- Entwistle & Cappucci LLP and Saxena White P.A. File Securities Class Action Lawsuit Against Activision Blizzard, Inc. and Related Defendants
May 2, 2026
BOCA RATON, Fla., May 01, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Entwistle & Cappucci LLP and Saxena White P.A. have filed a securities class action lawsuit (the “Class Action”) in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware against Activision Blizzard, Inc. (“Activision” or the “Company”) and certain members of the Company’s Board of Directors (the “Board”) (collectively, “Defendants”). The Class Action asserts claims under Sections 10(b) and 20(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (the “Exchange Act”) and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) Rule 10b-5 promulgated thereunder, on behalf of a class (the “Class”) consisting of all sellers of Activision common stock from January 18, 2022—the announcement date of the acquisition (the “Merger”) of Activision by Microsoft Corporation (“Microsoft”)—to October 13, 2023 (excluding those that tendered their Activision common stock in the Merger), and were damaged thereby. The Class Action filed by Entwistle & Cappucci and Saxena White is captioned The Arbitrage Fund v. Activision Blizzard, Inc., et al., No. 1:26-cv-00489 (D. Del.).
The Class Action seeks to recover damages on behalf of investors that were damaged as a result of allegedly false and misleading statements and omissions of material facts arising from an alleged scheme by Activision, the Company’s former Chief Executive Officer and member of the Board Robert Kotick (“Kotick”), and the Company’s former Chairman of the Board Brian Kelly (“Kelly”). Kotick and Kelly allegedly locked in huge profits on their stock holdings, options and other incentives by hastily negotiating Activision’s sale to Microsoft, to the detriment of the Company’s public shareholders.
Among other things, the Class Action alleges that widespread sexual harassment and discrimination allegations against Activision and its executives emerged starting in July 2021, resulting in numerous state and federal regulatory investigations and multiple employee walkouts. In response, Defendants Kotick and Kelly allegedly orchestrated a rushed corporate Merger—at a price that did not reflect the Board’s internal valuation of the Company, in order to guarantee hundreds of millions of dollars in profits from their existing equity in Activision—before allegations of the workplace harassment threatened their positions and the Company’s ongoing business relationship with Microsoft. As part of this scheme, Defendants allegedly made a series of material misstatements and omissions of material facts, beginning with the January 2022 announcement of the Merger through the close of the transaction, which misrepresented the motive, process and fairness of the Merger, and failed to disclose significant incentives to Microsoft in connection with the transaction.
If you sold Activision common stock during the Class Period and were damaged thereby, you are a member of the “Class” and may be able to seek appointment as lead plaintiff. If you wish to apply to be lead plaintiff, a motion on your behalf must be filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware no later than June 30, 2026. The lead plaintiff is a court-appointed representative for absent members of the Class. You do not need to seek appointment as lead plaintiff to share in any Class recovery in the Class Action. If you are a Class member and there is a recovery for the Class, you can share in that recovery as an absent Class member.
You may contact Robert N. Cappucci, Esq., a Partner at Entwistle & Cappucci (rcappucci@entwistle-law.com), or Marco A. Dueñas, Esq., a Senior Attorney at Saxena White P.A. (mduenas@saxenawhite.com), to discuss your rights regarding the appointment of lead plaintiff or your interest in the Class Action. You also may retain counsel of your choice to represent you in the Class Action. You may inquire about actively joining the Class Action at www.entwistle-law.com and www.saxenawhite.com.
AboutEntwistle & Cappucci LLP
Entwistle & Cappucci is a national law firm providing exceptional legal representation to clients in the most complex and challenging legal matters. Our practice encompasses all areas of litigation, corporate transactions, bankruptcy, insurance, corporate investigations and white-collar defense. Our clients include public and private corporations, major hedge funds, public pension funds, governmental entities, leading institutional investors, domestic and foreign financial services companies, emerging business enterprises and individual entrepreneurs.
About Saxena White P.A.
Saxena White, with offices in Florida, New York, California and Delaware, is a leading national law firm focused on prosecuting securities class actions and other complex litigation on behalf of injured investors. Currently serving as lead counsel in numerous securities fraud class actions nationwide, Saxena White has recovered billions of dollars on behalf of injured investors.
CONTACT INFORMATION:
Robert N. Cappucci, Esq.
rcappucci@entwistle-law.com
Entwistle & Cappucci LLP
230 Park Avenue, 3rd Floor
New York, New York 10169
Tel.: (212) 894-7200
www.entwistle-law.com
Marco A. Dueñas, Esq.
mduenas@saxenawhite.com
Saxena White P.A.
10 Bank Street, Suite 882
White Plains, New York 10606
Tel.: (914) 200-3263
www.saxenawhite.com
- From software to real estate, U.S. sectors under the grip of AI scare trade
Feb 13, 2026
By Medha Singh and Sruthi Shankar
Feb 13 (Reuters) - Wall Street is in the grip of disruption worries from AI. It first started with investors dumping shares of software companies but soon spread to sectors seen as vulnerable to automation, driving sharp losses in U.S. stocks this week.
The AI scare trade did not spare even sectors such as private credit, real estate brokers, data analytics, legal services and insurers.
Global tech stocks took the hit after Anthropic unveiled a legal AI plug-in. But soon the investor unease deepened following a flurry of AI model upgrades and fresh releases.
"With fear driving market sentiment, investors remain in 'sell first think later' mode, asking 'who is next' and showing no mercy for anything remotely seen as an AI loser," Barclays equity strategist Emmanual Cau said.
Here's a look at how various sectors were impacted by the selloff:
SOFTWARE AND SOFTWARE-EXPOSED LOANS
The S&P 500 Software & Services index has lost about $2 trillion in value since its peak in October. Half of the losses came in the past two weeks, on concerns that fast-advancing AI tools could upend traditional subscription and enterprise tools.
So far this year, the worst-performing Nasdaq 100 stocks include Atlassian down 47%, Intuit down 40% and Workday, which has lost a third of its value.
Salesforce tumbled about 30% in 2026, while Adobe is down 25% and CrowdStrike 12%.
"There's this idea that AI is somehow going to replace built‑out models in the near term - models that have been in place for many years and from which companies have profited strongly," said Robert Pavlik, senior portfolio manager at Dakota Wealth in Fairfield, Connecticut.
The U.S. software sector's worst drawdown in more than three years also knocked down shares of alternative asset managers on concerns over their exposure to loans and leverage tied to the companies.
Ares, Blackstone, Blue Owl, Apollo, TPG and KKR slumped between 13% and 24% this year.
About a fifth of the private credit space is exposed to the software sector, according to estimates from BNP Paribas.
FINANCIAL BROKERAGE, DATA ANALYTICS & LEGAL SERVICES
The financial industry, particularly brokerages and data analytics firms, were hammered after wealth management firm Altruist introduced AI-enabled tax planning features, stoking fears of the fast-advancing technology upending their business models.
Shares of brokers LPL Financial, Raymond James Financial and Charles Schwab fell more than 7% on Tuesday.
Index provider S&P Global, which issued a downbeat earnings forecast for 2026, has slumped more than 25% in February and was set for its worst month since 2009. Moody's, Factset Research and MSCI also fell sharply this month.
Story Continues
Nasdaq-listed shares of Thomson Reuters touched a near five-year low last week on concerns about AI hurting its legal services business.
REAL ESTATE SERVICES
Commercial real estate and investment managers took a blow on Wednesday, which KBW analysts said was due to investors rotating out of high-fee, labor-intensive business models viewed as potentially vulnerable to AI-driven disruption.
CBRE Group and Jones Lang LaSalle sank about 12% each on Wednesday, and Cushman & Wakefield slumped nearly 14%. CoStar Group, owner of Apartments.com and Homes.com, fell 5.9%.
"We view market concerns as overstated due to a combination of fragmented CRE end markets and the noncore nature of real estate activities for many clients," Morningstar analyst Sean Sunlop said, noting that their valuations were "not cheap" despite the selloff.
INSURANCE
Insurance stocks took a sharp hit. Brokers and underwriters across both sides of the Atlantic plunged after online platform Insurify released on Monday an AI‑powered comparison tool on ChatGPT, which allows users to compare car insurance rates.
The S&P 500 insurance index slumped 3.9% on Monday, its biggest single-day drop since mid-October.
Shares of insurance broker Willis Towers Watson have shed 15% so far this week and were set for its worst week since the pandemic-selloff in March 2020. Aon fell 9% and Arthur J. Gallagher dropped 15% this week.
"Ultimately, we believe brokers will bifurcate. Simpler insurance products like term life, personal auto, and home, could see significant AI disruption over the next five years," Morgan Stanley equity strategist Bob Jian Huang said.
"Higher-valued brokers will use AI to enhance analysis and improve underwriting, not be displaced by it, in our view."
TRUCKING & LOGISTICS
Traders probably did not see trucking and logistics firms as an AI target, but the sector plunged sharply on Thursday.
AI-focused logistics firm Algorhythm Holdings, which previously sold karaoke machines, said its SemiCab unit boosted customers' freight volumes by 300% to 400% "without a corresponding increase in operational headcount".
The news triggered a rout in stocks such as Landstar System and C.H. Robinson. The Dow Jones Transportation Average fell 4.4%.
Jefferies analysts, however, said the reaction was disconnected from fundamentals. "Proprietary freight data and physical networks remain durable moats," they said.
(Reporting by Medha Singh and Sruthi Shankar in Bengaluru; additional reporting by Avinash P; Editing by Arun Koyyur)
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- Italian Competition Authority Investigates Activision Blizzard's Promotions and Parental Controls
Jan 16, 2026 · pymnts.com
The Italian Competition Authority (AGCM) launched two investigations into the Microsoft-owned gaming company Activision Blizzard, alleging that it engaged in “misleading and aggressive practices.
- Invesco S&P 500 GARP ETF Experiences Big Inflow
Dec 23, 2025
Looking today at week-over-week shares outstanding changes among the universe of ETFs covered at ETF Channel, one standout is the Invesco S&P 500 GARP ETF (Symbol: SPGP) where we have detected an approximate $185.9 million dollar inflow -- that's a 22.1% increase week over week in outstanding units (from 10,650,000 to 13,000,000). Among the largest underlying components of SPGP, in trading today Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Symbol: VRTX) is up about 0.8%, Fortinet Inc (Symbol: FTNT) is up about 0.9%, and Activision Blizzard, Inc. (Symbol: ATVI) is lower by about 0.1%. For a complete list of holdings, visit the SPGP Holdings page » The chart below shows the one year price performance of SPGP, versus its 200 day moving average:
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Looking at the chart above, SPGP's low point in its 52 week range is $76.9301 per share, with $97.896 as the 52 week high point — that compares with a last trade of $79.21. Comparing the most recent share price to the 200 day moving average can also be a useful technical analysis technique -- learn more about the 200 day moving average ».
Exchange traded funds (ETFs) trade just like stocks, but instead of ''shares'' investors are actually buying and selling ''units''. These ''units'' can be traded back and forth just like stocks, but can also be created or destroyed to accommodate investor demand. Each week we monitor the week-over-week change in shares outstanding data, to keep a lookout for those ETFs experiencing notable inflows (many new units created) or outflows (many old units destroyed). Creation of new units will mean the underlying holdings of the ETF need to be purchased, while destruction of units involves selling underlying holdings, so large flows can also impact the individual components held within ETFs.
Click here to find out which 9 other ETFs had notable inflows »</p>
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
- Game Publisher Analysis and Outlook Report 2025-2034: $250 Billion Market Evolving Toward IP-Led, Community-Driven Models with Electronic Arts, Activision Blizzard, Ubisoft, and Nintendo Leading
Nov 11, 2025
Company Logo
Key market opportunities in the global game publisher market include leveraging licensed IP-based games for stable monetization, exploring emerging markets with culturally localized content, and tapping into government-backed technological innovations. Embracing transmedia, AI-driven personalization, blockchain utilities, and strategic partnerships for cloud and subscription platforms further enhances revenue potential.
Game Publisher MarketGame Publisher Market
Dublin, Nov. 11, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Game Publisher Market Size Analysis Report - Market Share, Forecast Trends and Outlook (2025-2034)" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.
The global game publisher market was valued at USD 250.74 Billion in 2024. The market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 7.40% during the forecast period of 2025-2034
The surge in licensed IP-based games such as anime, sports, and Hollywood, is opening stable monetisation channels for publishers through transmedia collaborations, merchandise, and multi-platform brand activations. In turn, the market is expected to reach a value of USD 512.00 Billion by 2034.
The industry is undergoing a dynamic shift, propelled by innovations, evolving consumer behaviour, and policy-backed infrastructure. Publishers play the central role of content creation, monetization, and distribution. Reflecting this momentum, China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology approved over 1,000 new game titles in 2023, signalling a more relaxed regulatory environment and a renewed focus on promoting local content.
The surge in demand for culturally localized content in emerging markets like Southeast Asia, MENA, and Latin America is a crucial factor driving the growth of the game publisher market. Publishers are investing heavily in region-specific narratives, voiceovers, and game aesthetics to enhance player engagement and retention. This hyper-localization enables tapping into underserved demographics, fostering loyal communities, and standing out in a crowded global market, ultimately driving sustainable growth and diversified revenue streams for publishers.
Government funds are also encouraging technological innovations in the market. For example, South Korea's Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism announced a USD 43 million fund to boost gaming content development in 2025, particularly targeting indie publishers and cross-platform storytelling. Similarly, the United States Department of Commerce revealed plans to integrate immersive gaming into educational technology, which has indirectly fuelled demand for narrative-heavy, edutainment publishing ventures. Game publisher companies can, hence, find immense opportunities to leverage such vast investments to refine their content production through research and development activities.
Moreover, the rise of transmedia, where games integrate with movies, comics, and virtual concerts, is crafting fresh revenue streams. Firms can position themselves as community architects and even cultural ambassadors, while taking advantage of advanced technologies. For B2B stakeholders, the industry is fast becoming a gateway for scalable IP monetization, deeper user analytics, and international expansion, especially in underserved markets like Africa and Southeast Asia.
A major catalyst driving the game publisher market development is the investment surge in gaming IPs. In Q4 2024, Japanese publisher Kadokawa Corporation invested USD 15 million in AI-powered narrative game development, a genre that is rapidly rising in popularity, in countries like Japan and Europe. This move reflects the growing preference among publishers to develop proprietary engines and storytelling ecosystems instead of relying on third-party tools.
Moreover, emerging economies are boosting demand in the market. India witnessed over USD 200 million in gaming startup funding in 2024, most of which was channelled into game publishing platforms that target tier-2 and tier-3 cities. This demographic, previously untapped, is now offering a low-cost, high-engagement audience segment for global publishers.
AI-Driven Game Personalization
To boost the game publisher market value, companies are leveraging AI to hyper-personalize gameplay experiences. For example, Ubisoft's NEO AI framework enables dynamic character dialogue and non-linear storytelling, reducing developer load and speeding up release cycles. Governments have supported this trend as well. For instance, Germany's Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure invested AI integration in digital media. This technology is not only improving player immersion but also offering B2B partners real-time data on player behaviours, fuelling targeted monetization.
Rise of Regional IPs for Global Licensing
Publishers are tapping into regional cultures to build globally marketable IPs. For example, in 2024, Brazil's Ministry of Culture funded six indie publishers to adapt indigenous folklore into interactive games, generating cross-border licensing interest from European studios, boosting the game publisher market growth. These culturally rich narratives offer high emotional resonance, making them ideal for transmedia adaptations, which further enhance brand value. This trend is also supported by UNESCO's cultural innovation grants that promote gamified cultural storytelling. B2B players can leverage this fresh opportunity to develop unique, exportable content.
Transmedia Integration Becoming a Norm
Firms are gradually transitioning into multi-platform storytellers. Publishers now partner directly with streaming platforms to build interconnected universes across games, shows, and books. This offers revenue diversification and better IP retention. In this regard, Netflix's acquisition of Finnish game studio Next Games in 2024 marked a pivotal shift. As a result, companies investing in transmedia are experiencing a rapid surge in IP engagement across platforms.
Blockchain and NFT Gaming Utilities
Publishers are currently integrating blockchain to let players truly own in-game assets and share in the revenue, boosting further demand in the game publisher market. For example, Mythical Games launched the Mythos ecosystem in April 2023, where players can earn actual stakes in the games they play. Governments are beginning to endorse and support this emerging trend. Similarly, Singapore's Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) approved trials for regulated NFT platforms in the entertainment space. For B2B players, this opens up opportunities for keeping users engaged and creating shared value, especially in mature marketplaces like in China.
Subscription Publishing and Micro-Studio Partnerships
To combat the rising expenses of AAA production, which typically costs USD 200 million, publishers are seeking micro-studios for developing niche content, bundled into subscription platforms, shaping the game publisher market dynamics. EA Originals, for example, signed six new studios focusing on mental health themes. The European Commission's Creative Europe program has offered several grants to help indie publishers with such partnerships.
繼續閱讀
By Region, North America Secures the Leading Position in the Market
North America boasts significant game publisher market opportunities. The region's high console penetration, strong broadband, and presence of tech giants create the ideal ecosystem for publishing companies to grow. Amazon and Microsoft have also entered direct publishing deals, offering publishers scalable technology and distribution channels. The United States government's CHIPS and Science Act has also sparked investments in gaming technology and graphics innovation.
The Asia Pacific market is projected to grow at a CAGR of 9.6% over the forecast period, with China standing out as a key driving country. Fuelled by the widespread adoption of mobile devices and faster internet connectivity, mobile gaming is booming among China's vast population. In 2024, China saw over 660 million active mobile gamers.
Publishers are also leveraging AR/VR integration and innovative storytelling to enhance user retention. Furthermore, supportive policies, like tax breaks on digital entertainment R&D, further fuel game publisher market expansion. Strategic collaborations between game publishers and smartphone makers, such as Tencent's recent tie-up with Oppo, are accelerating innovation, positioning China as a powerhouse within the APAC gaming ecosystem.
Competitive Landscape
The game publisher market players are shifting from volume-based strategies to IP-led and community-first models. Companies are now focusing on platform-agnostic publishing, decentralized monetization, and personalized content delivery. Publishers are forming partnerships with micro-studios, experimenting with AI writing tools, and co-developing content with creators on Twitch and YouTube.
The entry of non-traditional players like Netflix and TikTok Studios is reshaping the market scenario, pushing traditional game publisher companies to rethink strategies. These firms prioritize brand intimacy, real-time audience insights, and diverse, bite-sized storytelling formats. Opportunities lie in adaptability, creative risk-taking, and building emotionally resonant IPs that stand out in an increasingly crowded, content-driven market. Moreover, the rising popularity of midcore mobile genres, hybrid-casual mechanics, and seasonal live-events is encouraging publishers to adopt agile pipelines that combine behavioural analytics with iterative design for better player retention and monetisation efficiency.
Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts, established in 1982 and headquartered in California, United States, is shifting focus toward EA Originals and indie collaborations. The company's recent deal with Silver Rain Games on narrative-forward content is drawing attention from B2B narrative tool developers.
Activision Blizzard
Activision Blizzard, founded in 2008 and based in Santa Monica, California, is leaning heavily on remasters and mobile publishing. The company's partnership with NetEase to distribute Call of Duty: Mobile in Asia marks a key strategic shift.
Ubisoft
Ubisoft, founded in 1986 in Montreuil, France, is currently focusing on proprietary tools like Snowdrop engine and procedural AI. The company strategizes on sustainability-driven narratives to carve a new genre category altogether.
Nintendo
Nintendo, established in 1889 and headquartered in Kyoto, Japan, blends nostalgia with innovation. The company concentrates on hybrid physical-digital releases, such as Mario Kart Live, and is redefining in-home interactive entertainment.
Other key players in the market are Sony Interactive Entertainment, Microsoft Studios, TakeTwo Interactive, Square Enix, Bandai Namco Entertainment, and Tencent Games, among others.
