Drone Cops in Sky, Struggling With 6-Figures, AI All-in, More Investing News
Let's scan through the headlines for the stories of the week that speak to our Pro Portfolio holdings.
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Cincinnati police are using drones to help respond to emergencies. Many people making six-figures say they are just getting by. And AI is still everywhere. These are just some of the news stories of the week we've tracked that speak to our Pro Portfolio investments. Read on to keep informed on how to best approach your holdings.
Also, because of the Thanksgiving holiday, TheStreet Pro Portfolio’s November Monthly Roundup will be published on Dec. 1; the next bowl of Soup will be served up to you on Dec. 7.
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Artificial Intelligence
Alphabet’s Google has been playing catch-up in artificial intelligence ever since OpenAI introduced ChatGPT in 2022. The Tuesday launch of Gemini 3, an updated version of its own large language model, offers a chance to narrow that gap—and perhaps bring its considerable advantages to bear in the race for AI supremacy. The company said Gemini 3 will improve the sophistication of answers to queries in its Gemini app, as well as those made using AI Mode in the Google search engine. Read more here
According to the report, AI usage is both high and growing. Of those surveyed, 82% report engaging with AI at least occasionally, with tech workers and younger users indexing higher on their usage. However AI is not yet overtaking traditional search as a source of answers to users' questions. According to the study, 68% still rely on traditional search engines like Google, compared to only 21% citing AI tools like ChatGPT. Read more here
Perplexity is relaunching its AI-powered shopping experience for free for all users ahead of Black Friday, with memory improvements, personalization and product cards, the company said in a press release Wednesday. The revamped shopping experience is more conversational. The AI tool will help people narrow down the type of product they are looking for. It will also call upon past chats to personalize product recommendations. Read more here
Artificial intelligence has moved from a support function to the core of how companies operate. Enterprise adoption has climbed sharply in the past year. Several global surveys show that more than 70 percent of large organisations have already deployed AI in at least one business unit, and spending on AI systems is expected to cross 300 billion dollars by 2026. The common thread across sectors is a shift from routine automation to real-time, predictive intelligence. Read more here
Position: Alphabet (GOOGL) , Amazon (AMZN) , Arista Networks (ANET) , Axon (AXON) , Meta (META) ), Microsoft (MSFT) , ServiceNow (NOW) , SuRo Capital (SSSS)
Cash-Strapped Consumer
More people are falling behind on paying their bills to keep on the lights and heat their homes, according to a new analysis of consumer data — a warning sign for the U.S. economy and another political headache for President Donald Trump. Past due balances to utility companies jumped 9.7% annually to $789 between the April-June periods of 2024 and 2025… Read more here
A six-figure salary doesn’t mean what it once did. That’s the takeaway from a new Harris poll, which suggests a six-figure income in 2025 equates to survival, but not necessarily to success. One in three six-figure earners described themselves in the poll as financially distressed. Two in three said six-figure pay is not a sign of wealth. Read more here
Many homeowners continue to push off more expensive projects, Lowe's executives said. Ellison said that "affordability and uncertainty in the broader economy continue to weigh on consumer confidence, particularly when it comes to larger discretionary purchases." Read more here
Credit stress is beginning to “flash yellow” for this cohort. The overall savings rate has dipped significantly to 4.6%, resting well below the 40-year average of 6.4% and the 80-year average of 8.7%. Simultaneously, delinquencies are surging. In auto lending, subprime 60-day delinquencies have reached 6.7%, marking the highest level since 1994. Although total household debt grew in line with real disposable income (about 4% in Q3 2025), credit card balances grew at twice that pace, hitting 8%. The latest data shows 30-day past-due credit card payments running at 5.3%, an 11-year high, alongside surging student debt defaults. Read more here
Position: Amazon, Costco (COST) , TJX Companies (TJX)
Cybersecurity, Data Privacy & Digital Identity
DoorDash identified the cybersecurity incident on October 25th, 2025. According to the notices, an unauthorized third party gained access and stole “certain user contact information, which varied by individual.” The company warns that the affected information may include first and last names, phone numbers, email addresses, and physical addresses. Read more here
According to Entrust’s 2026 Identity Fraud Report, fraud attacks are rising in both scale and sophistication, fuelled by leaps in deepfake technology and a surge in injection attacks (where an attacker inserts malicious code or commands into a camera), which are up 40% year-over-year. Read more here
