not trying to be retro cool. It's the same address I've had for over thirty years and it's good enough for me. I have a Gmail account for professional purposes, but seldom use it. There's not a lot of interest in a writer almost 70 years old. When I access my email on my Chromebook, I go to the AOL homepage and the first thing I usually do is check out the rotating slide show that highlights the important news of the day. Recently, the big celebrity story was about Cardi B deciding not to have her butt implants removed. She took Sir Mix-A-Lot's "Baby Got Back" to the next level. 

Cardi B is one of the top performers in the music industry and has been so for almost a decade. You may be familiar with her from her duet "W.A.P." (Wet Ass Pussy) with Megan Thee Stallion. I prefer double entendres such as Blondie's "The Tide is High". Same meaning. Same message. Just a different way of saying it. Last week, the AOL homepage carousel featured a story about a dustup in the music industry between Moby and Kinks founders Ray and Dave Davies. In a recent interview, it appears that Moby takes umbrage with the lyrics to "Lola" and calls it transphobic and unevolved. It was 1970. Why the animosity? Dave Davies took to the music media to rebut in places such as Rolling Stone magazine. Now it's front page news. So much for current events.

"Lola" was controversial in 1970 and temporarily banned from the airwaves by the BBC in Great Britain, not for the trans references, but because of commercial product placement. The lyrics, "Well I'm not dumb but I can't understand why she walked like a woman and talked like a man", were deemed okay. Mentioning Coca-Cola was too much for the censors and it was taken off the air. Only after the Kinks changed Coca-Cola to cherry cola was the song able to reclaim air time. "Lola" was an international success, with a peak position of #9 on the U.S. singles charts soon after release. Although some British radio stations banned "Lola" for its lyrics, it remains one of the top songs in Rock and Roll history. I wonder how Moby holds up?

In 1973, Lou Reed had an AM radio hit with "Walk on the Wild Side". Off his second solo LP Transformer, it was a top 20 single of the year. Produced by David Bowie and Mick Ronson, it was groundbreaking and risqué, according to Wikipedia. I wouldn't know. It was just a catchy tune to me. The first stanza goes something like this: "Holly came from Miami, F.L.A., Hitchhiked her way across the USA. Plucked her eyebrows on the way, Shaved her leg and then he was a she." The song's name was derived from the 1962 movie Walk on the Wild Side, which itself was an adaptation of a Nelson Algren novel. Jane Fonda was one of the actors in her second starring role playing Kitty Twist. 

Renée Richards is the first transgender person I was aware of. Renée made headlines in the 1970s from being the first trans athlete competing on the professional women's tennis circuit after sex reassignment surgery. Before the transition from male to female, Richards was an incredible multisport athlete - in high school, in college, and in the Navy. I was in high school and didn't really know what to make of it all when Richards made the nightly news from taking her case to the New York State Supreme Court. Richards wanted to play tennis, professionally as a woman, and won. As a result, Richards played in both singles and doubles competition at the U.S. Open. She went on to a brief but successful professional tennis career. 

This past week, the International Olympic Committee banned transgender women athletes from women's events. “Eligibility for any female category event at the Olympic Games or any other IOC event, including individual and team sports, is now limited to biological females,” is the official statement from the IOC. The sex of the athlete will be determined by a mandatory gene test. I agree with this ruling. Once in a while, you get an outlier such as Olympic swimming phenom Katie Ledecky that can compete with men on a limited basis, but it's few and far between. It's not a level playing field. I don't like to side with the Trump agenda, but I do with this issue. In my opinion, trans people can serve in the military, can be a good parent, but can't play women's sports. It's not fair to women, who were born women. It's a stacked deck and just not fair.

I downloaded the MP3 file of "Lola" from iTunes. It's in mono sound. That's the way we used to listen to music on the AM radio. It has some sagacious lyrics: "Girls will be boys and boys will be girls, It's a mixed up, muddled up, shook up world, except for Lola.". Maybe Moby should give it another listen.