Key Highlights of the Game Publisher Market Report:
Historical performance and accurate forecasts through 2034, enabling long-view strategies for digital storefronts, in-game monetisation, and studio partnerships. Insights into product innovations like episodic narrative engines, live-service frameworks, and low-latency cross-platform architecture. In-depth competitive landscape profiling AAA publishers, mobile-first indie studios, and cloud-native development houses with monetisation partnerships across regions. Regional analysis identifying Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe as fast-scaling hubs with growing gamer bases, localisation needs, and mobile-first preferences. Investment-focused outlook supported by VC and M&A activity, with publishers acquiring backend tech firms and creative studios to enhance IP pipelines and player retention.
Key Attributes:
Report Attribute Details No. of Pages 153 Forecast Period 2025 - 2034 Estimated Market Value (USD) in 2025 $250.74 Billion Forecasted Market Value (USD) by 2034 $512 Billion Compound Annual Growth Rate 7.4% Regions Covered Global
Companies Featured
Electronic Arts (EA) Activision Blizzard Ubisoft Nintendo Sony Interactive Entertainment Microsoft Studios TakeTwo Interactive Square Enix Bandai Namco Entertainment Tencent Games
For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/2anofc
About ResearchAndMarkets.com
ResearchAndMarkets.com is the world's leading source for international market research reports and market data. We provide you with the latest data on international and regional markets, key industries, the top companies, new products and the latest trends.
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Game Publisher Market
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- A Motley Fool 5-Stock Sampler 10 Years Later
Sep 9, 2025
First up in this Rule Breaker Investing podcast is a look at our original 2015 stock sampler: "5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years," a motley mix that spanned Latin American e-commerce, rural convenience, blockbuster gaming, front-line cybersecurity, and kitchen-tech roll-ups. Longtime Fool Rick Munarriz joins as Motley Fool co-founder David Gardner's sidekick to share the what, why, and when of these stocks' march through the decade.
To catch full episodes of all The Motley Fool's free podcasts, check out our podcast center. When you're ready to invest, check out this top 10 list of stocks to buy.
A full transcript is below.
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The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the 10 best stocks for investors to buy now… and Casey's General Stores wasn’t one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years.
Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $670,781!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $1,023,752!*
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*Stock Advisor returns as of September 8, 2025
This podcast was recorded on Sept. 03, 2025.
David Gardner: Ten years ago, September 2nd, 2015, we launched our very first five stock sampler, 5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years. It was a Motley mix by design. A Latin American e-commerce upstart, a rural convenience chain that secretly sells rivers of pizza, a video game powerhouse, a cybersecurity fighter, and a kitchen tech roll up. Today, we fire up the time machine 10 years later to see what actually happened through recessions, pandemics, acquisitions, and all the surprises a decade can deliver. We'll score our returns against the S&P 500, then ask the only questions that matter. What do we get right? What do we get wrong? What may we have been missing? I've invited my side kick for this episode Rick Munarriz to bring the goods, the stories, some analysis. We'll have some numbers too. We'll talk about the lessons you could use on your next 10 year journey. Five stocks for the next five years, 10 years later. Only on this week's Rule Breaker Investing.
Story Continues
Welcome back to Rule Breaker Investing. It's September. I have been waiting for this month for months and months because in just a couple of weeks, the book, my final stock market book, Rule Breaker Investing comes out. A book I finished around a year ago, and I've been sitting on my hands for months and months doing Page Breaker previews. September is circled on my calendar. I could not be more excited that we're finally here September 2025. Now, speaking of months ago, I also did something else a few months ago. I signaled then what we're doing this week. I told you I wanted to go back to the 30 times I picked a five stock sampler on this show, 30 times where I said, here's a theme. Here's a basket, five stocks. Let's go beat the market and learn some great lessons together. Well, as history shows, we did beat the market. Most of these samplers were picked to play a game that lasted three years. How did they do over those three years? Well, many a review of Palooza podcast, as longtime listeners will know, ensued an episode I did here to update you on the stories. The performance of those 35 stock samplers picked 10 weeks apart over nearly six years. We check in a year later, two, and then three, and then close the game down. But earlier this summer, I began to foreshadow what's going to preoccupy us about, I don't know, once every 10 weeks going forward. Which is here on Rule Breaker Investing, we're going to go back to each of those five stock samplers, the great ones, the good ones, the also-runs, and the underdogs.
We have a few of those, too. Seeing now 10 years later, that week of their 10th anniversary, that's the actual timeframe that I as a Rule Breaker investor invest for. I hope you too, 10 years. How has that five stock sampler picked 10 years ago this week? How has it done? What can we learn? That's what we're doing this week, this special week we're kicking off our first episode in my 10 years later series with my pal and longtime sidekick, Rick Munarriz. But first, as I shared at the start of this year, my 2025 book, Rule Breaker Investing is available for your preorder right now. After 30 years of stock picking, this is my magnum opus, a lifetime of lessons distilled into one definitive guide. Each week, until the book launches on September 16th, I'm sharing a random excerpt. We break open the book to a random page, and I read a few sentences. Let's do it. This is the second to last page breaker preview. It's from the finale to Part 2 of the book where we explore the six traits of Rule Breaker stocks, and I'm reflecting on this page on a list that's on the page of my seven best stock picks. It's a table reflecting the seven 100 plus baggers topped by my single greatest ever stock pick amazon.com on September 8th of 1997. My gosh, September 8th. That's this very week. In 1997, 28 years later, it was, as of my publishing date, up 1371 times.
Anyway, let me quote now from the page, and I quote, "What matters most to me about this list is making it not just imaginable but real for millions of people. Each row is special. The prices have fluctuated since the publishing date, and these stocks will go in and out of favor. Some may fall from the hundred bagger ledge, while others near but not on the list like Shopify, Salesforce or Chipotle may arrive. In the end, there is no specific magic to the number 100. Heck, I prefer 1371." That's this week's Page Breaker preview. I'm really excited to say some early reviews are starting to roll in. Igor [inaudible] does his new frontier newsletter, online he reviews investing books, and he just came out with this this week. I quote, "There's certainly no shortage of investment books on the bookshelves. Some are a waste of time, some are helpful, and there are those that define your investment principles forever. David Gardner's Rule Breaker Investing is such a book. The stories are captivating. The writing style is magnetic, and you will certainly not put it down until the last page." Thank you very much, Igor [inaudible] for that. It does make me wonder. What did I write on the last page that Igor finally threw it down? I think I'm joking. Let's move on now to the first episode of 10 Years Later where I get to welcome Rick Munarriz. Rick has been part of the Motley Fool since 1995 as a contributing writer, analyst and cheerleader. Yep, I said 1995. When not breaking down stocks. He's breaking down scenes as part of the management team for Just the Funny, Miami's oldest improv comedy, theater, Rick Munarriz welcome back to Rule Breaker Investing.
Rick Munarriz: It's great to be here, David. Thank you.
David Gardner: Thank you. It's almost silly for me to say, welcome back, Rick. Since you were there at the start, it's like welcoming somebody to their own home and saying, welcome back to the place that you helped build. It is a delight to have you join with me, Rick, and as I thought about 5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years and all the stock picking that you and I have done together, and I get to brag earlier in my excerpt from my book, I mentioned Chipotle. That was a stock you brought to Motley Fool Rule Breakers. Your work and mine have been intertwined for many years, and it's a delight, therefore, to have you kick off 10 Years Later. Every 10 weeks, we open a time capsule. A past five stock sampler hits its 10 year birthday. We're going to score each pick equal weighted from the original air date. We're going to see its return and compare it to the S&P 500 over the same span. Then we do the real work. What do we get right? What do we get wrong? Are we missing anything? Well, actually, I have on each time a Motley Fool friend to help do a lot of that work. This week, it is, of course, longtime Fool, Rick Munarriz to join me and discuss together what the decade actually taught us as investors. We finish with the samplers overall result and maybe a quick go forward view on each company. If you're new here, that's 10 Years Later. Not just keeping score, but learning how and why Rule Breakers win, and sometimes lose too. The very nature of this week's episode and really the whole episodic series is we're going back in time. It's time to get in the Rule Breaker time machine. In this case, I'm setting the date for 10 years ago this week. [MUSIC] Rick, 5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years. This first sampler picked on September 2, 2015, there was no real theme to this one looking back. Looking over these stocks, there wasn't anything that really brought them together.
Rick Munarriz: It's a collection of magic makers, game makers, and pizza makers. There's a lot of things there. If there is a threat, is that they're all exciting growth talks at the time, promising companies.
David Gardner: It's funny to think back because I think at the time, as I picked this, I wasn't necessarily saying five stock sampler or we'll do 10 of these, let alone 30 of these. I think I was just feeling like, since we've started, this is a brand new podcast, I should pick stocks from time to time. I guess it made sense to lead off with what we would call a Motley List, given that this is Motley Fool Rule Breakers as a podcast. This is five completely different companies that all had something rule breakery about them. I hope what we're going to do together, is we're just going to go through each one. We're going to talk about the company, what it does really quickly for anybody who's not acquainted. Then Rick, you're going to start making me and all of us smarter as we look back on 10 years of performance. I'm going to give the performance, you're gonna help us understand why. Sound good?
Rick Munarriz: Sounds perfect.
David Gardner: Let's get started then, Stock number 1, 5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years was, and I use that past tense intentionally, was Activision Blizzard. Ticker symbol ATVI. Now in 2015, Activision Blizzard was already the House of Call of Duty and World of Watercraft, and then it added Candy Crush, bringing billions of phone swipes into the fold. Gaming was shifting from boxed disks to always on worlds. A few mega franchises became global habits, and ATVI owned. I think it's fair to say, Rick, several of them. The decade ended with Microsoft buying the whole Arcade for $95 a share, and that's a testament to how valuable that engagement flywheel became, I think. Listening back 10 years ago, which I did take time to do, Rick. Here's what I was saying in 2015. I basically said, video games are played more than movies are watched. That that trend would extend a top tier publisher, which with at the time, a $20 billion market cap struck me as the right way to ride that secular timeshare. Rick, before I give the numbers and performance, initial thoughts from you about this company and what began happening.
Rick Munarriz: Obviously, this is a story that I like to call four weddings and a funeral. To me, Activision is a story of love, mostly matrimony not always love. Many of the biggest games had been the product of acquiring a smaller developer for Activision Blizzard. They had Tony Hawk's Pro Skater in 1999. That was never soft. That's one wedding. Infinity War, it sounds like a department store, but it was actually a game developer in 2003, gave it Call of Duty a few months after it was acquired. I guess you can call that a shotgun wedding. The third wedding was the largest. It joined forces with Vivendi Blizzard in 2008. This is the company StarCraft and World of Warcraft, as you mentioned. It was big enough deal that Activision became Activision Blizzard. All this happened before our timeline started 10 years ago. But I think it's important because these three weddings and several other smaller deals helped give Activision Blizzard a diversified arsenal across genres and platforms. In a world of fickle gamers, Activision always seems to have a franchise with a pulse. Then it made a big splash afterwards. As you mentioned Candy Crush, and that was 2016, picked up Candy Crush developer King. That's wedding number 4. But when you live by bending the knee, you also die by it. Microsoft made an offer that Activision couldn't refuse three years ago. That was just $95 a share, which is $69 billion.
Unfortunately, all cash deal took a long time to close. It was announced in January of 2022, and it didn't close till October of 2023. But again, the story for us as Activision Blizzard investors ends there, because, again, you're getting a cash payout and whether you sold out early in January when it was announced or later on, forced your hand, you were left with money and money to go somewhere else. That's the Activision Blizzard story, a company that did fairly well over the years. It's never been perfect for the video game industry. It happens all the time. Sometimes the blunders, there's delays with releases. But overall, Activision Blizzard, I think has been successful, and has always found a way to pick up something that it needed. It's on a perpetual shopping trip sometimes. Even I didn't mention RedOctane but that's how it got Guitar Hero, which is another big hit for them for a while. There are just too many weddings. It's more Elizabeth Taylor wedding streak for this company. But I'll leave the wedding talk there, but definitely a dynamic company that's unfortunately no longer available as a stand-alone company.
David Gardner: That's right. I was looking back at this. We picked again, September 2nd, 2015. I picked it at $28.37. This was a sampler that was picked for five years. Almost all of the others were just for three years. We did finally review this September 2nd of 2020, the height of the pandemic in some ways, and the company was at $83.45. As you point out, not too long after that, it got gobbled up by Microsoft at 95. The total return then for this stock was 234.9% and the S&P 500 of the exact same time, September 2nd, 2015, right through the market close October 13th of 2023. The S&P was up 118.4%. Good news, we won by 116.4 points of Alpha, i.e, we about doubled up the market, Rick. Yeah, this one is over. As you mentioned, it got cashed out. I love your four weddings and a funeral analogy. I still enjoy Activision Blizzard games, but it's now Microsoft.
Rick Munarriz: It's come a long way again. I didn't know that the origin of the name is actually the four developers, that four gamers, they got active and television and merged that together to be Activision. Their very first big hit, which sold four million copies was Pitfall on the Atari. My eventual wife, before we met each other, that was our favorite Atari game. It was very different than all the other Atari games. But then again, everything else is obviously bigger than life. But it's sad to see it gone. Definitely one of my favorite video game stocks in video game companies that now because it's such a large company like Microsoft, I don't feel so financially invested in tracking it anymore.
David Gardner: Those are the particulars. Yes, as you pointed out, Rick, it's impossible to still own Activision Blizzard. It did not convert its shares into Microsoft. I guess somebody who knew Satya Nadella was going to be as awesome as he has been may have just bought Microsoft with their Activision Blizzard shares. But for this sampler and for this stock, Rick, we concluded it eight years in. It didn't get to play through to today. I think for each of these stocks, we should draw just a couple of lessons or observations, losing the trees and just forest level thinking about why, in this case, Rick Munarriz, why did Activision Blizzard work? The stock tripled, doubled out the market's average over 10 years, why?
Rick Munarriz: I think Activision Blizzard, they were able to build out a catalog that the original four founders of the company would have never been able to do on their own. They found what they needed. They built an empire that gamers of all ages, across all platforms, no matter what you're holding in your hands, or what you're watching on your TV, you can integrate yourself in the Activision Blizzard universe, and they made that work. That made the company very attractive to investors and ultimately very attractive to Microsoft.
David Gardner: Thank you, and I also want to say about the company, I liked the CEO. He was a controversial figure. Often video gamers don't love the CEOs of the companies that they buy their games from. They think they're greedy, capitalist, pigs or I'm not even sure. At different points, Bobby Kotick was maybe more or less popular. I always thought he was a great entrepreneur. I try to see the business side of things as I play the video games, and I liked everything that I saw. He was really, in many ways, the founder. He bought this company, I think, early on and really managed it all the way through to huge value creation over time. I met him once. I wrote an essay or two about that. I'm a Bobby Kotick fan. He actually makes an appearance in Money Ball, the movie with Brad Pitt, Bobby Kotick makes a cameo as the owner of the Oakland Athletics early on in that movie, fun fact. But I sometimes will want to call out at a forest level who is running this thing. Often they're admirable people, whether they have controversy in their lives, Elon Musk or not, they're great value creators. That's another thought I have about Activision Blizzard. Also, it's a fun stock to follow if you are a gamer, because you're buying something that you really know very well. For me, Rick, it's a lot more fun buying video game stock than a B2B SaaS company stock. I guess I should throw that in too.
Rick Munarriz: It's like Peter Lynch by what you know.
David Gardner: A lovely note to end on. That was Stock number 1. We're going through these alphabetically. That's as they were presented 10 years ago this week. Rick, let's move on to Stock number 2. Now for something completely different, as I think the Monty Python crew once said, because really, each of these stocks takes us in a new direction. Stock number 2, alphabetically, is Casey's General Stores. Ticker symbol CASY. I'm going to use the present tense for this one, because it didn't get bought out, taken off the market. Casey's looks like a gas station until you notice half the town shows up for the pizza. Yes, really. Over the decade, the chain quietly upgraded kitchens, apps, and loyalty. It turned its fill up and go into fill up, eat, and come back tomorrow. It's the Midwestern compounding story, small towns, good food, steady service, repeat business, Casey's General Stores. Why did I pick it, Rick? I think it's because I saw the time we had a pre existing recommendation for this and most of our sampled stocks. The reason they are samplers is because these were existing picks already, often at lower cost basis. But Casey's by this point, 2015 was the number 5 seller of pizza nationwide. But it's a convenience store, and it was only operating in less than 1/3 of the United States. A quirky, under followed growth runway hiding, I would say, in plain sight. Rick, as you've looked over this story, what's jumped out to you about Casey's?
Rick Munarriz: I walked away with three big reasons why this seemingly sleepy convenience store operator that you and I are admitting is a convenience store operator is crushing the market over the past decade. The first reason is expansion.
Rick Munarriz: They had 1,888 corporate stores 10 years ago. Today, it's 2,658. Not a huge jump in expansion. It built some from scratch, but mostly it buys chains in highly fragmented sectors. This is that kind of space. Then with expansion comes scalability, so you have this ability to grow. There's still potential. Earlier this year, it just opened its first store in Texas. It's 17 states.
David Gardner: That's amazing on its own, Rick, that they're only just now opening in Texas.
Rick Munarriz: Yes. Where you think Casey's pi originated from, but no, they just got there now.
David Gardner: In a lot of ways, Rick, even now, I look at it and say, Is this really a rule breaker stock? I think in general, it's not really a rule-breaker stock. But then again, Motley Fool rule breakers, the service or stock advisor for which I picked the stock, not always shooting for pure rule breakers all the time. But what we were looking for or some of the dynamics that some rule breakers have. For example, I can't say, Rick, this is a top dog and first mover in an important emerging industry. I can't say that, but I can say it has strong consumer appeal, which is trait Number 5 of rule breaker stocks. It's not necessarily a world-known brand. I sure isn't in parts of the US, people have never heard of Casey's, but in parts of the US that have they know and appreciate. It has a strong consumer appeal. It's not just the convenience or even the gas. It's the pizza, etc. I think that's worth pointing out often, even when a stock like this one doesn't feel like a true rule breaker, it's still a stock I'd recommend and love to have in my portfolio. Let's look at the numbers. Are we glad we had this one? Well, you did mention market crushing, and as of this week, 10 years later, having picked the stock at $104 and 80 cents, 10 years ago, it's now up to $495, 14 cents. That is more than a four-bagger. It's up 373%. The market up 223%. Now, the figure for the market is a little bit different than what I just presented for Activision Blizzard. Of course, because Activision Blizzard got pulled off the market back in October of 2023, when the S&P had overall returned 118%, but all four of the other stocks we're talking about this week, Rick, are being measured against the S&P 500 return over the last 10 years of 223.2%. We're just going to round, though, so yeah, Casey's 373 to the markets 223, about 150% point out performance, Rick. As we look over that one together now, again, forest level, big picture insights, why has Casey's quadrupled over the last decade crushing the market averages?
Rick Munarriz: I covered expansion. The second reason it's changing with the times. A decade ago, a Casey's General Stores was reporting same store cigarette sales. I'm not making that up. I looked up, like, their 2014 reports, and they're like, same store cigarette sales are up 7%. That's what convenience stores were at that time. You probably, even if you've never been to a Casey's, to me, it would pass a snap test if you lived in a rural community that depends on this. But even through the more mainstream the WoW was, the buckis of the world, that are these convenience stores that are just iconic, that's what Casey's is at that level. Again, you're talking about the pizza. This is a company that not only their favorite pizza, the quality of their coffee is something that they profess front and center. They've changed from a store that is just it's a gas station. That's the appeal. That's why you get there. That's actually my third reason, I'll just tie him as it dives right in there that it's no longer a pump play. A decade ago, the financial results would actually lead with gasoline business, how it's doing, cigarette sales, and then dive into the rest of the store. Fuel was the big draw to Casey's. That's not so much the case now. It's still important case for Casey's. But the gross profit for its inside the store business. That's everything else outside of gas is now nearly double its fuel business for the gross profit.