Warfare has become a joint cyber-kinetic endeavor, with nations using cyber operations to scope out targets before launching missiles. And private companies, including shipping, transportation, and electronics manufacturers, are getting caught in the crossfire, according to Amazon. Read more here
Position: Alphabet, First Trust Nasdaq Cybersecurity ETF, Microsoft
Digital Infrastructure
Anthropic on Wednesday said it had signed an ambitious new data center partnership with U.K.-based neocloud provider Fluidstack, committing $50 billion to building facilities across the U.S. to meet its growing compute needs. The data centers will be located in Texas and New York, and come online throughout 2026. Read more here
Three of the biggest companies in artificial intelligence said Tuesday they formed a partnership featuring tens of billions of dollars in spending, adding to an investment spree that is aimed at supercharging AI model development. Under the partnership, Nvidia and Microsoft will invest up to $15 billion in Anthropic, a competitor to OpenAI whose models are popular with coders and businesses. Anthropic, in turn, said it would buy $30 billion of computing capacity from Microsoft Azure running on Nvidia AI systems. Read more here
AMD, Cisco and HUMAIN unveiled a new joint venture which aims to deploy up to 1 GW of AI infrastructure by 2030, starting with an initial 100 MW in Saudi Arabia which is set to be rolled out in 2026. Read more here
Private asset management firm Brookfield launched a $100 billion global AI Infrastructure program in partnership with NVIDIA and the Kuwait Investment Authority.
The fund has a target of $10 billion of equity commitments to invest in the backbone of artificial intelligence. It has already received $5 billion of capital commitments from a select group of institutional and industry partners, including Brookfield, NVIDIA and KIA. Read more here
Cloudflare has become the latest web infrastructure giant to collapse in the span of a month, replacing entire sites, including X, ChatGPT, Spotify, Canva, and even the outage-tracking Downdetector, with an error message for hours this morning. It’s the latest in a string of outages that Mehdi Daoudi, CEO and cofounder of the internet performance monitoring platform Catchpoint, says should be a “wake-up call” for companies. Read more here
Positions: Arista Networks, Marvell (MRVL) , Nvidia (NVDA) , Qualcomm (QCOM)
Digital Lifestyle
After primarily focusing on private conversations since its founding, Snapchat is embracing public conversations with a new “Topic Chats” feature. The social network says the feature lets users chat about what’s happening in the world and across various communities, from Formula 1 to the reality TV show “Below Deck.” Read more here
Orange France is the first European wireless operator to launch a satellite text messaging service. Orange is working with Skylo to launch its Message Satellite service on December 11. The service initially will be available to Orange’s 5G and 5G+ customers who own a Google Pixel 9 or 10 smartphone and who live in mainland France. They’ll be able to send and receive SMS messages as well as their geolocation via satellite when mobile or Wi-Fi coverage is unavailable. The service will be available for use in France and 27 other countries. Read more here
Social teams enter 2026 with a workload that keeps rising faster than their resources. The latest data from Photoshelter shows how much they lean on social platforms to drive marketing outcomes. Ninety-five percent of marketers in the survey call social important, and nearly two thirds say it is the primary channel that delivers results for their organization. That reliance shows up in posting habits, budget decisions, and the technology they pull in to stay ahead. Read more here
Central to Amazon’s bid to advertisers are two new capabilities with names that speak to the simplicity and centrality it hopes to provide. The company introduced full-funnel campaigns and revamped its Campaign Manager, uniting sponsored ads and its demand-side platform in a single, artificial intelligence-powered ad hub. Amazon also continues to step up its streaming TV play, demonstrating how its connected TV prowess has driven advertiser outcomes... The new full-funnel campaigns offering, launching next year, is an agentic AI tool that helps advertisers automate campaigns across sponsored ads, display ads and streaming TV. Read more here
Position: Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta
Energy Pain Point
The Trump Administration will give Constellation Energy a $1 billion federal loan to restart the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania that suffered a partial core meltdown in 1979. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said Tuesday that restarting the plant will help bring down electricity prices and that the administration will act to bring more nuclear generation online. Read more here
The US government plans to buy and own as many as 10 new, large nuclear reactors that could be paid for using Japan’s $550 billion funding pledge, part of a push to meet surging demand for electricity. The new details of the unusual arrangement were outlined Wednesday by Carl Coe, the Energy Department’s chief of staff, about the non-binding commitment made by Japan in October to fund $550 billion in US projects, including as much as $80 billion for the construction of new reactors made by Westinghouse Electric Co. Read more here
