TechCheck

The IPO window of 2023 was short, not very sweet, and now likely closed as we head into the year end. Many of the recent debuts, including Birkenstock, Arm, Instacart and Klaviyo are down 10% or more from their highs, all before the lock-up period has expired when insiders can sell their shares. There are a number of factors that could be behind the stumbles, including company fundamentals, bankers mispricing the listing, and market conditions.  

CNBC’s Deirdre Bosa and Marc Golbert discuss Amazon Prime Day and Birkenstock's IPO price, the state of direct-to-consumer retail models, and Birkenstock’s unique approach to DTC business.

As Amazon’s second sales event of the year kicks off, every day seems like a deal day on e-commerce apps like Temu and Shein. Temu, in particular, is far outpacing Amazon in terms of growth, and might be capturing American shoppers by gamifying the experience. Ben Harburg of MSA Capital joins us to talk about the Temu effect and the rising anxiety that it’s going to displace everyone from Amazon to Dollar Stores to Costco. 

The chip designer Arm gained a number of bulls today as its post-debut quiet period ends, with more than 10 firms involved in underwriting the IPO initiating coverage of the company at a “buy” rating or equivalent, despite the stock being down more than 20% from the intra-day high after it IPO-ed. That’s good news for Softbank founder Masayoshi Son, as Arm has become his firm’s new crown jewel after Alibaba, going from a 12% stake in March last year to 22% as of June this year.  

AI startups are continuing to raise money by the bucketful. This time, it’s the chatbot maker Anthropic, which is reportedly in talks to raise $2 billion from Google and other companies, giving it an eye-popping $20 billion to $30 billion valuation. Plus, two of Biden’s top antitrust regulators gave an update today on the administration’s efforts to hold big tech accountable, just a few weeks into the DOJ’s landmark case against Google. The DOJ’s Jonathan Kanter said he’s been surprised about how many comments in his case are coming from ordinary workers, and the FTC’s Lina Khan talked about the failure to push back against corporate consolidation.  

Shares of Apple are up fractionally today despite a rare downgrade from KeyBanc - laying out an alternative view from what most analyst have been saying going into Apple's most important quarter of the year. The analyst joined Tech Check, describing his concerns including rich valuations nearing all-time-highs, U.S. iPhone sales softening, and international growth under pressure. 

Nvidia’s new strategy to dominate the future of AI might lie in the cloud. A report from The Information says Nvidia talked to at least one data center owner about leasing space to power its own cloud service - requiring major investment but could also be a big source of new revenue. Plus, Microsoft will soon try to generate meaningful sales directly from AI with the launch of its new AI assistant Co-Pilot for business customers. It costs nearly $30 per user per month, but some customers testing an early version say they’re seeing a big boost to productivity. 

After a big September selloff, megacap tech stocks might be cheap again. P/E ratios have fallen steeply and are at their biggest discount since Jan. 2017 as analysts continue to boost their earnings estimates for the next fiscal year, according to Goldman Sachs. Plus, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella today took the stand in the DOJ’s antitrust trial against Google, and explained why it’s so hard to compete against the tech giant’s search engine dominance. 

President Biden signaled an aggressive new agenda to curb the power of companies like Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta when he appointed Lina Khan, Jonathan Kanter, and Tim Wu – a trio of the toughest antitrust regulators to hold them accountable. Instead, two years in, big tech is bigger and more powerful than ever. This week on Tech Check, we dive into the toothless regulators and their upcoming showdowns that could be make-or-break for them, and for the dominance of big tech.