David Gardner: That is beautiful, and thank you for pointing that out. Companies that become increasingly relevant to their customers, when they add new possibilities, new ways to do business, some of those go away, Rick, cigarette sales, probably, I hope, not as big as they were 10 years ago. But the company just adding and augmenting its offerings for its dedicated customer base, a great sign of good management and solid steady growth, which is often all it takes over a 10 year period for a company to be a great investment. I was looking back as we closed out the Lollapalooza for this five years ago, because we said, after all, five stocks for the next five years, Casey's was actually a loser to the market. It was up 73%. The market at the time was up 81%. As we said goodbye to this sampler five years ago, I was having to say, Alas, Casey's has underperformed. What a disappointment, but we still believe in it. I'm really delighted now over a more meaningful time period, 10 years to reflect in this stock that is now more than a four-bagger. Sometimes, Rick, admittedly, we closed out, like during the pandemic, when things weren't great at different points. You can imagine Casey's probably wasn't as great a business in 2020 as it is in 2025. But isn't it nice to see companies come back and become world beaters in years 6-10?
Rick Munarriz: Definitely in this case, as terrible as the COVID pandemic was, it probably helped and basically emboldened people to, hey, this is our place that we can drive to and get a pizza because we're done with blue apron or whatever we're doing at home and go out and get something local, safe and eat. Help them become a bigger part of the community. Definitely, it's obviously the last five years have worked out pretty well for Casey's shareholders.
David Gardner: Let's move on to stock Number 3, and now for something completely different. In this case, it's not just a different business Rick. It's a different direction on the performance of the stock. Well, we'll talk about that. Stock Number 3 was FireEye. Ticker symbol FEYE. Again, we're doing this alphabetically. That's how I presented them, so FireEye. But over the course of 10 years, it took on a different name through a merger and then got merged out altogether. Today, it's part of a little company named Alphabet, ticker symbol GOOG. The return I'm giving carries it forward all the way through. If you 10 years ago this week bought my five stock sampler and owned some FireEye, your cost basis was $37 and 47 cents. I'm going to say in a little while, Rick, it's done and why. But first, some top-of-mind thoughts about cybersecurity, FireEye, 2015.
Rick Munarriz: The big lesson here is that business model surfing is not for the timid. This is a company that was in the right place in the right time. Obviously, cybersecurity is a big deal, and they basically were the leader, one of the leaders, the original breach detection hardware appliance business, which seemed to be an exciting place to be. While FireEye is a compound word, as you and I will eventually get to, it was not much of a compounder.
David Gardner: That is true. Not long after it got bought up merged with Mandiant, and threats are escalating. Cybersecurity started as nuisance-level stuff back in the day and became more nation-state stuff. That was true even 10 years ago, but Mandiant brought forensics and Intel. It was the company that you would bring in on speed dial when something had gone wrong to figure out more afterward what exactly happened. But, Rick, as history will show, Google ultimately bought Mandiant and folded that expertise into its own Cloud offerings. In some ways, we could say, this was proof the good guys business, which is always what I think about cybersecurity. I think I was saying 10 years ago, on this fairy podcast that week, the good guys always outnumber the bad guys, which I profoundly believe in this world, and that's good news for optimists, because it means it's really a tiny percentage of people who are really trying to mess with your cyber. I prefer the good guys' side of everything. In this case, this is the good guys' side of the business, but value accrues differently. Sometimes, Rick, based on business models, as you mentioned, so though I love the space and I love the mission, and it felt like a front-line operator in a market with I think we say non-negotiable demand, sometimes surprise demand at different points. This one didn't play out great.
Rick Munarriz: No, it didn't and here you have a company, again, it shifted its miles when it picked up Mandiant. I said, we're going to move away. They're still doing hardware more of a subscription-based cloud business that you and I have seen great companies take that model and make it work. They didn't, and basically sold its parts for scrap. It sold the original FireEye business for $1.2 billion, took that private. Then, half a year after rebranding itself as Mandiant that's when the Google Alphabet deal happened, $5.4 billion, again, all all-cash deal, and that was it. Again, it was at the right place. If you had a basket of 10 cybersecurity stocks about 10 years ago, you would probably have a much bigger basket today. But unfortunately, this one just did not work out. It couldn't navigate through the times.
David Gardner: Thank you very much, Rick, because it's on me to put the final numbers on things, I want to make sure I'm very clear here. That cost basis for FireEye of $37 and 47 cents 10 years ago, we have to adjust that for what happened. I'm going to give you the official numbers very shortly. I do want to mention that Mandiant purchase was in 2021. That was after the end of the review of Lollapalooza for these five stocks for the next five years. In fact, it was still FireEye when we last talked about it five years ago, this week on this podcast, and it had gone from 37.5-15, so it was down 59%. The market at the same time was up 81%. This was the obvious clunker loser, which sadly, it remains now five years after that with its 10-year return, but at least it's now moving with Alphabet stock. Here are the overall numbers in a somewhat complex situation. If you had bought FireEye stock with us ten years ago today, you would have an effective cost basis in Alphabet today of $182 and 10 cents, 182. Google is just over 211 right now. The overall investment, just buying and holding FireEye and rolling it into Mandiant, and then taking your Google money, including half payoffs of cash at different points. If you just held it all the way through, you're up. Yeah, 16% on the dot. 16%, Rick, over 10 long years. You were down 59% at one point, so it's been a comeback story. But unfortunately, as I already mentioned, the market's up 223%, so 16 doesn't even hold a candle to the market's overall performance. This is an obvious loser and obvious dud. Rick, what did I get wrong? What could I have done better here?
Rick Munarriz: David, if you want frank advice in retrospect, then we can all be geniuses here, you could have cut out the middleman and done a lot better. You bought Alphabet as a seven-bagger over the past ten years. Just get to the story, get to the finish line, and do that 10 years earlier, and it would have been great. But I don't think anyone could blame you for picking FireEye at the time. Everything was right about the bullish thesis. It just failed the execution, and others got better, while it just basically was not able to put the pieces together in time.
David Gardner: I think it's worth saying, as well, thank you, Rick, in some ways, forgiving me. I feel slightly better, but not still great on this one. I think there's something to say about an industry. Like, I had profound belief that cybersecurity was going to be a growth industry for the rest of our lives. I feel the same way today. It might be that in an AI world, we start safetying up things more. Maybe the AIs start figuring out how to make it less catastrophic or threatening the world of cybersecurity. Maybe cybersecurity declines at some point, but I don't see that point anytime soon. I feel as if we had the important emerging industry part right, but this really was never the top dog or first mover. It was a player within the industry. If there's a lesson here, maybe it's Dave, stick with your top dogs and first movers a little bit more. Or sometimes, Rick, maybe I should just ditch the industry altogether and buy Alphabet.
Rick Munarriz: Sounds good.
David Gardner: Yes, that's the total accounting then for stock Number 3, FireEye/Mandiant/Alphabet, up 16%, the market crushing it up 223% 10 years later. Let's move on to stock Number 4. Stock Number 4 was Mercado Libre ticker symbol MELI. I think you can think of Mercado Libre as Latin America's buy sell ship pay superail. It's a marketplace on the front end. It's got payments and credit in your pocket, logistics humming in the background. So what began as the Amazon/eBay of Latin America, which is how I was talking about it 10 years ago, has become the Amazon of the Amazon, as a friend of mine recently said. It's got bots in every direction, Mercado Pago, Envios sub businesses that are very similar to what Amazon does at global scale elsewhere. Volatile headlines, Rick Munarriz, steady mission, though. Volatile stock at different points. I know we'll talk about that. But ultimately, I was saying this in 2015, if you could have owned Amazon or eBay in the 1990s, that's where Latin America was, I said, 10 years ago. This was a $5 billion market cap. If you could have bought Amazon or eBay in the 90s at a $5 billion market cap, I think you would have loved to do so. That's how it felt to me, Rick. Now, I am not a native speaker of the language, Spanish; you are. You have a lot more association, I think, with this company. You've followed it carefully over the years. What have you seen that explains the fantastic outperformance that I will later reveal about stock Number 4?
Rick Munarriz: I think you've seen, again, it started with just that one verb. Just shopping, e-commerce, and that was fine. But the revenue mix has changed dramatically as it adds new offerings and different segments that had different ghost trajectories. E-commerce is still a force there. Ten years ago, its gross value of merchandise that was selling was double the payments it was processing, which is Mercado Pago, is payment platform. Today, it's completely different. Today, again, the e-commerce is still doing well, still much larger now, but Mercado Pago payment platform is generating four times the gross merchandise volume on the e-commerce end. You just don't settle for just putting your foot in the door. Mercado Libre has used its brand and reputation in Latin America to expand it to fulfillment, credit cards, trading marketplaces, loans, and all other products and related services. They've been able to take advantage of their leadership in one position, and it's the online company that people trust in that region and just expand it over time. It's been obviously very, very successful, as we'll get to soon. Thank you, and we will get to those numbers. Can't wait to share them very shortly. Have to mention Marcos Galperin because he has been a fantastic founder/CEO over the years. I don't think he's quite as active right now, but he is the genius behind this company, and like I called out in a good way, Bobby Kotick earlier for doing a great job building a company over decades that create a lot of value and had products and services, I appreciate it. I'm not an active buyer from Mercado Libre myself, Rick, but I know how many people are, and Galperin has been a genius-level CEO for this company. Definitely an underrated global CEO, because I think most people don't know that name, but now at a $122 billion market gap and counting, I'm going to say, Rick, we can clearly see we had a great CEO and founder.
Rick Munarriz: Again, just the 10 years and we're not even getting to the returns, but just the business. Net income has risen 20-fold since the end of 2014. Revenue has soared 40-fold. You don't see that too often. That's what you saw got in Mercado Libre. Hopefully, it got us some good returns.
David Gardner: It did. Our cost basis was $109 and 94 cents 10 years ago this week. Most recently, it's at 2,384. This stock picked 10 years ago is now a 21-bagger up 2,069%. The market, as we know, is up 2023. We pretty much destroyed market averages with this stock. As you and I talked offline beforehand, Rick, I could have picked four -100% losers alongside this one stock, and we would have a market crusher. Now, Rick, it's never our goal at the Motley Fool to pick bad stocks. Every one of these five, I picked with promise, and I couldn't have known ahead of time which one would win or lose or by how much. Boy, am I glad I opened my mouth and said Mercado Libre 10 years ago this week?
Rick Munarriz: Especially with this list, where two of the first three left us basically tooth fairy money under our pillow and moved on.
David Gardner: Here you have a Galileo saying, "Hey, you know what? Look what's under the tree." It is the situation where it's always good to have this heavy hitter, a cleanup hitter as your fourth pick. It is worth mentioning, Rick, as an active member of our Motley Fool Rule Breakers team. You already know this, but if you look up and down the history of the Motley Fool Rule Breakers Service launched in October of 2004, and you ask, what has been the greatest stock pick we ever made thus far at Motley Fool Rule Breakers, the answer is not Tesla. Tesla has been a total home run stock for Motley Fool Rule Breakers, and that even includes some of the downside we've seen. Some people don't like Elon Musk these days. I remain an Elon fan as a business follower and an investor, but you might think that Tesla, given that it is up 159 times in value for us since 2011, would have been our best stock ever for Rule Breakers, but no, it's Mercado Libre. The stock is up from its $14 cost basis in 2009. I think this is worth calling out as a lesson, Rick. That means that when I picked it 10 years ago this week, that was six years and way higher than we had it from our original cost basis. Our original cost basis is 14, but here we were 10 years ago, Rick, saying, we like it at 109. That is one of the more important lessons I could possibly share with you this week or any other, which is, what do winners do, Rick Munarriz?
Rick Munarriz: They keep winning.
David Gardner: They keep winning. Not every time. Not all the time, and not every one. But in general, that has been my experience. One of the things I love about the 5 Stock Sampler, the ones that worked out, and I even love it about the ones that didn't. Because I love all my children. But I love that we're constantly demonstrating adding to winners when many other people just say, I missed Apple. I'll never buy Apple or Amazon because I just missed. That's not the right mindset. Am I right?
Rick Munarriz: You're never going to catch them all to throw Pokémon thing in there. But you are getting these situations where one great pick is all you need to basically create life altering wealth.
David Gardner: Thank you for that. That certainly was true of this stock for this sampler. We're going to move to the final stock, which is not really a winner. It's a fire eye retread, so we're moving from the some of the peak of what was achievable 10 years ago, much lower into a valley. Of course, I'll be providing the overall numbers a little bit later, we'll also share, Rick, a little bit later, what we think of these stocks now. We'll have a little banter around that. But let's go to Stock Number 5 now from the sublime, if you will, not quite ridiculous, but Middleby was the fifth stock in five stocks for the next five years. The ticker symbol M-I-D-D Middleby, rolling up the gear behind your favorite restaurants. The ovens, the friars, the smart kitchen tech that makes cooks faster and food more consistent. Middleby, over many years, has been a winning company and a winning stock. Many Motley Fool members have owned some Middleby at some point. I picked it 10 years ago this week as part of five stock mix. Rick, it leaned into upgrades and efficiency. But this stock, I might as well give the numbers out right now since I've already hinted at them. It was at $107.47, 10 years ago this week. Today, it's at $136.70 or so cents, meaning it's up 27%. It is up over a long, dynamic, remarkable decade, and yet, Rick, 27% returned over 10 years is just way behind the market averages. Before I ask you why? Why has this stock underperformed so badly? Let me just first open it up with any general thoughts that you have about Middleby.
Rick Munarriz: I think Middleby. To me, again, you an they're a corporate hoarder. I counted the tiles on their brands page. I'm sure it's written somewhere, but I like to count sometimes. [laughs] It has 127 brands in its arsenal. Most of them were actually acquisitions or part of an acquisition, so it's been doing that for the whole run. To me, the most impressive thing out of the whole thing was, you've already gotten to how it's been a disappointment the past 10 years. The previous 10 years, with the same strategy, same acquiring, same growth, it was a 10 bagger, basically 2005-2015, and then this time around, its decade.
David Gardner: The stock, which I'd picked a couple of times in 2013 for Rule Breaker members, a couple of years before selecting it for this sampler, it was a monster winner for a little while there. I'm not going to go back and check the stock grafts or the numbers, but it was arcing higher and higher. It has to be the case that the departure of longtime CEO Salim Basle, longtime friend of the fool, Salim has attended Motley Fool events. He was briefly on our board. He is a wonderful, a highly entrepreneurial CEO who went on to be hired by six flags, which had its own recent merger, but Salim left Middleby. That's probably a factor in this 10 year performance.
Rick Munarriz: It could be the jump the Shark moment. There are other factors, too, but obviously, he was the one who was able to put all the pieces together. He's the one that acquired Viking to get into the residential side, all the food processing and stuff. Eighty one percent of their business is commercial food service and processing, and the balance is residential, so it's basically what you're talking about mostly restaurants and institutions. I think what held it back at least these last years, there were some macro issues. You have a case where restaurants struggling right now and folks are working from home now very often. The old commissaries that used to have to hire a lot of people, go through a lot of food, go through a lot of equipment, don't have to do that, so that's happening that. On the residential side, again, if you've priced the Viking appliance and all of some of the other appliances, they're not cheap. Right now with the real estate market the way it is, there's not a lot of activity, so a lot of people moving or up and I guess on the front burner of both these issues is the interest rates. Again, Middleby does know a thing or two about front burners, so that's why I use that is the high borrowing costs. It costs a lot of money you restaurant to finance these purchases. As consumers, it costs a lot of money to move and much less upgrade your homes now a lot more than they were 5, 7, 10 years ago. I think all this factored into stock that the company's still growing. It's still acquiring, still making the right moves, but not appreciating as an investment.
David Gardner: I feel a little bit disconnected from this one, Rick, as you know, I retired from stock picking for the Molly Fool four years ago. I'm not keeping up with everything all the time in the same way. Some stocks I do keep up with on a regular basis. My winners, in particular, like Mercado Libre. But Middleby, just looking now over the last year or so, just bouncing around 140. Some of the time it's been up to 170 briefly, dropped as low as 120. Not a particularly exciting company, Market Cap Game Show. I probably wouldn't win this if I were on my own game show, just $6.9 billion today. A company that has some treasured brands like Viking and a pretty storied history. This was a monster stock from the early 2000 when I think my brother first picked it for Hidden Gems, a real monster stock, but it's almost faded into investor awareness. I'm not going to say obscurity, but in the same way, most people never really knew the brand Middleby and knew some of those 127 other brands better, that feels like how the stock has made its own movement more and more toward obscurity here in recent years.
Rick Munarriz: I think if you look at the last 10 years, revenue and earnings have doubled over the past 10 years, which is reasonable. It's definitely a lot better than the stock chart. If you like, wait. The stocks up 20 some percent and the revenue and earnings are up, more than doubled, you could say, it trades out a lower revenue and earnings multiple now, but it doesn't mean that it's cheaper. I think that's an important point because to me, even though the multiples are lower and it's textbook cheaper, the growth expectations are different now. I think you're seeing it. This is a company that 10 years ago, nine of the 10 previous years in that great decade that I was talking about earlier, double digit growth. It's had two years of double digit growth over the last six or seven years. It growth has slowed now for the company.
David Gardner: That was quite a trip through time. That's what we do on this episodic series 10 Years Later for our 5 Stock Samplers. Let's now say goodbye to our time machine, return to the present. Rick, thank you again for bringing a lot of the stories and developments behind these companies. I've been getting to rock the numbers, and that's what I'm going to now do to close off our discussion around 5 Stocks for the next five years, 10 years later. When you blend together the S&P 500 returns of these 5 Stocks, four of them were identical. Two hundred and twenty three percent, but you also have to mix in that 118% for the prematurely concluded pick of Activision Blizzard, you end up with a blended S&P 500 return of 202.6%. As we record here, the afternoon near market close Tuesday, September 2, 2025. The market, Rick up 203%, these stocks, taken together as a basket, up 544.1% really couldn't have known it or guaranteed at the time, really happy to know that the very first 5 Stock Sampler we ever picked that was saying for the next five years has gone on. When we did this five years ago, by the way, it was up 237 to the markets 81. We're now up 544 to the markets 203. Without being cocky here, that's what I expect. I think with the passage of time, our 5 Stock Samplers will look better and better. Some of them will never look good. This one, Rick, does look a lot better than five years ago. As we draw to conclusion here, I want to do two things. First, any overall reflections you and I have about what we can learn from this group of 5 Stocks or from this overall experiment of 5 Stock Samplers, anything you want to share there, I'll do a little bit too. Then, second, I think we should talk about these 5 Stocks. Do you still like it today What do you think about that stock today? You ready?
Rick Munarriz: Yes, let's do this.
David Gardner: I'm going to kick us off with one overall thought and that is CEOs matter. I think, looking back here, the single biggest stock that on its own, pulled all of them up to the mountaintop had a fantastic entrepreneurial CEO who is highly invested in the company still is and with it all the way through. I talked about Bobby Kotick behind another of the winners, and then one of the losers, we lost our visionary CEO. In a world where too many people, I think, are looking at stock charts, or just the zigs and zags from one day to the next, I hope you and I, Rick, you've always gotten this that we distinguish ourselves as Rule Breakers by caring deeply about the character and vision and overall ability of the people running the companies themselves. That at a 10 year forest level view, seems important to me.