Living on a Thin LIne

The last time I heard The Kinks perform "Living on a Thin Line" was when it piped over the soundsystem at Bada Bing, Tony Soprano's strip club in the HBO series The Sopranos. It's an incredible song by an incredible band. The critics claim it's one of their best. I know I like it. When I was in college, The Kinks had a big album, Low Budget. It was their 18th LP and they cranked out records for almost two more decades. I forget who sat at the bar during the episode, but they knocked back drinks as topless women with pasties danced to the tune about the death of a culture and the changing of a nation. I get a sense of déjà vu now when I listen to it.

The current political climate in the United States is reminiscent of the Spanish Civil War from 1936-1939. A precursor to World War II, it pitted The Republicans (socialists, anarchists, and communists all backed by the Soviet Union) against The Nationalist rebels (an alliance of fascists, conservatives, monarchists and traditionalists supported by Nazi Germany). Although over 35,000 anti-fascist volunteers from the International Brigades (including George Orwell) joined The Republicans, they lost from a variety of factors that are too vast for this brief. At the end of the war, Francisco Franco became dictator of Spain and remained in power until his death in 1975. 

I don't have the apolitical blues. I'm angry. I'm a registered independent, lean left of center, and caucus with the Democrats. It's the lesser of two evils, but I believe in voting because I believe in The Republic. I voted for Jimmy Carter my first eligible presidential election and haven't missed one since. I was a card carrying Democrat for thirty years until I got fed up. They're a circular firing squad, and because of their blunders, a narcissist white nationalist masquerading as a real estate mogul was elected Commander in Chief. For the second time. Plus, Trump got the popular vote this past election. Nice job DNC. You bungled the job. As a result, the MAGA movement remains strong, running on an agenda fueled by Project 2025. 

According to Google, "Project 2025 is a political initiative published in April 2023 by the Heritage Foundation with the goal of reshaping the U.S. federal government by consolidating executive power in favor of right-wing policies." Russ Vought, the lead architect of the project is currently head of the Office of Management and Budget. This is the office that executes Trump's agenda among other duties. Pam Bondi, the U.S. Attorney General supports Project 2025. White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller is also in the fold. The left compares him to Heinrich Himmler. I don't go that far. I don't see any gas chambers, only detention camps. Kurt Vonnegut once wrote: "True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country." Most aren't my high school classmates. They're much younger.

If you follow the "fake news", Project 2025 is probably familiar to you. If you follow Fox News, you're probably familiar with it, too. After all, Project 2025 is the agenda of the White Christian nationalist movement. Only 10% of the country identifies with this crusade, but do they ever pack a punch. With an additional 20% of the country agreeing in sympathy, they're still a minority, but growing by the day. I'm not a hardliner on the issues. Closing the Southern Border is a good idea. Concentration Camps are not. 

I live in crunchy granola Ithaca, New York. Ten square miles surrounded by reality is the tagline for our liberal community. Lots of tie-dye shirts and black socks with Birkenstocks. The electorate here prefers communists and socialists to candidates with agendas that actually work. We finally have a Democrat legislator in Congress after years of GOP rule. Josh Riley is our representative. I voted for him twice and believe he's doing a great job. If you read the Ithaca subreddit, all the protesters and agitators want to vote him out. You get voted down if you dare say one thing positive about him. Why? Because Riley reached across the aisle on a couple of issues and also supports Israel. I know it's a small sample size, but it's a microcosm of bicoastal elitism. Snap out of it. 

The musical Cabaret takes place in Berlin circa 1931 during the decadent years of the Weimar Republic as the Nazi Party gained power. Most of the play is set in the Kit Kat Club, a popular nightclub. According to Google Gemini, "the cheerful music often underscores the bleak political reality, serving as a chilling reminder of how easily people can become complacent as totalitarianism takes hold." Liza Minnelli and Joel Grey starred in the film adaptation in 1972. I remember watching it when HBO was called Home Box Office. The end of the story "culminates with tragic consequences to those who ignored the danger."

Life is a Cabaret, old chum.