Here’s what you need to know today

• In Australia, Federal Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has told supermarkets to rein in prices or his government would force them to sell stores. Such an aggressive tone from the party of free markets prompted fierce internal debate in the Liberal and National party rooms. 
  
  

• Americans are celebrating their 4th of July Independence Day in a manner they know how: spending. The holiday is expected to see $9.4 billion spent on food and drinks and a record 71 million Americans travel during the holiday week. This is 5.7 million more travellers than the pre-pandemic level of 2019. Maybe the US consumer is holding up okay?
  
  

• While the majority of the world considers a 4-day workweek, Greece has bucked the trend and introduced a 6-day working week. The 48-hour working week has been decried as “barbaric” by unions but supporters argue it is necessary to manage a shrinking population and shortage of skilled workers.
  
  

• In a world first, Swedish grandparents can now receive paid parental leave for caring for their grandchildren. Parents can transfer up to 45 days of their parental leave to a friend, neighbour or grandparent. Single parents can transfer up to 90 days.
  
  

• Consternation about US President Joe Biden continues, with betting markets now pricing Vice President Kamala Harris as shorter odds that Biden himself to be the next President. We checked on one Australian betting platform and saw Biden at $8.50, Harris at $5.50 and Trump at $1.62.
  
  

• The fight for the future of Paramount Global (owner, of amongst other things, Australia’s Channel 10) has been reignited as Skydance Media tries to buy Paramount’s controlling shareholder National Amusements. Skydance is owned by David Ellison, son of Oracle co-founder and world’s 5th richest person Larry Ellison. Paramount shares rose 13% following the reports.

What the…?

Turns out humans aren’t the only animal capable of performing amputations to save lives. A new study published in the journal Current Biology has found Florida carpenter ants recognise the injured limbs of nestmates and will bite off the injured limb to help them survive. The study found between 90% and 95% of the amputated ants survive the process and continue working.

Investing is a lifelong journey

Here’s what you can learn today.

Nvidia is hot. But 4 companies in the S&P 500 are on an even hotter streak

Nvidia has been the investing story of the year. Up 200% in the past 12 months and up 3,000% in the past 5 years, it’s easy to see why.

What has been particularly notable about the Nvidia story is just how profitable the company has become. As AI takes off and demand for Nvidia’s H100 chips far outpace supply, the company has been able to name its price. As a result, it has been reporting insane profit margins - 48.8% at last report. Put another way, this means that for every $25,000 H100 chip the company sells, about $12,500 of that is profit.

This article from Quartz points out that while Nvidia is great, there are actually four companies that are even better. Measured purely on profit margin, Nvidia takes 5th spot in the S&P 500 index. Ahead of them are: VICI Properties, CME Group, VeriSign and Visa.

Check out the full article to see what these companies do and how they’ve been able to achieve such insane profit margins. Most importantly for investors, however, is to answer the question - can they maintain them?

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