Rick Munarriz: Invest in people and then companies, probably in that order sometimes. It is sometimes a worthwhile strategy. My takeaway, I'm going to go with a deeper cut. I'm going to say, learn to embrace the buyouts. Because I think as an investor, when you're buying disruptive stocks, and David, you know all about this. You probably have a running list. I don't. How many Rule Breakers have been acquired over the time? It's a lot. You're a disruptive company. You're basically advertising to much larger companies, and we saw this happen in basically 40% of the stocks in this list from 10 years ago. Well, they didn't work out the way you wanted to, necessarily, you get a nice little premium. Every time that I have a stock that I own and it gets bought out, I'm like, no, but the runway was so much longer. But, you know what? Just get off, hop on a different plane. You have the money, you have the proceeds. Go enjoy that trip, where the runway may be long.
David Gardner: Rick, you as a continuing member of our Motley Fool Rule Breakers team picking stocks month in and month out, you know, I do, too. There's always another stock coming. There's always another train or plane about to leave the depot or the airport. There are always more opportunities. In fact, I think there will be more Rule Breakers born over the next 20 years than were over the last 20 years because technology its keep speeding up and getting more interesting with new possibilities. I appreciate that point about the buyouts. I generally like UIC root against my companies being bought out. I love that Amazon didn't get bought out by Walmart at some point. I think we made a lot more money that Walmart never could or did buy Amazon, but, Activision Blizzard probably is doing OK with Microsoft. I know one thing Marvel did pretty well with Disney. In some ways, I still wish we had Marvel stock. In other ways, it does diversify and make the stock safer when it gets acquired, and there's always another stock coming. Maybe one more quick thought for me, maybe one more from you, Rick, before we go to the, what do we think of these stocks today? Conversation. My quick thought is, it's an obvious forest level thought here, but one stock on its own beat all the others, and one stock on its own made the other four irrelevant. It's very hard to do that in any near term time frame, like a year or three years or even five years, but it's not uncommon over 10 years.
That's the level we're looking at today. I don't think there are many investing podcasts out there that have 10 years of results that they're reviewing this week. I think most people just don't think or act that long, but that's what we do. Just to observe that Mercado Libre could go up more than 20 times in value and make everything else picked in this 5 Stock Sampler, irrelevant almost. Is its own key lesson. As I've often said, Rick, the only way you'll ever get a 20 bagger, or a 100 bagger, or a 1371 bagger, is if you let it become that in your portfolio. I think a lot of people either don't think that could even happen or just wouldn't let it because of their own, I would say, instinct sometimes too short term, more of a trading instinct than an investing instinct. Rick, that's another takeaway I have from this one remarkable stock. Three of them of the five beat the market, by the way, and that's good. That's usually higher than my average, I think. But the key Rule Breaker lesson takeaway to me is, let that winner win.
Rick Munarriz: Don't stop at a 19 bagger. Keep going.
David Gardner: [laughs] Rick, let's just briefly talk about these companies today. Not all of them are even still public. Although if you embrace the idea that Activision Blizzard is now Microsoft and FireEye is now Alphabet, there are five stocks. We can talk briefly about which of these is like a stock that you would really favor today just as much maybe as 10 years ago.
Rick Munarriz: The value investor, you would say, Middleby, it's 18 times trailing earnings. That's a good multiple for a historic company. Or Casey's, there's a dividend, you spell pizza when you walking through the doors. I'm going to stick with Mercado Libre again. We're not going to punish a 22 bagger. It would be a big mistake. I think that's my favorite of the five, at least of the three that are still run but if I had to pick a second one, I'm intrigued by Middleby, but Casey's just seems to have that right thing, and just the fact that again, there are only 17 states in this country. I think there's still room for them to grow. Valuations a little of a concern to me. It's a little richly valued, but that's been the worst reason not to buy a stock in my experience in the past. But Mercado Libre is right supreme for me.
David Gardner: Thank you for that. As a fellow Rule Breaker, of course, have to agree with the point you just made. Thank you for that. I also love Mercado Libre today. It's one of my larger personal holdings. Just as I said, what if you could have bought eBay or Amazon at $5 billion in the 1990s? I was saying in 2015, you can with Mercado Libre. I love it at $122 billion today. I think that global capitalism is going to be on the rise. I think more and more people are going to come out of poverty and be able as middle class people to afford more and goods and services. I think Latin America is one of the safer, more beautiful parts of the world. There are some bad thoughts about economics in some of those countries, but even for a company that does some business in Argentina and Venezuela, this is a company that somehow has navigated an interesting, sometimes difficult political atmosphere and just keeps creating value, so I also love Mercado Libre. Here, obviously, my money is where my mouth. I think I like Alphabet, maybe second most. It's such an innovative company. It's such a pure Rule Breaker. Now that my FireEye became Alphabet, I would still be holding that. Certainly in my own portfolio, I do own some alphabet, as well. Do you own any Alphabet, Rick?
Rick Munarriz: I do. Yes. It's not one of my largest holdings, but I've always had a little bit of Alphabet, dating back from the original Google Days, yes.
David Gardner: Very nice. I think that's true probably for a lot of our listeners, as well, and got to love Casey's General Stores. It's the energizer bunny in a portion of the country, just keeps cranking. I like the brand. I think Casey's will be better known 10 years from now than it is today for reasons that we've sort of elucidated. There's a little bit of a future look at some of these companies. Your mileage, dear listener may vary. I want to thank Rick Munarriz for taking the time to jump into the time machine with me and get back to the 2015 week this week, 10 years ago, where these five stocks were picked and for Rick and me, to be able to sort through them together this week with you, fellow Fool and talk about what worked, what didn't, what we can learn, that's what we're trying to do on this podcast now in its 11th year itself we'll be doing our next 10 years later right about 10 weeks from now. It'll be mid November. Five Lesser Known Rule Breakers was the name of that 5 Stock Sampler. In the meantime, I want to thank our producer, Bart Shannon. I want to thank my special guest, Rick Munarriz. We want to thank you for tuning in to a discussion of, to me, the game that counts the most investing and investing over the only term that counts, the long term, how much fun it is to think back over 10 years, listen and learn. Rick, thanks a lot.
Rick Munarriz: Thank you, David.
David Gardner: Fool on.
David Gardner has positions in Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, MercadoLibre, and Middleby. Rick Munarriz has positions in Alphabet and Apple. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Intel, MercadoLibre, Microsoft, Middleby, Salesforce, Shopify, and eBay. The Motley Fool recommends Casey's General Stores and recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft, short August 2025 $24 calls on Intel, short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft, short November 2025 $21 puts on Intel, and short September 2025 $60 calls on Chipotle Mexican Grill. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
A Motley Fool 5-Stock Sampler 10 Years Later was originally published by The Motley Fool
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- A Motley Fool 5-Stock Sampler 10 Years Later
Sep 9, 2025
First up in this Rule Breaker Investing podcast is a look at our original 2015 stock sampler: "5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years," a motley mix that spanned Latin American e-commerce, rural convenience, blockbuster gaming, front-line cybersecurity, and kitchen-tech roll-ups. Longtime Fool Rick Munarriz joins as Motley Fool co-founder David Gardner's sidekick to share the what, why, and when of these stocks' march through the decade.
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A full transcript is below.
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This podcast was recorded on Sept. 03, 2025.
David Gardner: Ten years ago, September 2nd, 2015, we launched our very first five stock sampler, 5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years. It was a Motley mix by design. A Latin American e-commerce upstart, a rural convenience chain that secretly sells rivers of pizza, a video game powerhouse, a cybersecurity fighter, and a kitchen tech roll up. Today, we fire up the time machine 10 years later to see what actually happened through recessions, pandemics, acquisitions, and all the surprises a decade can deliver. We'll score our returns against the S&P 500, then ask the only questions that matter. What do we get right? What do we get wrong? What may we have been missing? I've invited my side kick for this episode Rick Munarriz to bring the goods, the stories, some analysis. We'll have some numbers too. We'll talk about the lessons you could use on your next 10 year journey. Five stocks for the next five years, 10 years later. Only on this week's Rule Breaker Investing.
Welcome back to Rule Breaker Investing. It's September. I have been waiting for this month for months and months because in just a couple of weeks, the book, my final stock market book, Rule Breaker Investing comes out. A book I finished around a year ago, and I've been sitting on my hands for months and months doing Page Breaker previews. September is circled on my calendar. I could not be more excited that we're finally here September 2025. Now, speaking of months ago, I also did something else a few months ago. I signaled then what we're doing this week. I told you I wanted to go back to the 30 times I picked a five stock sampler on this show, 30 times where I said, here's a theme. Here's a basket, five stocks. Let's go beat the market and learn some great lessons together. Well, as history shows, we did beat the market. Most of these samplers were picked to play a game that lasted three years. How did they do over those three years? Well, many a review of Palooza podcast, as longtime listeners will know, ensued an episode I did here to update you on the stories. The performance of those 35 stock samplers picked 10 weeks apart over nearly six years. We check in a year later, two, and then three, and then close the game down. But earlier this summer, I began to foreshadow what's going to preoccupy us about, I don't know, once every 10 weeks going forward. Which is here on Rule Breaker Investing, we're going to go back to each of those five stock samplers, the great ones, the good ones, the also-runs, and the underdogs.
We have a few of those, too. Seeing now 10 years later, that week of their 10th anniversary, that's the actual timeframe that I as a Rule Breaker investor invest for. I hope you too, 10 years. How has that five stock sampler picked 10 years ago this week? How has it done? What can we learn? That's what we're doing this week, this special week we're kicking off our first episode in my 10 years later series with my pal and longtime sidekick, Rick Munarriz. But first, as I shared at the start of this year, my 2025 book, Rule Breaker Investing is available for your preorder right now. After 30 years of stock picking, this is my magnum opus, a lifetime of lessons distilled into one definitive guide. Each week, until the book launches on September 16th, I'm sharing a random excerpt. We break open the book to a random page, and I read a few sentences. Let's do it. This is the second to last page breaker preview. It's from the finale to Part 2 of the book where we explore the six traits of Rule Breaker stocks, and I'm reflecting on this page on a list that's on the page of my seven best stock picks. It's a table reflecting the seven 100 plus baggers topped by my single greatest ever stock pick amazon.com on September 8th of 1997. My gosh, September 8th. That's this very week. In 1997, 28 years later, it was, as of my publishing date, up 1371 times.
Anyway, let me quote now from the page, and I quote, "What matters most to me about this list is making it not just imaginable but real for millions of people. Each row is special. The prices have fluctuated since the publishing date, and these stocks will go in and out of favor. Some may fall from the hundred bagger ledge, while others near but not on the list like Shopify, Salesforce or Chipotle may arrive. In the end, there is no specific magic to the number 100. Heck, I prefer 1371." That's this week's Page Breaker preview. I'm really excited to say some early reviews are starting to roll in. Igor [inaudible] does his new frontier newsletter, online he reviews investing books, and he just came out with this this week. I quote, "There's certainly no shortage of investment books on the bookshelves. Some are a waste of time, some are helpful, and there are those that define your investment principles forever. David Gardner's Rule Breaker Investing is such a book. The stories are captivating. The writing style is magnetic, and you will certainly not put it down until the last page." Thank you very much, Igor [inaudible] for that. It does make me wonder. What did I write on the last page that Igor finally threw it down? I think I'm joking. Let's move on now to the first episode of 10 Years Later where I get to welcome Rick Munarriz. Rick has been part of the Motley Fool since 1995 as a contributing writer, analyst and cheerleader. Yep, I said 1995. When not breaking down stocks. He's breaking down scenes as part of the management team for Just the Funny, Miami's oldest improv comedy, theater, Rick Munarriz welcome back to Rule Breaker Investing.
Rick Munarriz: It's great to be here, David. Thank you.
David Gardner: Thank you. It's almost silly for me to say, welcome back, Rick. Since you were there at the start, it's like welcoming somebody to their own home and saying, welcome back to the place that you helped build. It is a delight to have you join with me, Rick, and as I thought about 5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years and all the stock picking that you and I have done together, and I get to brag earlier in my excerpt from my book, I mentioned Chipotle. That was a stock you brought to Motley Fool Rule Breakers. Your work and mine have been intertwined for many years, and it's a delight, therefore, to have you kick off 10 Years Later. Every 10 weeks, we open a time capsule. A past five stock sampler hits its 10 year birthday. We're going to score each pick equal weighted from the original air date. We're going to see its return and compare it to the S&P 500 over the same span. Then we do the real work. What do we get right? What do we get wrong? Are we missing anything? Well, actually, I have on each time a Motley Fool friend to help do a lot of that work. This week, it is, of course, longtime Fool, Rick Munarriz to join me and discuss together what the decade actually taught us as investors. We finish with the samplers overall result and maybe a quick go forward view on each company. If you're new here, that's 10 Years Later. Not just keeping score, but learning how and why Rule Breakers win, and sometimes lose too. The very nature of this week's episode and really the whole episodic series is we're going back in time. It's time to get in the Rule Breaker time machine. In this case, I'm setting the date for 10 years ago this week. [MUSIC] Rick, 5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years. This first sampler picked on September 2, 2015, there was no real theme to this one looking back. Looking over these stocks, there wasn't anything that really brought them together.
Rick Munarriz: It's a collection of magic makers, game makers, and pizza makers. There's a lot of things there. If there is a threat, is that they're all exciting growth talks at the time, promising companies.
David Gardner: It's funny to think back because I think at the time, as I picked this, I wasn't necessarily saying five stock sampler or we'll do 10 of these, let alone 30 of these. I think I was just feeling like, since we've started, this is a brand new podcast, I should pick stocks from time to time. I guess it made sense to lead off with what we would call a Motley List, given that this is Motley Fool Rule Breakers as a podcast. This is five completely different companies that all had something rule breakery about them. I hope what we're going to do together, is we're just going to go through each one. We're going to talk about the company, what it does really quickly for anybody who's not acquainted. Then Rick, you're going to start making me and all of us smarter as we look back on 10 years of performance. I'm going to give the performance, you're gonna help us understand why. Sound good?
Rick Munarriz: Sounds perfect.
David Gardner: Let's get started then, Stock number 1, 5 Stocks for the Next 5 Years was, and I use that past tense intentionally, was Activision Blizzard. Ticker symbol ATVI. Now in 2015, Activision Blizzard was already the House of Call of Duty and World of Watercraft, and then it added Candy Crush, bringing billions of phone swipes into the fold. Gaming was shifting from boxed disks to always on worlds. A few mega franchises became global habits, and ATVI owned. I think it's fair to say, Rick, several of them. The decade ended with Microsoft buying the whole Arcade for $95 a share, and that's a testament to how valuable that engagement flywheel became, I think. Listening back 10 years ago, which I did take time to do, Rick. Here's what I was saying in 2015. I basically said, video games are played more than movies are watched. That that trend would extend a top tier publisher, which with at the time, a $20 billion market cap struck me as the right way to ride that secular timeshare. Rick, before I give the numbers and performance, initial thoughts from you about this company and what began happening.
Rick Munarriz: Obviously, this is a story that I like to call four weddings and a funeral. To me, Activision is a story of love, mostly matrimony not always love. Many of the biggest games had been the product of acquiring a smaller developer for Activision Blizzard. They had Tony Hawk's Pro Skater in 1999. That was never soft. That's one wedding. Infinity War, it sounds like a department store, but it was actually a game developer in 2003, gave it Call of Duty a few months after it was acquired. I guess you can call that a shotgun wedding. The third wedding was the largest. It joined forces with Vivendi Blizzard in 2008. This is the company StarCraft and World of Warcraft, as you mentioned. It was big enough deal that Activision became Activision Blizzard. All this happened before our timeline started 10 years ago. But I think it's important because these three weddings and several other smaller deals helped give Activision Blizzard a diversified arsenal across genres and platforms. In a world of fickle gamers, Activision always seems to have a franchise with a pulse. Then it made a big splash afterwards. As you mentioned Candy Crush, and that was 2016, picked up Candy Crush developer King. That's wedding number 4. But when you live by bending the knee, you also die by it. Microsoft made an offer that Activision couldn't refuse three years ago. That was just $95 a share, which is $69 billion.
Unfortunately, all cash deal took a long time to close. It was announced in January of 2022, and it didn't close till October of 2023. But again, the story for us as Activision Blizzard investors ends there, because, again, you're getting a cash payout and whether you sold out early in January when it was announced or later on, forced your hand, you were left with money and money to go somewhere else. That's the Activision Blizzard story, a company that did fairly well over the years. It's never been perfect for the video game industry. It happens all the time. Sometimes the blunders, there's delays with releases. But overall, Activision Blizzard, I think has been successful, and has always found a way to pick up something that it needed. It's on a perpetual shopping trip sometimes. Even I didn't mention RedOctane but that's how it got Guitar Hero, which is another big hit for them for a while. There are just too many weddings. It's more Elizabeth Taylor wedding streak for this company. But I'll leave the wedding talk there, but definitely a dynamic company that's unfortunately no longer available as a stand-alone company.
David Gardner: That's right. I was looking back at this. We picked again, September 2nd, 2015. I picked it at $28.37. This was a sampler that was picked for five years. Almost all of the others were just for three years. We did finally review this September 2nd of 2020, the height of the pandemic in some ways, and the company was at $83.45. As you point out, not too long after that, it got gobbled up by Microsoft at 95. The total return then for this stock was 234.9% and the S&P 500 of the exact same time, September 2nd, 2015, right through the market close October 13th of 2023. The S&P was up 118.4%. Good news, we won by 116.4 points of Alpha, i.e, we about doubled up the market, Rick. Yeah, this one is over. As you mentioned, it got cashed out. I love your four weddings and a funeral analogy. I still enjoy Activision Blizzard games, but it's now Microsoft.
Rick Munarriz: It's come a long way again. I didn't know that the origin of the name is actually the four developers, that four gamers, they got active and television and merged that together to be Activision. Their very first big hit, which sold four million copies was Pitfall on the Atari. My eventual wife, before we met each other, that was our favorite Atari game. It was very different than all the other Atari games. But then again, everything else is obviously bigger than life. But it's sad to see it gone. Definitely one of my favorite video game stocks in video game companies that now because it's such a large company like Microsoft, I don't feel so financially invested in tracking it anymore.
David Gardner: Those are the particulars. Yes, as you pointed out, Rick, it's impossible to still own Activision Blizzard. It did not convert its shares into Microsoft. I guess somebody who knew Satya Nadella was going to be as awesome as he has been may have just bought Microsoft with their Activision Blizzard shares. But for this sampler and for this stock, Rick, we concluded it eight years in. It didn't get to play through to today. I think for each of these stocks, we should draw just a couple of lessons or observations, losing the trees and just forest level thinking about why, in this case, Rick Munarriz, why did Activision Blizzard work? The stock tripled, doubled out the market's average over 10 years, why?
Rick Munarriz: I think Activision Blizzard, they were able to build out a catalog that the original four founders of the company would have never been able to do on their own. They found what they needed. They built an empire that gamers of all ages, across all platforms, no matter what you're holding in your hands, or what you're watching on your TV, you can integrate yourself in the Activision Blizzard universe, and they made that work. That made the company very attractive to investors and ultimately very attractive to Microsoft.
David Gardner: Thank you, and I also want to say about the company, I liked the CEO. He was a controversial figure. Often video gamers don't love the CEOs of the companies that they buy their games from. They think they're greedy, capitalist, pigs or I'm not even sure. At different points, Bobby Kotick was maybe more or less popular. I always thought he was a great entrepreneur. I try to see the business side of things as I play the video games, and I liked everything that I saw. He was really, in many ways, the founder. He bought this company, I think, early on and really managed it all the way through to huge value creation over time. I met him once. I wrote an essay or two about that. I'm a Bobby Kotick fan. He actually makes an appearance in Money Ball, the movie with Brad Pitt, Bobby Kotick makes a cameo as the owner of the Oakland Athletics early on in that movie, fun fact. But I sometimes will want to call out at a forest level who is running this thing. Often they're admirable people, whether they have controversy in their lives, Elon Musk or not, they're great value creators. That's another thought I have about Activision Blizzard. Also, it's a fun stock to follow if you are a gamer, because you're buying something that you really know very well. For me, Rick, it's a lot more fun buying video game stock than a B2B SaaS company stock. I guess I should throw that in too.
