Intelligence Brief. Today’s scan captures a defining moment in the AI transition: the shift from "chatbot curiosity" to "structural disruption." While wealth management legacy players are feeling the sting of automated competition, sovereign markets like Japan and India are aggressively restructuring to capture the next wave of foreign capital and deep-tech innovation.
Market Sentiment: Corrective Rotation. Investors are pivoting away from over-concentrated "Mag 7" growth toward AI-immune value sectors, while sovereign markets in Asia hit all-time highs on political stability.
1. Global & US Strategy Digest
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1. The AI Wealth Selloff: Altruist Disrupts
A tax-strategy tool from AI startup Altruist sent shockwaves through the market, causing shares of Charles Schwab and LPL Financial to slide 7%. Wall Street’s newest trade involves dumping any stock perceived to be in the crosshairs of AI automation.Strategic Implication: This is a "sell-first, ask questions later" environment. Companies with high human-capital costs in advisory roles must prove their "agentic moat" or face valuation compression. -
2. Runway’s $5.3B Pivot to ‘World Models’
AI video pioneer Runway raised $315M at a $5.3B valuation. The funding marks a shift from simple video generation toward "World Models"—AI that understands the physical laws of the universe, essential for robotics and autonomous systems. -
3. xAI Stability Concerns: Founders Depart
Nearly half of xAI’s founding team has departed just as the company prepares for a highly scrutinized IPO. The exits raise questions about Elon Musk’s ability to maintain core talent in the hyper-competitive frontier model race. -
4. Japan is Back: Takaichi Landslide Rally
The Nikkei average extended its rise to record levels as foreign capital pours into Japan following Sanae Takaichi’s historic win. Experts anticipate a sustained bull run as Japan focuses its rare earths strategy away from China. -
5. Alphabet’s 100-Year AI Bond
Alphabet issued a rare 100-year bond to fuel its multi-billion dollar AI infrastructure blitz. This landmark debt deal signals that Big Tech is preparing for a "century-long" race for compute supremacy. -
6. The $60M Seed for AI Code Management
Former GitHub CEO Thomas Dohmke raised a record $60M seed for a new startup that manages the massive volume of code produced by AI agents, addressing the growing "code sprawl" in the enterprise.
2. Marketing Trends
- Agentic AI Breaks the Billing Model: As AI agents begin replacing human tasks in IT and services, traditional "headcount-based" billing is collapsing. Agencies must pivot to value-based or outcome-based pricing to survive the "lean workforce" era (ET Prime).
- The Social Media 'Big Tobacco' Moment: Social networks are facing a wave of addiction-related lawsuits that regulators are comparing to the tobacco industry’s reckoning. Expect a mandatory shift toward "friction-by-design" in algorithm updates (Bloomberg).
- Lunar New Year Ad War: Alibaba, Tencent, and ByteDance have returned to aggressive subsidy wars, using "digital red packets" to secure long-term subscribers in a stagnating consumer market.
3. India News
- Goldman’s India Ascendance: Goldman Sachs vaulted to fourth in Indian equity offerings, overtaking Morgan Stanley for the first time in a decade. The firm's shift from the fringes to the core of Indian dealmaking is paying dividends as mergers accelerate.
- US-India Trade Pact Confusion: The White House revised its agricultural fact sheet for the new trade deal, removing references to "pulses" (lentils/chickpeas). The move has added to confusion among Indian farmer groups regarding the deal's ultimate scope.
- Deep Tech Startup Reforms: The Indian government has adjusted rules for deep tech startups to facilitate easier funding and longer-term success, aiming to position the nation as a global hub for hard-science innovation.
4. My Latest Posts
Fresh analysis from across my network:
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Shashi.co: Nebius Group NV Acquires Tavily to Consolidate Agentic Search Infrastructure
Nebius Group's $400M acquisition of Tavily signals a shift from experimental to industrial-scale agentic AI. This analysis explores how pairing Nebius's inference cloud with Tavily's grounding engine creates a vertically integrated stack for autonomous agents, challenging the traditional hyperscaler model.
Read the Analysis -
Shashi.co: The Physics Gap: Why Neara’s $60M Raise Signals a Shift from "Building New" to "Sweating Assets"
Utilities can no longer "build their way out" of the AI energy crisis. Neara's $63M Series D validates a new strategy: using "Physics-Enabled Digital Twins" to unlock latent capacity in existing grids. This post analyzes the pivot from static maps to dynamic, physics-based modeling.
Read the Story -
ReadyThoughts.com: Rationality in the Marketplace
Celebrating 90 years of *Consumer Reports* and the enduring value of verified data. In an era of algorithmic noise, this post reflects on why "laboratories of facts" are the only antidote to influencer hype.
Read the Post
Works Cited
- Authers, John. "Big Tech's Stranglehold on Profits is Over." Bloomberg Points of Return, 11 Feb. 2026.
- "Evening Briefing Asia: The AI Threat." Bloomberg News, 11 Feb. 2026.
- "Investors Signal 'Japan is Back' as Stocks Rally." Nikkei Asia, 10 Feb. 2026.
- "Agentic AI Breaking IT's Billing Model." The Economic Times, 11 Feb. 2026.
- "Anthropic closes in on $20B round." TechCrunch, 9 Feb. 2026.
- "Runway raises $315M at $5.3B valuation." TechCrunch, 10 Feb. 2026.
- "India Has Changed Its Startup Rules for Deep Tech." TechCrunch, 9 Feb. 2026.
- Bellamkonda, Shashi. "Nebius Group NV Acquires Tavily to Consolidate Agentic Search Infrastructure." *Shashi.co*, 10 Feb. 2026.
- Bellamkonda, Shashi. "The Physics Gap: Why Neara’s $60M Raise Signals a Shift from 'Building New' to 'Sweating Assets'." *Shashi.co*, 10 Feb. 2026.
- Bellamkonda, Shashi. "Rationality in the Marketplace: Why Consumer Reports Is More Than a Magazine." *ReadyThoughts*, 10 Feb. 2026.
Disclaimer: This blog post reflects my personal views only. AI tools may have been used for brevity, structure, or research support. Please independently verify any information before relying on it. This content does not represent the views of my employer, Infotech.com.
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