Position: Eaton (ETN)
Homebuilding & Materials
The American housing market is entering a new phase of cooling, with a majority of homeowners now seeing their property values slip from last year's highs. New analysis from Zillow shows that 53% of U.S. homes have lost value over the past 12 months -- the largest share since 2012, when the market was clawing its way out of the post-recession trough. The shift represents a dramatic reversal from 2023, when only 14% of homes were declining in value. But economists say the pullback reflects normalization after years of overheated appreciation, not the start of a broad market downturn. Read more here
“We believe that consumer uncertainty and continued pressure in housing are disproportionately impacting home improvement demand,” Home Depot CEO Ted Decker said on an earnings call yesterday (Nov. 18). Lowe’s chief Marvin Ellison similarly told analysts today (Nov. 19) that the retailer is facing “softer demand within an uncertain macro environment.” Read more here
Safety & Security
Cincinnati police launched their $4.8 million drone as first responder program in late July. It's the first of its kind in the Midwest to use remotely piloted drones to respond to calls for service. The department's drones can be remotely deployed and piloted toward the scene of an incident from docks placed across the city. The Skydio X10 drones are complex, featuring a zoom camera with thermal vision, a loudspeaker and a parachute. Each drone costs around $62,000 all-in, including the price of its dock, accessories, training, warranty and maintenance. That does not include an annual $250,000 expense for a Dedrone radar, which identifies other flying objects in the sky so drones do not collide with them. Read more here
King County Council on Tuesday unanimously approved a $20 billion, two-year budget that boosts spending on public safety, homelessness services and behavioral health while bracing for potential cuts in federal funding. The budget includes more than $225 million for public safety and criminal justice and over $55 million for housing and homelessness initiatives. Read more here
Public safety and healthcare agencies are among the earliest beneficiaries of this shift… These systems now sit on secure cloud platforms that connect data across departments and devices. “AI is changing how public safety and healthcare organizations plan, respond, and care for people. From predicting emergency call volumes to helping doctors spot health risks early, AI is making operations faster, smarter, and more reliable,” said Girish Jambagi, Cloud Security and Public Safety expert at Oracle Corporation USA. Read more here
Position: Axon Enterprise (AXON) , Palantir (PLTR)
The Strategies Behind Our Thematic Models
Aging of the Population - Capturing the demographic wave of the aging population and the changing demands it brings.
Artificial Intelligence – Software, chips, and related companies that facilitate the collection and analysis of large data sets and autonomous generation of solutions given non-machine language prompts.
Cash-Strapped Consumer - Companies poised to benefit as consumers stretch the disposable spending dollars they do have.
CHIPs Act – Capturing the reshoring of the US semiconductor industry and the $52.7 billion poised to be spent on semiconductor manufacturing.
Cybersecurity - Companies that focus on protecting against the penetration of digital networks and the theft, ransom, corruption, or destruction of data.
Data Privacy & Digital Identity - Companies providing the tools and services that verify authorized users and safeguard personal data privacy.
Digital Infrastructure & Connectivity -The buildout and upgrading of our Networks, Data Storage Facilities, and Equipment.
Digital Lifestyle - The companies behind our increasingly connected lives.
Digital Payments - This model focuses on companies benefiting from the accelerating structural adoption of digital payments and financial technology (FinTech).
Energy Pain Point - Companies poised to prosper from rising power demand.
EV Transition - Capturing the transition to EVs and related infrastructure from combustion engine vehicles.
Guilty Pleasure – Companies that produce/provide food and drink products that consumers tend to enjoy regardless of the economic environment and potential long-term health hazards associated with excessive consumption.
Homebuilding & Materials – Ranging from homebuilders to key building product companies that serve the housing market, this model looks to capture the rising demand for housing, one that should benefit as the Fed returns monetary policy to more normalized levels.
Luxury Buying Boom - Tapping into aspirational buying and affluent buyers amid rising global wealth.
Rebuilding America - Turning the focused spending on rebuilding US infrastructure into revenue and profits.
Safety & Security – Targeted exposure to companies that provide goods and services primarily to the Defense and security sectors of the economy.