Rick Munarriz: It's like Peter Lynch by what you know.
David Gardner: A lovely note to end on. That was Stock number 1. We're going through these alphabetically. That's as they were presented 10 years ago this week. Rick, let's move on to Stock number 2. Now for something completely different, as I think the Monty Python crew once said, because really, each of these stocks takes us in a new direction. Stock number 2, alphabetically, is Casey's General Stores. Ticker symbol CASY. I'm going to use the present tense for this one, because it didn't get bought out, taken off the market. Casey's looks like a gas station until you notice half the town shows up for the pizza. Yes, really. Over the decade, the chain quietly upgraded kitchens, apps, and loyalty. It turned its fill up and go into fill up, eat, and come back tomorrow. It's the Midwestern compounding story, small towns, good food, steady service, repeat business, Casey's General Stores. Why did I pick it, Rick? I think it's because I saw the time we had a pre existing recommendation for this and most of our sampled stocks. The reason they are samplers is because these were existing picks already, often at lower cost basis. But Casey's by this point, 2015 was the number 5 seller of pizza nationwide. But it's a convenience store, and it was only operating in less than 1/3 of the United States. A quirky, under followed growth runway hiding, I would say, in plain sight. Rick, as you've looked over this story, what's jumped out to you about Casey's?
Rick Munarriz: I walked away with three big reasons why this seemingly sleepy convenience store operator that you and I are admitting is a convenience store operator is crushing the market over the past decade. The first reason is expansion.
Rick Munarriz: They had 1,888 corporate stores 10 years ago. Today, it's 2,658. Not a huge jump in expansion. It built some from scratch, but mostly it buys chains in highly fragmented sectors. This is that kind of space. Then with expansion comes scalability, so you have this ability to grow. There's still potential. Earlier this year, it just opened its first store in Texas. It's 17 states.
David Gardner: That's amazing on its own, Rick, that they're only just now opening in Texas.
Rick Munarriz: Yes. Where you think Casey's pi originated from, but no, they just got there now.
David Gardner: In a lot of ways, Rick, even now, I look at it and say, Is this really a rule breaker stock? I think in general, it's not really a rule-breaker stock. But then again, Motley Fool rule breakers, the service or stock advisor for which I picked the stock, not always shooting for pure rule breakers all the time. But what we were looking for or some of the dynamics that some rule breakers have. For example, I can't say, Rick, this is a top dog and first mover in an important emerging industry. I can't say that, but I can say it has strong consumer appeal, which is trait Number 5 of rule breaker stocks. It's not necessarily a world-known brand. I sure isn't in parts of the US, people have never heard of Casey's, but in parts of the US that have they know and appreciate. It has a strong consumer appeal. It's not just the convenience or even the gas. It's the pizza, etc. I think that's worth pointing out often, even when a stock like this one doesn't feel like a true rule breaker, it's still a stock I'd recommend and love to have in my portfolio. Let's look at the numbers. Are we glad we had this one? Well, you did mention market crushing, and as of this week, 10 years later, having picked the stock at $104 and 80 cents, 10 years ago, it's now up to $495, 14 cents. That is more than a four-bagger. It's up 373%. The market up 223%. Now, the figure for the market is a little bit different than what I just presented for Activision Blizzard. Of course, because Activision Blizzard got pulled off the market back in October of 2023, when the S&P had overall returned 118%, but all four of the other stocks we're talking about this week, Rick, are being measured against the S&P 500 return over the last 10 years of 223.2%. We're just going to round, though, so yeah, Casey's 373 to the markets 223, about 150% point out performance, Rick. As we look over that one together now, again, forest level, big picture insights, why has Casey's quadrupled over the last decade crushing the market averages?
Rick Munarriz: I covered expansion. The second reason it's changing with the times. A decade ago, a Casey's General Stores was reporting same store cigarette sales. I'm not making that up. I looked up, like, their 2014 reports, and they're like, same store cigarette sales are up 7%. That's what convenience stores were at that time. You probably, even if you've never been to a Casey's, to me, it would pass a snap test if you lived in a rural community that depends on this. But even through the more mainstream the WoW was, the buckis of the world, that are these convenience stores that are just iconic, that's what Casey's is at that level. Again, you're talking about the pizza. This is a company that not only their favorite pizza, the quality of their coffee is something that they profess front and center. They've changed from a store that is just it's a gas station. That's the appeal. That's why you get there. That's actually my third reason, I'll just tie him as it dives right in there that it's no longer a pump play. A decade ago, the financial results would actually lead with gasoline business, how it's doing, cigarette sales, and then dive into the rest of the store. Fuel was the big draw to Casey's. That's not so much the case now. It's still important case for Casey's. But the gross profit for its inside the store business. That's everything else outside of gas is now nearly double its fuel business for the gross profit.
David Gardner: That is beautiful, and thank you for pointing that out. Companies that become increasingly relevant to their customers, when they add new possibilities, new ways to do business, some of those go away, Rick, cigarette sales, probably, I hope, not as big as they were 10 years ago. But the company just adding and augmenting its offerings for its dedicated customer base, a great sign of good management and solid steady growth, which is often all it takes over a 10 year period for a company to be a great investment. I was looking back as we closed out the Lollapalooza for this five years ago, because we said, after all, five stocks for the next five years, Casey's was actually a loser to the market. It was up 73%. The market at the time was up 81%. As we said goodbye to this sampler five years ago, I was having to say, Alas, Casey's has underperformed. What a disappointment, but we still believe in it. I'm really delighted now over a more meaningful time period, 10 years to reflect in this stock that is now more than a four-bagger. Sometimes, Rick, admittedly, we closed out, like during the pandemic, when things weren't great at different points. You can imagine Casey's probably wasn't as great a business in 2020 as it is in 2025. But isn't it nice to see companies come back and become world beaters in years 6-10?
Rick Munarriz: Definitely in this case, as terrible as the COVID pandemic was, it probably helped and basically emboldened people to, hey, this is our place that we can drive to and get a pizza because we're done with blue apron or whatever we're doing at home and go out and get something local, safe and eat. Help them become a bigger part of the community. Definitely, it's obviously the last five years have worked out pretty well for Casey's shareholders.
David Gardner: Let's move on to stock Number 3, and now for something completely different. In this case, it's not just a different business Rick. It's a different direction on the performance of the stock. Well, we'll talk about that. Stock Number 3 was FireEye. Ticker symbol FEYE. Again, we're doing this alphabetically. That's how I presented them, so FireEye. But over the course of 10 years, it took on a different name through a merger and then got merged out altogether. Today, it's part of a little company named Alphabet, ticker symbol GOOG. The return I'm giving carries it forward all the way through. If you 10 years ago this week bought my five stock sampler and owned some FireEye, your cost basis was $37 and 47 cents. I'm going to say in a little while, Rick, it's done and why. But first, some top-of-mind thoughts about cybersecurity, FireEye, 2015.
Rick Munarriz: The big lesson here is that business model surfing is not for the timid. This is a company that was in the right place in the right time. Obviously, cybersecurity is a big deal, and they basically were the leader, one of the leaders, the original breach detection hardware appliance business, which seemed to be an exciting place to be. While FireEye is a compound word, as you and I will eventually get to, it was not much of a compounder.
David Gardner: That is true. Not long after it got bought up merged with Mandiant, and threats are escalating. Cybersecurity started as nuisance-level stuff back in the day and became more nation-state stuff. That was true even 10 years ago, but Mandiant brought forensics and Intel. It was the company that you would bring in on speed dial when something had gone wrong to figure out more afterward what exactly happened. But, Rick, as history will show, Google ultimately bought Mandiant and folded that expertise into its own Cloud offerings. In some ways, we could say, this was proof the good guys business, which is always what I think about cybersecurity. I think I was saying 10 years ago, on this fairy podcast that week, the good guys always outnumber the bad guys, which I profoundly believe in this world, and that's good news for optimists, because it means it's really a tiny percentage of people who are really trying to mess with your cyber. I prefer the good guys' side of everything. In this case, this is the good guys' side of the business, but value accrues differently. Sometimes, Rick, based on business models, as you mentioned, so though I love the space and I love the mission, and it felt like a front-line operator in a market with I think we say non-negotiable demand, sometimes surprise demand at different points. This one didn't play out great.
Rick Munarriz: No, it didn't and here you have a company, again, it shifted its miles when it picked up Mandiant. I said, we're going to move away. They're still doing hardware more of a subscription-based cloud business that you and I have seen great companies take that model and make it work. They didn't, and basically sold its parts for scrap. It sold the original FireEye business for $1.2 billion, took that private. Then, half a year after rebranding itself as Mandiant that's when the Google Alphabet deal happened, $5.4 billion, again, all all-cash deal, and that was it. Again, it was at the right place. If you had a basket of 10 cybersecurity stocks about 10 years ago, you would probably have a much bigger basket today. But unfortunately, this one just did not work out. It couldn't navigate through the times.
David Gardner: Thank you very much, Rick, because it's on me to put the final numbers on things, I want to make sure I'm very clear here. That cost basis for FireEye of $37 and 47 cents 10 years ago, we have to adjust that for what happened. I'm going to give you the official numbers very shortly. I do want to mention that Mandiant purchase was in 2021. That was after the end of the review of Lollapalooza for these five stocks for the next five years. In fact, it was still FireEye when we last talked about it five years ago, this week on this podcast, and it had gone from 37.5-15, so it was down 59%. The market at the same time was up 81%. This was the obvious clunker loser, which sadly, it remains now five years after that with its 10-year return, but at least it's now moving with Alphabet stock. Here are the overall numbers in a somewhat complex situation. If you had bought FireEye stock with us ten years ago today, you would have an effective cost basis in Alphabet today of $182 and 10 cents, 182. Google is just over 211 right now. The overall investment, just buying and holding FireEye and rolling it into Mandiant, and then taking your Google money, including half payoffs of cash at different points. If you just held it all the way through, you're up. Yeah, 16% on the dot. 16%, Rick, over 10 long years. You were down 59% at one point, so it's been a comeback story. But unfortunately, as I already mentioned, the market's up 223%, so 16 doesn't even hold a candle to the market's overall performance. This is an obvious loser and obvious dud. Rick, what did I get wrong? What could I have done better here?
Rick Munarriz: David, if you want frank advice in retrospect, then we can all be geniuses here, you could have cut out the middleman and done a lot better. You bought Alphabet as a seven-bagger over the past ten years. Just get to the story, get to the finish line, and do that 10 years earlier, and it would have been great. But I don't think anyone could blame you for picking FireEye at the time. Everything was right about the bullish thesis. It just failed the execution, and others got better, while it just basically was not able to put the pieces together in time.
David Gardner: I think it's worth saying, as well, thank you, Rick, in some ways, forgiving me. I feel slightly better, but not still great on this one. I think there's something to say about an industry. Like, I had profound belief that cybersecurity was going to be a growth industry for the rest of our lives. I feel the same way today. It might be that in an AI world, we start safetying up things more. Maybe the AIs start figuring out how to make it less catastrophic or threatening the world of cybersecurity. Maybe cybersecurity declines at some point, but I don't see that point anytime soon. I feel as if we had the important emerging industry part right, but this really was never the top dog or first mover. It was a player within the industry. If there's a lesson here, maybe it's Dave, stick with your top dogs and first movers a little bit more. Or sometimes, Rick, maybe I should just ditch the industry altogether and buy Alphabet.
Rick Munarriz: Sounds good.
David Gardner: Yes, that's the total accounting then for stock Number 3, FireEye/Mandiant/Alphabet, up 16%, the market crushing it up 223% 10 years later. Let's move on to stock Number 4. Stock Number 4 was Mercado Libre ticker symbol MELI. I think you can think of Mercado Libre as Latin America's buy sell ship pay superail. It's a marketplace on the front end. It's got payments and credit in your pocket, logistics humming in the background. So what began as the Amazon/eBay of Latin America, which is how I was talking about it 10 years ago, has become the Amazon of the Amazon, as a friend of mine recently said. It's got bots in every direction, Mercado Pago, Envios sub businesses that are very similar to what Amazon does at global scale elsewhere. Volatile headlines, Rick Munarriz, steady mission, though. Volatile stock at different points. I know we'll talk about that. But ultimately, I was saying this in 2015, if you could have owned Amazon or eBay in the 1990s, that's where Latin America was, I said, 10 years ago. This was a $5 billion market cap. If you could have bought Amazon or eBay in the 90s at a $5 billion market cap, I think you would have loved to do so. That's how it felt to me, Rick. Now, I am not a native speaker of the language, Spanish; you are. You have a lot more association, I think, with this company. You've followed it carefully over the years. What have you seen that explains the fantastic outperformance that I will later reveal about stock Number 4?
Rick Munarriz: I think you've seen, again, it started with just that one verb. Just shopping, e-commerce, and that was fine. But the revenue mix has changed dramatically as it adds new offerings and different segments that had different ghost trajectories. E-commerce is still a force there. Ten years ago, its gross value of merchandise that was selling was double the payments it was processing, which is Mercado Pago, is payment platform. Today, it's completely different. Today, again, the e-commerce is still doing well, still much larger now, but Mercado Pago payment platform is generating four times the gross merchandise volume on the e-commerce end. You just don't settle for just putting your foot in the door. Mercado Libre has used its brand and reputation in Latin America to expand it to fulfillment, credit cards, trading marketplaces, loans, and all other products and related services. They've been able to take advantage of their leadership in one position, and it's the online company that people trust in that region and just expand it over time. It's been obviously very, very successful, as we'll get to soon. Thank you, and we will get to those numbers. Can't wait to share them very shortly. Have to mention Marcos Galperin because he has been a fantastic founder/CEO over the years. I don't think he's quite as active right now, but he is the genius behind this company, and like I called out in a good way, Bobby Kotick earlier for doing a great job building a company over decades that create a lot of value and had products and services, I appreciate it. I'm not an active buyer from Mercado Libre myself, Rick, but I know how many people are, and Galperin has been a genius-level CEO for this company. Definitely an underrated global CEO, because I think most people don't know that name, but now at a $122 billion market gap and counting, I'm going to say, Rick, we can clearly see we had a great CEO and founder.
Rick Munarriz: Again, just the 10 years and we're not even getting to the returns, but just the business. Net income has risen 20-fold since the end of 2014. Revenue has soared 40-fold. You don't see that too often. That's what you saw got in Mercado Libre. Hopefully, it got us some good returns.
David Gardner: It did. Our cost basis was $109 and 94 cents 10 years ago this week. Most recently, it's at 2,384. This stock picked 10 years ago is now a 21-bagger up 2,069%. The market, as we know, is up 2023. We pretty much destroyed market averages with this stock. As you and I talked offline beforehand, Rick, I could have picked four -100% losers alongside this one stock, and we would have a market crusher. Now, Rick, it's never our goal at the Motley Fool to pick bad stocks. Every one of these five, I picked with promise, and I couldn't have known ahead of time which one would win or lose or by how much. Boy, am I glad I opened my mouth and said Mercado Libre 10 years ago this week?
Rick Munarriz: Especially with this list, where two of the first three left us basically tooth fairy money under our pillow and moved on.
David Gardner: Here you have a Galileo saying, "Hey, you know what? Look what's under the tree." It is the situation where it's always good to have this heavy hitter, a cleanup hitter as your fourth pick. It is worth mentioning, Rick, as an active member of our Motley Fool Rule Breakers team. You already know this, but if you look up and down the history of the Motley Fool Rule Breakers Service launched in October of 2004, and you ask, what has been the greatest stock pick we ever made thus far at Motley Fool Rule Breakers, the answer is not Tesla. Tesla has been a total home run stock for Motley Fool Rule Breakers, and that even includes some of the downside we've seen. Some people don't like Elon Musk these days. I remain an Elon fan as a business follower and an investor, but you might think that Tesla, given that it is up 159 times in value for us since 2011, would have been our best stock ever for Rule Breakers, but no, it's Mercado Libre. The stock is up from its $14 cost basis in 2009. I think this is worth calling out as a lesson, Rick. That means that when I picked it 10 years ago this week, that was six years and way higher than we had it from our original cost basis. Our original cost basis is 14, but here we were 10 years ago, Rick, saying, we like it at 109. That is one of the more important lessons I could possibly share with you this week or any other, which is, what do winners do, Rick Munarriz?
Rick Munarriz: They keep winning.
David Gardner: They keep winning. Not every time. Not all the time, and not every one. But in general, that has been my experience. One of the things I love about the 5 Stock Sampler, the ones that worked out, and I even love it about the ones that didn't. Because I love all my children. But I love that we're constantly demonstrating adding to winners when many other people just say, I missed Apple. I'll never buy Apple or Amazon because I just missed. That's not the right mindset. Am I right?
Rick Munarriz: You're never going to catch them all to throw Pokémon thing in there. But you are getting these situations where one great pick is all you need to basically create life altering wealth.
David Gardner: Thank you for that. That certainly was true of this stock for this sampler. We're going to move to the final stock, which is not really a winner. It's a fire eye retread, so we're moving from the some of the peak of what was achievable 10 years ago, much lower into a valley. Of course, I'll be providing the overall numbers a little bit later, we'll also share, Rick, a little bit later, what we think of these stocks now. We'll have a little banter around that. But let's go to Stock Number 5 now from the sublime, if you will, not quite ridiculous, but Middleby was the fifth stock in five stocks for the next five years. The ticker symbol M-I-D-D Middleby, rolling up the gear behind your favorite restaurants. The ovens, the friars, the smart kitchen tech that makes cooks faster and food more consistent. Middleby, over many years, has been a winning company and a winning stock. Many Motley Fool members have owned some Middleby at some point. I picked it 10 years ago this week as part of five stock mix. Rick, it leaned into upgrades and efficiency. But this stock, I might as well give the numbers out right now since I've already hinted at them. It was at $107.47, 10 years ago this week. Today, it's at $136.70 or so cents, meaning it's up 27%. It is up over a long, dynamic, remarkable decade, and yet, Rick, 27% returned over 10 years is just way behind the market averages. Before I ask you why? Why has this stock underperformed so badly? Let me just first open it up with any general thoughts that you have about Middleby.
Rick Munarriz: I think Middleby. To me, again, you an they're a corporate hoarder. I counted the tiles on their brands page. I'm sure it's written somewhere, but I like to count sometimes. [laughs] It has 127 brands in its arsenal. Most of them were actually acquisitions or part of an acquisition, so it's been doing that for the whole run. To me, the most impressive thing out of the whole thing was, you've already gotten to how it's been a disappointment the past 10 years. The previous 10 years, with the same strategy, same acquiring, same growth, it was a 10 bagger, basically 2005-2015, and then this time around, its decade.
David Gardner: The stock, which I'd picked a couple of times in 2013 for Rule Breaker members, a couple of years before selecting it for this sampler, it was a monster winner for a little while there. I'm not going to go back and check the stock grafts or the numbers, but it was arcing higher and higher. It has to be the case that the departure of longtime CEO Salim Basle, longtime friend of the fool, Salim has attended Motley Fool events. He was briefly on our board. He is a wonderful, a highly entrepreneurial CEO who went on to be hired by six flags, which had its own recent merger, but Salim left Middleby. That's probably a factor in this 10 year performance.
Rick Munarriz: It could be the jump the Shark moment. There are other factors, too, but obviously, he was the one who was able to put all the pieces together. He's the one that acquired Viking to get into the residential side, all the food processing and stuff. Eighty one percent of their business is commercial food service and processing, and the balance is residential, so it's basically what you're talking about mostly restaurants and institutions. I think what held it back at least these last years, there were some macro issues. You have a case where restaurants struggling right now and folks are working from home now very often. The old commissaries that used to have to hire a lot of people, go through a lot of food, go through a lot of equipment, don't have to do that, so that's happening that. On the residential side, again, if you've priced the Viking appliance and all of some of the other appliances, they're not cheap. Right now with the real estate market the way it is, there's not a lot of activity, so a lot of people moving or up and I guess on the front burner of both these issues is the interest rates. Again, Middleby does know a thing or two about front burners, so that's why I use that is the high borrowing costs. It costs a lot of money you restaurant to finance these purchases. As consumers, it costs a lot of money to move and much less upgrade your homes now a lot more than they were 5, 7, 10 years ago. I think all this factored into stock that the company's still growing. It's still acquiring, still making the right moves, but not appreciating as an investment.
