Despite DeepSeek, the AI energy trade is alive and well

Cable and broadband company Charter Communications is on pace for its worst-ever trading day on Friday, as investors dump the stock following its Q1 results and forward guidance.

Charter, which owns Spectrum, reported adjusted earnings of $9.17 per share, below Wall Street estimates of $9.96 per share from analysts polled by FactSet. On the company’s earnings call, CFO Jessica Fischer appeared to lower its guidance for full-year revenue per user.

“It’ll be close either way in terms of whether we end up with net growth,” Fischer said.

The company lost 120,000 internet subscribers in the quarter, deeper than the expected 94,800 and double its loss from the same period last year. That news comes one day after Comcast’s earnings provided a bit of optimism for broadband as a category: the company reported Q1 losses of 65,000, significantly improving from 183,000 losses in the same quarter last year. Comcast is down more than 10%, on pace for its worst day since January 2025.

The stock price of the company responsible for the brains of the AI boom is finally showing some brawn again.

Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company, is poised to close at a record high for the first time since October 29, 2025, on Friday (if it ends above $207.04).

The AI chip trade is on fire, with the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index slated to deliver its 18th consecutive gain as Intel’s robust results and outlook juice the entire ecosystem. Hyperscalers report earnings next week, and their capex guidance can be thought of as the earnings guidance for Nvidia and other AI suppliers for the quarters to come.

This would end Nvidia’s longest stretch without a record close since the unofficial start of the AI boom (when the chip designer delivered blowout quarterly results in May 2023).

(Sorry if I jinx this!)

Eli Lilly fell on Friday after prescription data for its new weight-loss pill, Foundayo, showed that it’s having a significantly slower rollout than its top competitor.

The pill was prescribed about 3,700 times in its second week, according to IQVIA data cited by Deutsche Bank analysts, compared to the roughly 8,000 they were expecting. Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy pill, which came out in January, hit over 18,000 prescriptions in its second week.

The FDA approved Foundayo on April 1 and shipments began on April 9. Deutsche analysts noted that Lilly’s GLP-1 injections, which currently outsell Novo’s, also had a slower start.

Lilly fell more than 4% after the numbers were released. Novo Nordisk rose more than 5%.