Raunaq's World

Monday, May 25, 2026 -- Memorial Day Edition

SF Events -- What's Happening This Week

Massive week: Alabama Shakes, Margaret Cho, Champions League Final watch party, SF Porchfest, and June festivals stacking up.

Concert

Alabama Shakes at the Greek Theatre, Berkeley

May 29-30 -- Two nights of Brittany Howard

This is the show of the week. One of the most powerful live performers in music, outdoors at the Greek. If you only do one thing, do this.

May 29-30 | Greek Theatre, Berkeley

Block Party

SOMA Nights -- Folsom St Block Party

Thu May 28, 5-9 PM | Your neighborhood

Monthly street party on Folsom from 6th to 12th. Food, vendors, art, DJs. Free. Walk over.

Thu May 28 | Free

Sports

Champions League Final Watch Party at Thrive City

Sat May 30 | Doors 8 AM, Kickoff 9 AM

The biggest club football match of the year, watched outdoors at Chase Center plaza. Full day of soccer, music, food, drinks.

Sat May 30 | Thrive City

Music Festival

SF Porchfest -- Free Live Music in the Mission

Sat May 30 -- Bands on porches, stoops, and garages

Wander the Mission while local bands play from front porches. Free, outdoors, charming. Pair with tacos from 24th.

Sat May 30 | Mission District | Free

Coming Up

Union Street Festival + North Beach Festival

Jun 6-7 -- Two of SF's biggest free festivals, same weekend

Union Street Festival in Cow Hollow (one of the largest in SF) plus North Beach's Italian street festival with pizza toss and accordions. Both free, both all day.

Jun 6-7 | Free

Investments -- Market Snapshot

Markets closed for Memorial Day. ASML ripping (+8.7% weekly), MRVL earnings Wed, Iran deal = tech tailwind.

Action Required

First Execution Window: Tuesday May 26

$300K META-to-semi rotation still unexecuted

Plan formed May 21, sat through Memorial Day weekend. Iran/Hormuz deal pushed oil down 4.5% (tech tailwind). MRVL earnings Wed creates event risk -- consider scaling in gradually. NVDA $215.33 is in entry zone.

NVDA 30% | TSM 25% | ASML 20% | AMAT 10% | AVGO 10% | Cash 5%

Watchlist

ASML: $1,632.90 -- New ATH, +8.7% Weekly

Reclaimed cup-with-handle buy point, extended but in range

EUV monopoly thesis playing out. Ended quarterly order disclosure. Your plan allocates 20% ($60K) here. The entry looks good from the $1,603 alternate entry level.

52W range: $587.80 - $1,412.60 (pre-ATH breakout)

Earnings Watch

MRVL Earnings Wednesday -- 13.6% Move Expected

Q1 FY27: consensus $2.40B rev (+27% YoY). Stock at $196.33 near ATH.

Custom silicon + data center AI driving growth. Options pricing in a big move. This will ripple across the whole semi sector. Consider timing your AVGO/ASML entries around it.

May 27 after close | $196.33 | +131% YTD

Manchester United

Season wrapped: 3rd, 71 pts, UCL secured. Carrick permanent. Ederson deal basically done.

Record Breaker

Bruno: 21 Assists -- All-Time PL Record, Outright

Surpassed Henry and De Bruyne (20 each)

Assist #21 came in the 3-0 win at Brighton on the final day. The man is 31 and playing the best football of his life under Carrick.

May 24 | 3-0 vs Brighton

Transfer

Ederson Deal Virtually Done -- ~45M Euro

Atalanta midfielder, 5-year contract agreed

Romano and Moretto confirmed verbal agreement. Casemiro's replacement: younger, more mobile, more press-resistant. Atalanta manager confirmed talks with a "top club." Fee details being finalized.

~45M euro | First summer signing

Robotics & Physical AI

Figure AI's 200-hour marathon stole the show. China controls 80% of humanoid output.

Milestone

Figure AI: 200 Hours, 250,000 Packages, Zero Human Help

The 8-hour test that wouldn't stop

Three Helix-02 robots (Bob, Frank, Gary) sorted packages on livestream for 200 hours straight. CEO Adcock said there was a "high chance something would break." Nothing did. BotQ factory now at 1 robot/hour (24x scale in 120 days).

Livestreamed May 13-21

Geopolitics

China: 80% of Global Humanoid Market, 140+ OEMs

$26B state investment. EngineAI: 10K robots/year.

The US has better demos. China has better factories. This is the solar panel playbook applied to humanoids. EngineAI produces one T800 robot every 15 minutes.

$26B state investment | 94% output surge projected

Startups & VC

Q1 2026: $300B global VC. AI captured 81%. Hark AI raised $700M Series A.

Mega Round

Hark AI: $700M Series A at $6B Valuation

NVIDIA, AMD Ventures, ARK Invest, Intel Capital, Qualcomm, Salesforce

"Universal interface between humans and machines" -- pairing foundation models with hardware. The investor list is a who's who of compute infra. Worth watching if the hardware-AI convergence thesis is right.

May 21 | $6B valuation

AI Giant

Anthropic: $30B+ Round, $900B Valuation

Now the most valuable AI company. Karpathy joined pretraining.

Series H surpassed $30B. Karpathy hire from OpenAI adds fuel. The timing for anyone interviewing there is... notable.

$900B valuation | May 22

Music

Olivia Rodrigo's "the cure" went No. 1 instantly. Alabama Shakes at the Greek this week.

New Release

Olivia Rodrigo -- "the cure" Hits Spotify No. 1

Album "You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl So in Love" drops June 12

Released May 22, immediately topped Spotify Global and US iTunes. Previous single "drop dead" surged back into the top 10. She says the title has nothing to do with the band.

Released May 22 | Album June 12

Album Drop

Bleachers -- "everyone for ten minutes"

Jack Antonoff finally makes an album that sounds like him

Anthemic pop-rock that actually commits to being loud. After years producing for Taylor and Lana, good to hear him build something that isn't someone else's house.

Out May 22 | 9.2M Spotify listeners