David Gardner: I feel a little bit disconnected from this one, Rick, as you know, I retired from stock picking for the Molly Fool four years ago. I'm not keeping up with everything all the time in the same way. Some stocks I do keep up with on a regular basis. My winners, in particular, like Mercado Libre. But Middleby, just looking now over the last year or so, just bouncing around 140. Some of the time it's been up to 170 briefly, dropped as low as 120. Not a particularly exciting company, Market Cap Game Show. I probably wouldn't win this if I were on my own game show, just $6.9 billion today. A company that has some treasured brands like Viking and a pretty storied history. This was a monster stock from the early 2000 when I think my brother first picked it for Hidden Gems, a real monster stock, but it's almost faded into investor awareness. I'm not going to say obscurity, but in the same way, most people never really knew the brand Middleby and knew some of those 127 other brands better, that feels like how the stock has made its own movement more and more toward obscurity here in recent years.
Rick Munarriz: I think if you look at the last 10 years, revenue and earnings have doubled over the past 10 years, which is reasonable. It's definitely a lot better than the stock chart. If you like, wait. The stocks up 20 some percent and the revenue and earnings are up, more than doubled, you could say, it trades out a lower revenue and earnings multiple now, but it doesn't mean that it's cheaper. I think that's an important point because to me, even though the multiples are lower and it's textbook cheaper, the growth expectations are different now. I think you're seeing it. This is a company that 10 years ago, nine of the 10 previous years in that great decade that I was talking about earlier, double digit growth. It's had two years of double digit growth over the last six or seven years. It growth has slowed now for the company.
David Gardner: That was quite a trip through time. That's what we do on this episodic series 10 Years Later for our 5 Stock Samplers. Let's now say goodbye to our time machine, return to the present. Rick, thank you again for bringing a lot of the stories and developments behind these companies. I've been getting to rock the numbers, and that's what I'm going to now do to close off our discussion around 5 Stocks for the next five years, 10 years later. When you blend together the S&P 500 returns of these 5 Stocks, four of them were identical. Two hundred and twenty three percent, but you also have to mix in that 118% for the prematurely concluded pick of Activision Blizzard, you end up with a blended S&P 500 return of 202.6%. As we record here, the afternoon near market close Tuesday, September 2, 2025. The market, Rick up 203%, these stocks, taken together as a basket, up 544.1% really couldn't have known it or guaranteed at the time, really happy to know that the very first 5 Stock Sampler we ever picked that was saying for the next five years has gone on. When we did this five years ago, by the way, it was up 237 to the markets 81. We're now up 544 to the markets 203. Without being cocky here, that's what I expect. I think with the passage of time, our 5 Stock Samplers will look better and better. Some of them will never look good. This one, Rick, does look a lot better than five years ago. As we draw to conclusion here, I want to do two things. First, any overall reflections you and I have about what we can learn from this group of 5 Stocks or from this overall experiment of 5 Stock Samplers, anything you want to share there, I'll do a little bit too. Then, second, I think we should talk about these 5 Stocks. Do you still like it today What do you think about that stock today? You ready?
Rick Munarriz: Yes, let's do this.
David Gardner: I'm going to kick us off with one overall thought and that is CEOs matter. I think, looking back here, the single biggest stock that on its own, pulled all of them up to the mountaintop had a fantastic entrepreneurial CEO who is highly invested in the company still is and with it all the way through. I talked about Bobby Kotick behind another of the winners, and then one of the losers, we lost our visionary CEO. In a world where too many people, I think, are looking at stock charts, or just the zigs and zags from one day to the next, I hope you and I, Rick, you've always gotten this that we distinguish ourselves as Rule Breakers by caring deeply about the character and vision and overall ability of the people running the companies themselves. That at a 10 year forest level view, seems important to me.
Rick Munarriz: Invest in people and then companies, probably in that order sometimes. It is sometimes a worthwhile strategy. My takeaway, I'm going to go with a deeper cut. I'm going to say, learn to embrace the buyouts. Because I think as an investor, when you're buying disruptive stocks, and David, you know all about this. You probably have a running list. I don't. How many Rule Breakers have been acquired over the time? It's a lot. You're a disruptive company. You're basically advertising to much larger companies, and we saw this happen in basically 40% of the stocks in this list from 10 years ago. Well, they didn't work out the way you wanted to, necessarily, you get a nice little premium. Every time that I have a stock that I own and it gets bought out, I'm like, no, but the runway was so much longer. But, you know what? Just get off, hop on a different plane. You have the money, you have the proceeds. Go enjoy that trip, where the runway may be long.
David Gardner: Rick, you as a continuing member of our Motley Fool Rule Breakers team picking stocks month in and month out, you know, I do, too. There's always another stock coming. There's always another train or plane about to leave the depot or the airport. There are always more opportunities. In fact, I think there will be more Rule Breakers born over the next 20 years than were over the last 20 years because technology its keep speeding up and getting more interesting with new possibilities. I appreciate that point about the buyouts. I generally like UIC root against my companies being bought out. I love that Amazon didn't get bought out by Walmart at some point. I think we made a lot more money that Walmart never could or did buy Amazon, but, Activision Blizzard probably is doing OK with Microsoft. I know one thing Marvel did pretty well with Disney. In some ways, I still wish we had Marvel stock. In other ways, it does diversify and make the stock safer when it gets acquired, and there's always another stock coming. Maybe one more quick thought for me, maybe one more from you, Rick, before we go to the, what do we think of these stocks today? Conversation. My quick thought is, it's an obvious forest level thought here, but one stock on its own beat all the others, and one stock on its own made the other four irrelevant. It's very hard to do that in any near term time frame, like a year or three years or even five years, but it's not uncommon over 10 years.
That's the level we're looking at today. I don't think there are many investing podcasts out there that have 10 years of results that they're reviewing this week. I think most people just don't think or act that long, but that's what we do. Just to observe that Mercado Libre could go up more than 20 times in value and make everything else picked in this 5 Stock Sampler, irrelevant almost. Is its own key lesson. As I've often said, Rick, the only way you'll ever get a 20 bagger, or a 100 bagger, or a 1371 bagger, is if you let it become that in your portfolio. I think a lot of people either don't think that could even happen or just wouldn't let it because of their own, I would say, instinct sometimes too short term, more of a trading instinct than an investing instinct. Rick, that's another takeaway I have from this one remarkable stock. Three of them of the five beat the market, by the way, and that's good. That's usually higher than my average, I think. But the key Rule Breaker lesson takeaway to me is, let that winner win.
Rick Munarriz: Don't stop at a 19 bagger. Keep going.
David Gardner: [laughs] Rick, let's just briefly talk about these companies today. Not all of them are even still public. Although if you embrace the idea that Activision Blizzard is now Microsoft and FireEye is now Alphabet, there are five stocks. We can talk briefly about which of these is like a stock that you would really favor today just as much maybe as 10 years ago.
Rick Munarriz: The value investor, you would say, Middleby, it's 18 times trailing earnings. That's a good multiple for a historic company. Or Casey's, there's a dividend, you spell pizza when you walking through the doors. I'm going to stick with Mercado Libre again. We're not going to punish a 22 bagger. It would be a big mistake. I think that's my favorite of the five, at least of the three that are still run but if I had to pick a second one, I'm intrigued by Middleby, but Casey's just seems to have that right thing, and just the fact that again, there are only 17 states in this country. I think there's still room for them to grow. Valuations a little of a concern to me. It's a little richly valued, but that's been the worst reason not to buy a stock in my experience in the past. But Mercado Libre is right supreme for me.
David Gardner: Thank you for that. As a fellow Rule Breaker, of course, have to agree with the point you just made. Thank you for that. I also love Mercado Libre today. It's one of my larger personal holdings. Just as I said, what if you could have bought eBay or Amazon at $5 billion in the 1990s? I was saying in 2015, you can with Mercado Libre. I love it at $122 billion today. I think that global capitalism is going to be on the rise. I think more and more people are going to come out of poverty and be able as middle class people to afford more and goods and services. I think Latin America is one of the safer, more beautiful parts of the world. There are some bad thoughts about economics in some of those countries, but even for a company that does some business in Argentina and Venezuela, this is a company that somehow has navigated an interesting, sometimes difficult political atmosphere and just keeps creating value, so I also love Mercado Libre. Here, obviously, my money is where my mouth. I think I like Alphabet, maybe second most. It's such an innovative company. It's such a pure Rule Breaker. Now that my FireEye became Alphabet, I would still be holding that. Certainly in my own portfolio, I do own some alphabet, as well. Do you own any Alphabet, Rick?
Rick Munarriz: I do. Yes. It's not one of my largest holdings, but I've always had a little bit of Alphabet, dating back from the original Google Days, yes.
David Gardner: Very nice. I think that's true probably for a lot of our listeners, as well, and got to love Casey's General Stores. It's the energizer bunny in a portion of the country, just keeps cranking. I like the brand. I think Casey's will be better known 10 years from now than it is today for reasons that we've sort of elucidated. There's a little bit of a future look at some of these companies. Your mileage, dear listener may vary. I want to thank Rick Munarriz for taking the time to jump into the time machine with me and get back to the 2015 week this week, 10 years ago, where these five stocks were picked and for Rick and me, to be able to sort through them together this week with you, fellow Fool and talk about what worked, what didn't, what we can learn, that's what we're trying to do on this podcast now in its 11th year itself we'll be doing our next 10 years later right about 10 weeks from now. It'll be mid November. Five Lesser Known Rule Breakers was the name of that 5 Stock Sampler. In the meantime, I want to thank our producer, Bart Shannon. I want to thank my special guest, Rick Munarriz. We want to thank you for tuning in to a discussion of, to me, the game that counts the most investing and investing over the only term that counts, the long term, how much fun it is to think back over 10 years, listen and learn. Rick, thanks a lot.
Rick Munarriz: Thank you, David.
David Gardner: Fool on.
David Gardner has positions in Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, MercadoLibre, and Middleby. Rick Munarriz has positions in Alphabet and Apple. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Intel, MercadoLibre, Microsoft, Middleby, Salesforce, Shopify, and eBay. The Motley Fool recommends Casey's General Stores and recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft, short August 2025 $24 calls on Intel, short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft, short November 2025 $21 puts on Intel, and short September 2025 $60 calls on Chipotle Mexican Grill. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.</p>
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
- BC-Most Active Stocks
Aug 13, 2025
NEW YORK (AP) — prices for the Nasdaq composite, NYSE and NYSE American listed most active stocks.
Nasdaq most active stocks:
Stock Name Volume High Low Last Change Momentus Inc. 164,681,829 2.33 1.69 1.73 +0.62 Wang & Lee Group Inc. 82,789,101 0.0679 0.0622 0.0649 +0.0107 Color Star Technology Co. Ltd. 60,976,739 0.1659 0.1275 0.1525 -0.4075 X4 Pharmaceuticals Inc. 56,006,335 3.45 2.83 3.12 +0.54 Bolt Projects Holdings Inc. 53,576,877 4.3999 3.21 3.96 +1.78 NVIDIA Corp. 48,935,085 183.97 180.98 181.33 -1.83 Ondas Holdings Inc. 47,045,125 3.77 3.47 3.6201 -0.6699 Opendoor Technologies Inc. 41,563,510 2.60 2.40 2.445 -0.025 180 Life Sciences Corp. 39,494,632 17.00 14.00 16.9088 +6.6688 Tilray Brands Inc. 39,358,774 1.09 0.9587 1.0754 +0.1249 Advanced Micro Devices Inc. 34,034,465 185.91 179.91 185.745 +10.795 Gibo Holdings Ltd. 32,661,103 0.0438 0.04 0.0425 +0.0029 Paramount Skydance Corp. 30,752,413 14.16 11.15 13.3901 +2.4201 Plug Power Inc. 29,855,776 1.72 1.52 1.6253 +0.0853 Cognition Therapeutics Inc. 29,309,190 1.47 1.29 1.325 +0.225 iShares Ethereum Trust ETF 27,816,836 35.90 35.18 35.315 +1.065 Rigetti Computing Inc. 26,399,429 17.23 15.77 16.09 -0.11 SharpLink Gaming Inc. 20,869,048 24.55 23.20 23.385 +0.915 Vor Biopharma Inc. 20,553,072 2.30 1.9836 2.1413 +0.4813 Tesla Inc. 20,239,143 348.98 340.24 344.14 +3.30 SoFi Technologies Inc. 19,032,065 24.50 23.72 23.825 +0.175 Soundhound AI Inc. 17,585,012 17.08 15.72 15.89 -0.09 Safety Shot Inc. 17,519,392 0.6252 0.50 0.5791 +0.1341 Intel Corp. 16,169,884 21.74 21.36 21.5615 -0.2485 TNF Pharmaceuticals Inc. 15,346,076 0.1079 0.0988 0.1032 -0.0068 Bit Origin Ltd. 13,842,849 0.5976 0.5231 0.5761 +0.0881 Upexi Inc. 13,665,745 8.41 7.65 7.925 +1.265 Robinhood Markets Inc. 13,537,194 116.40 108.14 109.3496 -4.7404 Palantir Technologies Inc. 13,393,790 189.46 186.21 186.745 -0.225 Sapiens International Corp. 13,045,338 42.68 42.499 42.50 +13.00 Incannex Healthcare Inc. 12,278,810 0.422 0.4029 0.4116 -0.0102 iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF 11,910,957 69.50 68.22 69.46 +1.51 COREWEAVE INC. 11,757,557 134.50 127.105 127.96 -20.79 Apple Inc. 11,624,437 232.58 230.43 232.41 +2.76 WARNER BROS. DISCOVERY INC. 11,352,897 12.05 11.28 12.005 +0.785 Lucid Group Inc. 11,102,391 2.29 2.22 2.24 -0.03 Erayak Power Solut.Group Inc. 10,677,782 0.0629 0.0588 0.0607 -0.0037 OceanPal Inc. 10,335,315 0.1015 0.0976 0.0995 -0.0053 Innoviz Technologies Ltd. 10,240,796 1.635 1.48 1.6171 -0.2029 Chanson International Holding 10,238,979 0.0794 0.072 0.0726 -0.0142 Canopy Growth Corp. 10,111,248 1.65 1.55 1.64 +0.09 American Airlines Group Inc. 9,905,448 13.03 12.74 12.995 +0.015 New Era Energy & Digital Inc. 9,595,155 0.4627 0.39 0.4404 -0.0166 MARA Holdings Inc. 8,748,238 16.32 15.7599 16.165 +0.445 Cre8 Enterprise Ltd. 8,659,811 2.10 1.48 1.53 -5.43 Bitfarms Ltd. 8,637,521 1.33 1.275 1.32 +0.05 Amazon.com Inc. 8,644,754 224.9185 222.00 223.9612 +2.4912 Terawulf Inc. 8,506,613 5.69 5.42 5.47 +0.23 Applied Digital Corp. 8,270,634 15.85 14.85 14.915 -0.055 TPI Composites Inc. 8,410,400 0.1645 0.144 0.1506 -0.0271 Bit Digital Inc. 7,761,556 3.25 3.10 3.1327 +0.1027 Recursion Pharmaceuticals Inc. 7,709,417 5.82 5.52 5.68 +0.27 Tempus AI Inc. 7,552,681 71.10 67.06 69.35 +3.01 Oriental Rise Holdings Ltd. 7,042,447 0.118 0.112 0.1128 -0.0092 Super Micro Computer Inc. 6,684,183 46.64 45.76 46.055 -0.375 ALT5 Sigma Corp. 6,620,665 6.76 6.30 6.64 +0.68 Nebius Group N.V. 6,342,464 75.21 71.37 72.0992 -3.2308 Grab Holdings Limited 6,027,298 5.08 4.97 5.0494 +0.0594 ProPhase Labs Inc. 6,005,992 0.343 0.311 0.3246 -0.0294 Gevo Inc. 5,977,759 2.10 1.87 2.0611 +0.0711 Navitas Semiconductor Corp. 5,865,595 7.34 7.03 7.2063 +0.2463 Coinbase Global Inc. 5,840,235 345.3899 327.15 334.80 +12.18 ProFrac Holding Corp. 5,601,420 3.98 3.67 3.715 -2.605 BioXcel Therapeutics Inc. 5,371,753 7.31 6.67 7.11 +0.31 WEBTOON Entertainment Inc. 5,386,754 16.27 12.725 15.9482 +6.5882 Microvast Holdings Inc. 5,161,357 3.13 2.725 2.865 +0.245 Micron Technology Inc. 5,022,767 128.60 125.02 125.44 -2.31 Maplebear Inc. 4,978,960 46.89 44.795 45.08 -5.90 Cleanspark Inc. 4,977,035 10.25 9.925 10.14 +0.22 Cisco Systems Inc. 4,972,114 72.03 71.0901 71.185 -0.195 Plus Therapeutics Inc. 4,897,581 0.6805 0.6092 0.649 -0.0818 CSX Corp. 4,850,785 36.07 35.83 35.965 +0.145 Alphabet Inc. 4,796,763 204.53 202.23 203.1301 -0.2099 Cytomx Therapeutics Inc. 4,650,276 1.98 1.88 1.9401 +0.0801 Quantum Computing Inc. 4,631,147 16.89 15.965 16.03 -0.57 Riot Platforms Inc. 4,399,373 11.80 11.44 11.67 +0.23 Faraday Future Intel.Electric 4,384,829 2.76 2.60 2.6599 +0.0799 Luminar Technologies Inc. 4,269,865 2.51 2.35 2.4365 -0.5735 Jetblue Airways Corp. 4,159,800 4.89 4.76 4.865 +0.075 Core Scientific Inc. New 4,054,527 14.75 14.11 14.15 -0.96 Aurora Innovation Inc. 4,008,619 6.63 6.25 6.27 -0.09 Rocket Lab Corp. 3,972,364 44.70 42.9068 43.035 -0.395 Alphabet Inc. 3,838,803 205.43 203.18 204.15 -0.01 Pacific Biosci.of California 3,761,941 1.32 1.235 1.315 +0.105 Palo Alto Networks Inc. 3,735,343 180.39 176.22 177.2521 +1.8521 The Trade Desk Inc. 3,678,546 53.82 52.515 52.915 -0.355 IREN Ltd. 3,589,628 18.425 17.65 18.225 +0.395 Absci Corp. 3,572,093 3.145 2.80 3.135 +0.165 Geron Corp. (Del.) 3,476,715 1.41 1.34 1.405 +0.055 Broadcom Inc. 3,464,362 317.35 310.45 310.795 -2.035 ImmunityBio Inc. 3,434,450 2.665 2.55 2.605 +0.135 Richtech Robotics Inc. 3,357,609 2.205 2.08 2.10 -0.02 AST SpaceMobile Inc. 3,300,305 50.65 47.12 48.0289 -1.7311 Lumentum Holdings Inc. 3,286,487 129.98 122.30 122.7772 +3.1172 Iovance Biotherapeutics Inc. 3,213,610 2.49 2.25 2.4415 +0.2115 Rivian Automotive Inc. 3,246,782 12.05 11.905 12.0444 +0.0744 Fortinet Inc. 3,178,140 79.9848 78.44 79.45 +0.98 DeFi Development Corp. 3,158,697 21.80 19.44 19.75 +1.91 Prairie Operating Co. 3,006,383 3.24 2.61 2.8001 -0.5799 Cerence Inc. 2,921,743 13.19 11.61 12.3416 +1.4516
NYSE most active stocks:
Story Continues
Stock Name Volume High Low Last Change BigBear.ai Holdings Inc. 27,624,506 6.03 5.63 5.7728 -0.1972 Cava Group Inc. 16,947,844 71.64 65.70 70.00 -14.50 Hanesbrands Inc. 15,390,157 6.6475 6.23 6.555 +0.375 D-Wave Quantum Inc. 14,138,425 19.055 17.93 18.015 -0.495 Hudbay Minerals Inc. 10,718,969 12.10 11.49 11.59 +1.74 Agilon Health Inc. 9,418,609 1.0183 0.8968 0.9756 +0.0841 Archer Aviation Inc. 8,758,381 10.578 10.05 10.10 -0.15 Endeavour Silver Corp. 8,349,629 5.74 5.065 5.445 -0.305 Pfizer Inc. 8,120,031 25.17 24.743 25.14 +0.49 Circle Internet Group Inc. 7,572,608 164.64 154.00 157.59 -5.62 Ford Motor Co. 7,384,076 11.3653 11.19 11.33 +0.08 Bloom Energy Corp. 7,313,144 46.50 42.775 44.4485 +3.1985 Nu Holdings Ltd. 7,057,165 12.46 12.25 12.315 +0.075 Oklo Inc. 6,897,885 83.60 77.95 78.27 -0.20 Snap Inc. 6,239,724 7.31 7.22 7.295 +0.025 IonQ Inc. 5,980,409 43.50 41.23 41.42 -1.58 QuantumScape Corp. 5,874,463 9.70 9.24 9.265 -0.085 Rocket Companies Inc. 5,715,689 19.03 18.50 18.855 +0.585 Surf Air Mobility Inc. 5,329,087 5.30 4.53 4.97 +0.78 Kroger Co., The 5,210,657 71.50 68.38 70.28 -3.27 Joby Aviation Inc. 5,046,309 18.45 17.71 17.885 -0.125 CareTrust REIT Inc. 4,902,408 33.00 32.25 32.84 -0.15 UnitedHealth Group Inc. 4,609,872 271.85 262.89 270.43 +8.86 Carnival Corp. 4,538,662 30.24 29.70 29.945 +0.305 Hims & Hers Health Inc. 4,427,215 48.65 47.58 47.7819 -0.1781 Baytex Energy Corp. 4,440,600 2.05 2.01 2.0301 +0.0101 Walmart Inc. 4,360,619 102.805 100.91 102.40 -1.22 NuScale Power Corp. 4,248,209 39.42 37.17 37.57 -0.60 fuboTV Inc. 4,065,730 3.77 3.62 3.73 +0.09 Venture Global Inc. 4,039,470 13.99 12.76 13.215 +1.035 Amer. Eagle Outfitters Inc. 3,878,129 13.23 12.56 12.615 +0.075 C3 AI Inc. 3,770,500 17.515 16.9406 17.495 +0.585 Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. 3,648,644 10.4593 9.93 10.355 +0.445 Wolfspeed Inc. 3,610,045 1.4099 1.33 1.3395 -0.0605 MP Materials Corp. 3,536,795 77.56 74.31 75.91 +0.96 Bank of America Corp. 3,441,978 47.76 47.455 47.635 +0.135 Centene Corp. 3,401,392 27.18 26.225 26.967 +0.797 Barrick Mining Corp. 3,349,655 24.145 23.56 24.105 +0.605 First Majestic Silver Corp. 3,213,827 9.055 8.89 8.895 -0.055 Unity Software Inc. 3,186,948 37.90 36.77 37.585 +0.295 Oscar Health Inc. 3,034,031 15.34 14.9299 15.22 +0.24 Rithm Capital Corp. 3,003,660 12.3899 12.32 12.3365 +0.0265 AT & T Inc. 2,981,578 28.55 28.36 28.4741 -0.0059 Hecla Mining Co. 2,947,098 7.82 7.605 7.715 +0.045 Uber Technologies Inc. 2,938,606 92.20 90.26 90.485 -1.245 Freeport-McMoRan Inc. 2,966,323 43.09 42.19 42.625 +0.475 Dow Inc. 2,918,574 22.66 21.71 22.5603 +0.8503 Coeur Mining Inc. 2,796,303 11.92 11.73 11.78 -0.08 Coherent Corp. 2,759,118 123.25 115.10 115.675 -0.885 AMCOR PLC 2,720,592 9.82 9.71 9.795 +0.025 Kinross Gold Corp. 2,618,260 19.45 19.185 19.225 -0.105 Energy Transfer L.P. 2,627,266 17.56 17.375 17.4895 +0.0995 Transocean Ltd. 2,615,064 3.02 2.91 3.0051 +0.0651 Figma Inc. 2,582,765 91.00 84.33 84.50 -2.86 Borr Drilling Ltd 2,489,102 2.58 2.39 2.55 +0.18 UWM Holdings Corp. 2,418,152 5.27 5.065 5.23 +0.17 Albertsons Companies Inc. 2,420,233 19.0999 18.595 18.87 -0.63 AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc 2,412,165 3.14 3.05 3.055 -0.015 NIKE Inc. 2,382,597 77.455 75.185 77.14 +2.24 On Holding AG 2,358,126 49.02 47.70 47.95 -1.86 Verizon Communications Inc. 2,340,777 43.59 43.00 43.565 +0.315 Iamgold Corp. 2,304,179 8.18 8.01 8.095 +0.045 Citigroup Inc. 2,304,516 96.20 95.43 95.84 +0.10 Salesforce Inc. 2,269,080 233.79 229.605 233.58 +1.92 United Parcel Service Inc. 2,252,061 88.11 86.39 87.3194 -0.1106 Under Armour Inc. 2,213,108 5.1286 5.00 5.065 +0.035 Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. 2,220,569 42.98 42.40 42.97 +0.14 Zeta Global Holdings Corp. 2,128,133 19.10 18.51 18.785 +0.255 Regions Financial Corp. 2,126,494 25.595 25.38 25.515 +0.185 Coupang Inc. 2,084,670 28.64 28.34 28.455 +0.315 Lithium Americas Corp. 2,073,162 2.9179 2.84 2.86 +0.01 Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings 2,063,179 24.76 24.28 24.66 +0.42 3 D Systems Corp. 2,096,330 2.381 2.13 2.245 -0.035 Keycorp 2,008,650 18.03 17.835 17.94 +0.03 AMPRIUS TECHNOLOGIES INC 1,986,495 8.07 7.45 7.47 -0.29 Stellantis N.V. 1,981,164 9.70 9.5449 9.695 +0.065 Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co. 1,967,541 21.66 21.28 21.655 +0.335 Pinterest Inc. 1,887,669 35.425 34.82 35.15 +0.34 Teladoc Health Inc. 1,885,511 7.30 6.9504 7.289 +0.419 Exxon Mobil Corp. 1,877,460 106.99 105.74 106.83 +0.70 Arcos Dorados Holdings Inc. 1,846,500 7.62 7.00 7.5701 +0.6201 Kenvue Inc. 1,775,735 21.75 21.38 21.51 -0.39 Eli Lilly and Company 1,762,354 657.50 644.50 652.69 +13.26 Fortuna Mining Corp. 1,728,659 7.24 7.0628 7.165 +0.145 Oracle Corp. 1,720,685 257.6699 253.43 254.16 +0.30 Cenovus Energy Inc. 1,703,559 15.1665 14.79 15.12 +0.29 Blue Owl Capital Inc. 1,630,733 20.485 20.085 20.145 -0.175 PG & E Corp. 1,600,855 15.51 15.31 15.355 -0.105 Lumen Technologies Inc. 1,577,442 4.06 3.94 4.05 +0.10 Amrize AG 1,571,481 51.54 49.90 51.40 +2.83 Vertiv Holdings Co. 1,577,614 145.12 138.09 139.4425 -4.2775 WideOpenWest Inc. 1,551,120 5.05 5.04 5.05 +0.01 UiPath Inc. 1,537,941 10.6586 10.465 10.625 +0.125 Johnson Controls Internat. PLC 1,516,760 107.87 105.49 105.50 -1.14 Occidental Petroleum Corp. 1,486,329 44.68 43.88 44.525 +0.375 Intl Business Machines Corp. 1,472,365 240.62 236.20 240.08 +5.31 Wells Fargo & Co. 1,463,370 79.72 78.91 78.985 -0.495 Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. 1,460,387 47.51 46.35 47.465 +0.915 Arista Networks Inc. 1,458,393 141.99 138.0301 138.45 -2.80 Schlumberger N.V. (Ltd.) 1,419,133 33.375 32.815 33.245 +0.305
NYSE American most active stocks:
Stock Name Volume High Low Last Change Denison Mines Corp. 74,701,352 2.10 1.99 2.015 -0.145 BitMine Immersion Techno. Inc. 32,952,548 70.7399 65.25 65.3948 +2.9548 Uranium Energy Corp. 5,908,848 10.88 10.45 10.471 +0.141 B2Gold Corp. 5,479,310 3.91 3.79 3.90 +0.12 Energy Fuels Inc. 3,747,290 10.15 9.402 9.41 -0.18 Taseko Mines Ltd. 2,947,475 3.51 3.20 3.29 +0.12 United States Antimony Corp. 2,910,552 3.9169 3.44 3.56 -0.26 Equinox Gold Corp. 2,510,434 6.88 6.815 6.855 +0.045 New Gold Inc. 2,283,679 5.08 4.99 5.03 +0.07 Nuburu Inc. 1,892,998 0.1997 0.1871 0.188 -0.0052 Unusual Machines Inc. 1,356,503 11.38 10.6701 10.815 +0.205 Atlasclear Holdings Inc. 1,346,216 0.1758 0.17 0.171 -0.0017 Centrus Energy Corp. 1,307,656 201.80 188.40 190.58 -26.79 Avino Silver & Gold Mines Ltd. 1,184,291 3.975 3.90 3.915 +0.005 AgEagle Aerial Systems Inc. 1,179,426 2.17 2.09 2.1113 -0.0187 Silvercorp Metals Inc. 1,149,519 4.67 4.51 4.53 +0.01 Comstock Inc. 1,146,037 2.59 2.37 2.525 -0.495 Tecogen Inc. (New) 1,034,731 11.55 9.51 10.38 +1.56 Myomo Inc. 1,014,708 1.16 1.08 1.10 +0.02 Genius Group Ltd. 946,475 0.9101 0.88 0.8936 -0.05 Ocean Power Technologies Inc. 933,554 0.54 0.5101 0.5174 -0.0023 Castellum Inc. 915,148 1.24 1.20 1.23 +0.04 Northern Dynasty Minls Ltd. 914,254 0.89 0.86 0.8662 -0.0138 BiomX Inc. 846,723 0.5933 0.5453 0.55 -0.012 Ring Energy Inc. 839,285 0.8256 0.80 0.822 +0.002 MAIA Biotechnology Inc. 704,408 1.715 1.62 1.635 +0.065 Senseonics Holdings Inc. 654,812 0.4791 0.465 0.4771 +0.0037 Hyliion Holdings Corp. 586,695 1.6192 1.47 1.58 -0.11 Vista Gold Corp. 546,607 1.15 1.08 1.091 +0.031 Vizsla Silver Corp. 531,867 3.46 3.39 3.4302 +0.0602 Americas Gold & Silver Corp. 476,993 1.08 1.02 1.03 0.00 Spirit Aviation Holdings Inc. 439,155 2.21 1.97 2.15 +0.05 Hyperscale Data Inc. 437,213 0.70 0.683 0.6964 +0.0088 NovaGold Resources Inc. 398,854 6.00 5.88 5.95 +0.06 Gold Royalty Corp. 390,978 3.12 3.00 3.09 +0.09 EMX Royalty Corp. 357,668 3.39 3.18 3.34 +0.20 SRX HealthSolutions Inc. 356,636 0.3376 0.3033 0.3301 -0.0019 Lineage Cell Therapeutics Inc. 354,308 1.05 0.97 1.04 +0.03 Ur-Energy Inc. 332,036 1.22 1.1816 1.185 -0.025 Mega Matrix Inc. 310,702 3.43 3.20 3.425 +0.145 Credit Suisse High Yld Bd Fd 309,588 2.13 2.115 2.12 0.00 I-80 Gold Corp. 307,857 0.588 0.5821 0.5853 +0.0013 Aris Mining Corp. 296,367 7.13 6.9101 6.92 -0.08 KAIROS Pharma Ltd. 293,040 1.19 1.11 1.13 +0.01 Cornerstone Strat.Val.Fd Inc. 282,098 8.21 8.18 8.185 +0.015 Gold Resource Corp. 266,732 0.4944 0.4802 0.4818 -0.0021 Catheter Precision Inc. 265,494 0.1791 0.1711 0.1791 +0.0061 Integra Resources Corp. 242,957 1.76 1.72 1.7289 +0.0189 Standard Lithium Ltd. 240,596 2.786 2.71 2.73 -0.04 KULR Technology Group Inc. 238,341 5.39 5.16 5.30 0.00 Perspective Therapeutics Inc. 234,794 3.96 3.6601 3.96 -0.02 Westwater Resources Inc. 213,680 0.74 0.7202 0.7274 +0.0191 Orla Mining Ltd. (new) 200,126 9.99 9.76 9.9246 +0.1346 Protalix BioTherapeutics Inc. 199,315 1.655 1.55 1.645 +0.005 GEE Group Inc. 195,820 0.2145 0.21 0.212 +0.002 Cornerstone Total Return Fund 172,090 7.93 7.91 7.91 -0.01 Mag Silver Corp. 167,739 23.42 22.90 22.935 -0.285 IT Tech Packaging Inc. 144,895 0.2048 0.1966 0.1995 -0.0032 Galiano Gold Inc. 139,214 1.60 1.5698 1.575 +0.015 Cybin Inc. 130,642 7.75 7.53 7.59 -0.04 Pineapple Financial Inc. 129,126 4.49 4.23 4.27 -0.40 Dolly Varden Silver Corp. 124,094 3.7321 3.63 3.6407 +0.0407 Platinum Group Metals Ltd. 119,053 1.53 1.50 1.515 +0.015 IGC Pharma Inc. 117,153 0.3478 0.3379 0.344 -0.0013 OS Therapies Inc. 117,019 1.85 1.80 1.84 +0.06 InfuSystems Holdings Inc. 108,501 9.45 8.78 8.8405 -0.5895 Know Labs Inc. 107,984 2.20 2.02 2.08 -0.04 GoldMining Inc. 106,565 0.8099 0.80 0.8009 +0.0009 Cel-Sci Corp. 106,216 8.19 7.5201 7.6001 -0.0299 Azitra Inc. 97,886 0.15 0.1454 0.1489 +0.0019 Signing Day Sports Inc. 95,044 1.62 1.41 1.565 -0.055 EON Resources Inc. 93,186 0.2895 0.2805 0.2811 -0.0079 Nanoviricides Inc. 90,342 1.54 1.48 1.485 -0.055 Impact Biomedical Inc. 88,398 0.5645 0.5295 0.5645 -0.0009 Stereotaxis Inc. 85,447 2.68 2.6138 2.63 -0.03 Cboe Global Markets Inc. 80,020 248.445 245.51 246.0865 -2.4335 Trilogy Metals Inc. 76,737 1.64 1.575 1.575 +0.005 Flexible Solutions Intl Inc. 71,010 7.3516 6.9999 7.2091 +0.2591 Ivanhoe Electric Inc. 68,924 10.19 9.99 10.16 +0.12 Volato Group Inc. 68,684 1.3898 1.34 1.36 -0.03 Intl Tower Hill Mines Ltd. 68,212 1.3542 1.3101 1.3101 -0.0399 Idaho Strategic Resources Inc. 65,875 24.41 23.50 23.545 -0.215 Matinas BioPharma Holdings Inc 64,638 1.52 1.33 1.37 -0.11 Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. 63,154 0.72 0.70 0.7148 +0.0061 Aeon Biopharma Inc. 61,459 0.6891 0.6259 0.6878 -0.0014 NORTHANN CORP. 58,701 0.157 0.1541 0.1551 -0.0019 Mixed Martial Arts Group Ltd. 54,648 0.86 0.831 0.8501 -0.0099 Austin Gold Corp. 53,968 1.33 1.25 1.2899 -0.0001 Credit Sui. Asset Mgmt Inc. Fd 52,905 2.9981 2.985 2.99 0.00 Fury Gold Mines Ltd. 51,674 0.53 0.5071 0.53 +0.024 Ryde Group Ltd. 51,647 0.31 0.3024 0.3024 +0.0035 Gran Tierra Energy Inc. 50,753 3.70 3.59 3.70 +0.12 Moving iMage Technologies Inc. 50,035 0.709 0.6202 0.709 -0.0158 Splash Beverage Group Inc. 48,313 1.90 1.6909 1.6909 -0.0801 Exodus Movement Inc. 45,349 28.90 26.93 27.54 -0.32 Indonesia Energy Corp. Ltd. 43,979 2.7919 2.75 2.75 -0.02 Multi Ways Holdings Ltd. 42,810 0.245 0.22 0.2402 +0.0252 Western Copper & Gold Corp. 42,745 1.30 1.28 1.29 +0.01 Clough Global Opportunities FD 42,085 5.5786 5.53 5.54 +0.01 SunLink Health Systems Inc. 41,879 0.95 0.90 0.9156 +0.0011
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- BC-Most Active Stocks
Aug 8, 2025
NEW YORK (AP) — prices for the Nasdaq composite, NYSE and NYSE American listed most active stocks.
Nasdaq most active stocks:
Stock Name Volume High Low Last Change Oriental Rise Holdings Ltd. 644,497,959 0.2087 0.1365 0.1393 +0.0492 Safe & Green Holdings Corp. 196,387,726 0.435 0.353 0.3846 +0.0966 Incannex Healthcare Inc. 93,653,726 0.516 0.463 0.473 +0.0105 Soundhound AI Inc. 85,524,214 13.79 12.75 13.587 +2.867 The Trade Desk Inc. 35,925,875 57.00 54.00 54.68 -33.65 Aurora Innovation Inc. 35,581,316 6.335 5.99 6.105 -0.095 NVIDIA Corp. 31,164,685 182.77 180.40 181.725 +0.955 Click Holdings Ltd. 30,152,859 0.3951 0.34 0.3688 -0.0002 Erayak Power Solut.Group Inc. 29,395,846 0.0737 0.0632 0.0643 +0.0035 Bit Origin Ltd. 28,513,848 0.55 0.4725 0.5141 +0.0871 Tesla Inc. 27,007,772 333.93 320.98 329.7395 +7.4695 Opendoor Technologies Inc. 22,852,561 1.89 1.77 1.8312 -0.0188 Palantir Technologies Inc. 19,870,342 187.72 184.41 186.50 +4.30 Ondas Holdings Inc. 19,720,026 3.95 3.395 3.705 +0.455 BioXcel Therapeutics Inc. 19,595,551 4.47 3.5708 4.145 +0.735 Advanced Micro Devices Inc. 19,071,332 176.48 172.75 173.3417 +0.9417 SharpLink Gaming Inc. 17,602,442 24.70 23.18 23.5662 +0.2062 Rocket Lab Corp. 16,018,740 49.92 43.50 44.93 +0.72 Gibo Holdings Ltd. 15,608,736 0.0389 0.0366 0.0367 -0.0024 Tempus AI Inc. 15,559,311 65.73 57.88 59.07 +0.33 Iovance Biotherapeutics Inc. 15,020,344 2.2799 1.90 2.18 -0.46 Lucid Group Inc. 13,467,905 2.18 2.14 2.145 -0.025 SoFi Technologies Inc. 13,249,879 22.585 22.01 22.5277 +0.4477 iShares Ethereum Trust ETF 13,059,566 30.42 29.57 30.045 +0.735 Apple Inc. 12,843,128 223.10 219.25 222.095 +2.065 Intel Corp. 12,823,519 20.02 19.75 19.855 +0.085 Wang & Lee Group Inc. 12,425,164 0.048 0.042 0.0464 +0.0044 Terawulf Inc. 12,081,277 5.21 4.83 4.885 -0.055 Robinhood Markets Inc. 11,874,951 116.52 110.90 115.945 +4.715 Bit Digital Inc. 9,996,505 3.00 2.87 2.95 0.00 Alphabet Inc. 9,997,162 201.34 197.17 200.81 +4.29 Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.,The 9,035,193 8.84 7.80 8.585 -1.675 Super Micro Computer Inc. 8,939,138 47.37 45.70 45.72 -0.95 Bollinger Innovations Inc. 8,770,661 2.02 1.87 2.02 -0.12 Cleanspark Inc. 8,703,428 11.35 10.185 10.25 -0.47 OceanPal Inc. 8,213,767 0.1106 0.1074 0.1095 -0.0027 CIMG Inc. 7,926,156 0.3641 0.32 0.3343 -0.0927 Peloton Interactive Inc. 7,829,173 7.93 7.21 7.315 +0.205 iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF 7,764,177 66.7163 66.19 66.365 -0.465 Nebius Group N.V. 7,680,278 71.49 67.01 68.455 +3.145 Chanson International Holding 7,300,342 0.1009 0.0903 0.0938 -0.0001 Alphabet Inc. 6,647,194 202.15 197.90 201.61 +4.33 American Airlines Group Inc. 6,477,045 11.8081 11.56 11.74 +0.01 Navitas Semiconductor Corp. 6,354,373 7.00 6.59 6.655 -0.135 RealReal Inc., The 6,377,467 7.37 6.76 6.76 +1.25 Plug Power Inc. 6,318,452 1.565 1.505 1.535 +0.025 AbCellera Biologics Inc. 6,057,407 5.01 4.01 4.025 -0.215 Amazon.com Inc. 5,819,200 223.80 222.185 222.3256 -0.8044 WARNER BROS. DISCOVERY INC. 5,642,113 11.977 11.65 11.65 -0.21 Rigetti Computing Inc. 5,605,965 16.16 15.51 15.7567 +0.0967 Microchip Technology Inc. 5,539,658 63.61 60.875 62.605 -3.615 Paramount Skydance Corp. 5,548,990 11.69 11.08 11.655 -0.085 COREWEAVE INC. 5,470,830 130.9799 125.36 126.40 +5.32 TNF Pharmaceuticals Inc. 5,370,042 0.103 0.0963 0.0976 -0.0008 Applied Digital Corp. 5,224,251 14.49 13.78 13.94 -0.30 Canopy Growth Corp. 5,121,289 1.17 1.10 1.1546 +0.1046 Graphjet Technology 5,025,866 0.1098 0.10 0.1033 -0.0191 Sunrun Inc. 4,946,328 12.25 11.265 11.315 -0.685 Fortinet Inc. 4,885,296 76.71 73.25 73.605 -1.695 Microvast Holdings Inc. 4,798,285 3.16 2.7028 2.775 +0.075 MARA Holdings Inc. 4,617,830 16.175 15.63 15.785 -0.165 Maplebear Inc. 4,586,519 53.50 49.49 50.38 +0.99 Array Technologies Inc. 4,557,972 6.74 5.80 5.87 +0.03 Applied Optoelectronics Inc. 4,541,759 24.40 21.6801 22.64 +0.31 180 Life Sciences Corp. 4,401,906 3.60 3.08 3.18 -0.25 Tilray Brands Inc. 4,184,742 0.6664 0.65 0.6547 +0.0042 Rivian Automotive Inc. 4,102,512 12.285 12.00 12.045 -0.025 Bitfarms Ltd. 4,063,715 1.305 1.25 1.255 -0.025 USA Rare Earth Inc. 4,076,567 16.43 15.23 16.15 +1.11 Cipher Mining Inc. 4,036,857 4.98 4.69 4.71 -0.16 Faraday Future Intel.Electric 4,000,439 2.5699 2.37 2.49 +0.14 CorMedix Inc. 3,944,514 11.23 9.8192 10.41 -0.40 Tripadvisor Inc. 3,891,968 19.26 17.017 19.145 +3.055 Upexi Inc. 3,847,389 6.2997 5.6008 6.2588 +0.6888 Grab Holdings Limited 3,851,130 4.99 4.86 4.88 -0.07 Lyft Inc. 3,762,836 14.40 13.9046 14.135 -0.075 Riot Platforms Inc. 3,682,294 11.79 11.27 11.3216 -0.2584 Ouster Inc. 3,661,126 32.95 27.93 29.8692 +6.7692 Beauty Health Co., The 3,639,793 2.35 1.77 2.00 +0.41 AEye Inc. 3,601,292 3.14 2.73 3.10 +0.26 IREN Ltd. 3,554,185 19.06 18.31 18.46 -0.11 Niocorp Developments Ltd. 3,470,962 4.831 4.2155 4.68 +0.44 Monster Beverage Corp. (NEW) 3,486,897 66.75 64.35 64.665 +3.865 Heron Therapeutics Inc. 3,413,514 1.46 1.255 1.335 -0.505 LegalZoom.com Inc. 3,380,522 11.65 10.71 11.625 +3.255 Recursion Pharmaceuticals Inc. 3,373,626 5.58 5.45 5.515 +0.105 Cisco Systems Inc. 3,378,701 71.0451 70.215 70.945 +1.045 Sabre Corp. 3,272,974 1.96 1.76 1.76 -0.17 DraftKings Inc. 3,285,937 44.88 42.91 43.72 -1.48 Core Scientific Inc. New 3,249,430 14.63 14.19 14.405 +0.055 Wendy's Co., The 3,191,197 10.35 9.9394 10.1828 +0.2228 Sangamo Therapeutics Inc. 3,147,454 0.4643 0.42 0.43 -0.0526 Solid Power Inc. 2,986,355 4.615 4.32 4.38 -0.10 Gilead Sciences Inc. 2,982,842 121.38 114.80 118.61 +8.33 Pacific Biosci.of California 2,963,321 1.51 1.32 1.325 +0.065 Applovin Corp. 2,955,054 463.38 447.0183 458.74 +21.40 Firefly Aerospace Inc. 2,973,835 57.07 52.11 55.74 -4.61 Clean Energy Fuels Corp. 2,970,332 2.55 2.10 2.344 +0.304 StoneCo Ltd. 2,864,394 14.75 14.00 14.425 +0.925 Micron Technology Inc. 2,874,141 113.84 111.67 113.44 +1.57
NYSE most active stocks:
Story Continues
Stock Name Volume High Low Last Change Spruce Power Holding Corp. 60,896,293 1.75 1.34 1.3702 +0.2002 BigBear.ai Holdings Inc. 20,858,416 7.22 6.85 6.93 +0.32 Under Armour Inc. 14,535,487 5.645 5.25 5.445 -1.195 fuboTV Inc. 13,650,413 3.79 3.51 3.715 +0.015 Sweetgreen Inc. 13,500,350 10.15 8.80 9.39 -3.27 Pinterest Inc. 13,109,308 35.96 33.10 35.1672 -4.0028 D-Wave Quantum Inc. 11,318,206 17.77 16.685 16.945 -0.225 QuantumScape Corp. 11,053,030 9.60 9.10 9.32 +0.08 Snap Inc. 10,305,049 7.56 7.39 7.415 -0.125 MP Materials Corp. 9,521,349 79.36 72.07 73.70 +2.63 AMPRIUS TECHNOLOGIES INC 8,961,647 9.66 8.21 8.51 +0.79 Joby Aviation Inc. 7,369,880 17.36 16.44 16.645 -0.605 Block Inc. 6,591,549 82.50 77.93 78.52 +1.67 Ford Motor Co. 6,344,669 11.35 11.21 11.33 +0.05 Hims & Hers Health Inc. 6,054,809 52.71 50.83 51.19 +0.14 Iamgold Corp. 5,833,553 7.715 7.37 7.54 -0.18 NuScale Power Corp. 5,801,180 44.74 40.62 41.5801 -3.0999 Hecla Mining Co. 5,634,862 7.595 7.19 7.525 +0.305 Uber Technologies Inc. 5,401,513 94.31 92.54 92.865 +0.195 Pfizer Inc. 5,317,867 24.54 24.16 24.435 +0.205 Baytex Energy Corp. 4,926,492 2.07 2.01 2.0299 -0.0201 IonQ Inc. 4,786,697 41.79 40.46 41.1699 +0.6799 OLO INC. 4,712,631 10.365 10.21 10.22 -0.12 Archer Aviation Inc. 4,733,614 9.93 9.63 9.715 -0.085 Twilio Inc. 4,728,097 105.75 99.50 99.5901 -22.7999 Oklo Inc. 3,892,311 80.80 75.10 77.30 -2.02 Under Armour Inc. 3,716,777 5.36 5.05 5.20 -1.07 Clearwater Analytics Holdings 3,658,324 19.13 18.66 18.93 +0.14 Agilon Health Inc. 3,705,368 0.943 0.83 0.9022 +0.0272 Barrick Mining Corp. 3,526,745 23.505 23.16 23.30 +0.23 Verizon Communications Inc. 3,423,118 43.355 43.035 43.205 +0.255 Occidental Petroleum Corp. 3,414,777 44.73 43.46 43.81 +0.22 Transocean Ltd. 3,327,961 3.04 2.9635 3.025 +0.075 AT & T Inc. 3,300,929 28.25 28.03 28.195 +0.135 First Majestic Silver Corp. 3,287,646 8.835 8.66 8.685 -0.045 Bank of America Corp. 3,238,613 45.62 44.98 45.555 +0.635 Oscar Health Inc. 3,208,211 15.31 14.88 15.2299 +0.0699 Eli Lilly and Company 3,150,322 656.18 637.2609 637.63 -3.23 Centuri Holdings Inc. 3,069,651 20.40 19.85 20.40 -0.80 Circle Internet Group Inc. 3,034,328 161.29 154.117 159.74 +6.81 Redwire Corp. 2,990,573 9.65 8.97 9.27 -0.20 Coeur Mining Inc. 2,952,051 11.61 11.20 11.445 +0.165 Figma Inc. 2,792,378 82.60 78.50 79.54 +1.30 Kenvue Inc. 2,775,790 21.83 21.28 21.455 -0.305 Zeta Global Holdings Corp. 2,745,555 19.86 19.01 19.32 -0.26 Lumen Technologies Inc. 2,672,932 3.8988 3.75 3.765 +0.065 Unity Software Inc. 2,691,077 34.62 33.35 34.522 +0.952 Evolent Health Inc. 2,615,310 8.74 8.26 8.57 -1.12 Nu Holdings Ltd. 2,587,021 12.59 12.39 12.445 +0.035 Exxon Mobil Corp. 2,609,389 107.51 105.95 106.28 +0.33 Energy Transfer L.P. 2,577,565 17.5699 17.3013 17.435 -0.185 Blend Labs Inc. 2,520,946 3.27 2.85 2.995 -0.575 Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co. 2,482,082 20.99 20.51 20.885 +0.485 Wells Fargo & Co. 2,429,343 78.05 76.35 77.9601 +0.9101 PG & E Corp. 2,379,216 15.09 14.89 14.915 -0.135 Flutter Entertainment PLC 2,366,502 293.80 279.03 281.45 -24.62 Amer. Eagle Outfitters Inc. 2,372,523 12.73 12.15 12.38 -0.22 Newmont Corp. 2,324,049 70.29 69.61 69.64 +0.57 Kinross Gold Corp. 2,300,594 19.15 18.855 19.02 +0.25 Carnival Corp. 2,252,451 29.135 28.745 29.025 +0.015 SES AI Corporation 2,232,701 1.21 1.14 1.1492 +0.0092 Alight Inc. 2,144,709 4.01 3.85 3.85 -0.14 Devon Energy Corp. 2,177,917 33.54 32.36 32.615 +0.225 Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc. 2,074,800 3.29 3.08 3.1066 -0.3134 Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. 2,078,958 42.72 42.23 42.5063 -0.1837 Stellantis N.V. 2,071,937 9.48 9.28 9.38 +0.16 UnitedHealth Group Inc. 2,044,751 249.44 244.37 247.25 +2.58 Fortuna Mining Corp. 2,036,750 6.57 6.33 6.435 +0.215 Rocket Companies Inc. 1,930,547 17.645 17.13 17.41 -0.14 Pagseguro Digital Ltd. 1,924,713 8.65 8.32 8.435 +0.235 UWM Holdings Corp. 1,896,264 4.59 4.43 4.495 -0.005 Lionsgate Studios Corp. (New) 1,889,315 6.375 5.69 6.32 +0.41 Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. 1,883,825 9.60 9.37 9.595 +0.175 Walt Disney Co., The 1,887,712 114.292 112.377 113.805 +0.925 Kinder Morgan Inc. 1,870,169 27.07 26.755 26.855 +0.095 American Axle & Mfg Hldgs Inc. 1,809,491 5.16 4.50 5.005 +0.425 Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. 1,791,233 46.09 45.31 45.765 +0.405 Dow Inc. 1,781,566 21.78 21.4132 21.5749 -0.0351 Schlumberger N.V. (Ltd.) 1,772,430 33.22 32.655 32.725 -0.065 Centene Corp. 1,751,200 25.635 25.18 25.40 +0.14 Walmart Inc. 1,722,499 104.40 103.15 104.32 +1.20 Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings 1,712,733 24.62 24.19 24.52 +0.05 Endeavour Silver Corp. 1,682,788 5.55 5.38 5.465 +0.065 Wolfspeed Inc. 1,663,823 1.52 1.47 1.50 -0.01 Grindr Inc. 1,657,032 16.24 14.75 15.45 -2.44 Peabody Energy Corp. 1,637,038 18.30 17.11 17.62 +0.59 Oracle Corp. 1,625,621 250.5299 247.96 249.23 -0.16 Kosmos Energy Ltd. 1,585,208 1.89 1.81 1.845 +0.025 AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc 1,572,010 2.87 2.79 2.865 +0.055 Salesforce Inc. 1,566,531 242.95 240.31 240.76 -0.12 AMCOR PLC 1,565,551 9.72 9.64 9.695 +0.055 Hanesbrands Inc. 1,524,655 4.87 4.5948 4.825 +0.175 Energy Vault Holdings Inc. 1,511,561 1.4696 1.20 1.405 +0.005 Halliburton Co. 1,498,627 21.345 20.82 20.845 -0.035 Pan American Silver Corp. 1,493,101 32.10 31.11 31.79 +0.35 Citigroup Inc. 1,435,877 92.555 91.34 92.47 +1.24 Permian Resources Corp. 1,437,646 13.50 13.13 13.17 -0.07 Chart Industries Inc. 1,429,029 199.19 198.915 198.935 -0.055 Arista Networks Inc. 1,436,517 140.08 137.91 139.52 +0.24 Lithium Americas Corp. 1,412,033 2.81 2.7438 2.755 +0.025
NYSE American most active stocks:
Stock Name Volume High Low Last Change BitMine Immersion Techno. Inc. 21,330,895 48.00 42.63 47.14 +5.86 Pineapple Financial Inc. 18,332,100 5.22 2.78 4.7317 +1.9117 B2Gold Corp. 12,979,507 3.76 3.46 3.70 -0.13 Denison Mines Corp. 12,648,169 2.36 2.245 2.255 +0.015 FOXO Technologies Inc. 9,055,177 0.1043 0.101 0.104 -0.0119 Energy Fuels Inc. 6,172,264 10.74 9.71 10.215 +0.615 Northern Dynasty Minls Ltd. 5,623,128 0.9485 0.891 0.9001 +0.0484 Uranium Energy Corp. 3,382,476 10.36 9.77 10.035 +0.185 BiomX Inc. 2,767,465 0.5294 0.4515 0.5151 -0.0788 Silvercorp Metals Inc. 2,575,107 4.65 4.32 4.465 -0.355 New Gold Inc. 2,282,855 4.87 4.80 4.835 +0.025 United States Antimony Corp. 1,986,115 3.79 3.605 3.655 +0.135 Equinox Gold Corp. 1,854,892 6.70 6.58 6.585 +0.035 Nuburu Inc. 1,522,069 0.2275 0.2146 0.216 -0.004 Avino Silver & Gold Mines Ltd. 1,372,548 3.81 3.71 3.78 +0.07 Atlasclear Holdings Inc. 1,289,880 0.1861 0.1756 0.1795 -0.0048 Castellum Inc. 1,275,070 1.31 1.26 1.285 +0.065 AgEagle Aerial Systems Inc. 1,240,676 2.245 2.14 2.1785 -0.0615 Senseonics Holdings Inc. 1,010,979 0.485 0.4554 0.4801 +0.0172 I-80 Gold Corp. 912,891 0.6098 0.5911 0.6022 +0.0143 Ur-Energy Inc. 900,607 1.29 1.22 1.2622 +0.0422 Ring Energy Inc. 862,822 0.7896 0.756 0.7702 +0.0202 Genius Group Ltd. 815,421 1.02 0.9655 1.005 +0.005 NovaGold Resources Inc. 778,690 5.835 5.63 5.805 +0.095 Ocean Power Technologies Inc. 625,665 0.5198 0.5025 0.5078 -0.0022 Standard Lithium Ltd. 562,981 2.86 2.69 2.8235 +0.1435 Ryde Group Ltd. 541,765 0.3613 0.30 0.3612 +0.0412 Aris Mining Corp. 509,348 8.18 7.75 7.81 -0.20 Gold Royalty Corp. 486,622 3.20 3.07 3.1106 +0.0306 Catheter Precision Inc. 460,295 0.1822 0.1722 0.177 -0.0017 Vizsla Silver Corp. 458,371 3.38 3.27 3.32 0.00 Unusual Machines Inc. 395,291 10.0499 9.6901 9.86 +0.27 Hyperscale Data Inc. 380,447 0.69 0.683 0.685 +0.0033 Azitra Inc. 376,557 0.1693 0.1639 0.1669 -0.001 Taseko Mines Ltd. 376,222 3.185 3.08 3.165 +0.055 Stereotaxis Inc. 366,458 2.49 2.29 2.42 +0.23 Mixed Martial Arts Group Ltd. 343,493 0.92 0.81 0.91 -0.0475 Intl Tower Hill Mines Ltd. 334,682 1.49 1.40 1.47 +0.04 Vista Gold Corp. 314,878 1.06 1.00 1.055 +0.0649 Americas Gold & Silver Corp. 308,909 1.12 1.08 1.0854 +0.0054 KULR Technology Group Inc. 289,955 5.39 5.18 5.24 +0.10 Centrus Energy Corp. 276,448 246.00 230.16 242.0126 +7.0726 Know Labs Inc. 265,022 2.44 1.76 2.19 -0.20 Westwater Resources Inc. 249,825 0.78 0.75 0.755 -0.0156 Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. 244,451 0.6876 0.6802 0.6802 +0.0099 Gold Resource Corp. 209,648 0.51 0.503 0.5046 +0.0083 NORTHANN CORP. 195,161 0.1563 0.1537 0.1558 -0.0019 Perfect Moment Ltd. 192,946 0.3454 0.2738 0.2804 +0.0064 Ivanhoe Electric Inc. 180,005 9.975 9.745 9.955 +0.215 Idaho Strategic Resources Inc. 165,096 23.89 22.75 23.86 +1.30 EON Resources Inc. 164,635 0.2866 0.277 0.2795 -0.0095 Dakota Gold Corp. 164,129 4.125 4.05 4.115 +0.105 Credit Sui. Asset Mgmt Inc. Fd 161,792 2.9872 2.97 2.98 -0.01 TRX Gold Corp. 159,293 0.3725 0.3649 0.3725 +0.0089 Mag Silver Corp. 154,507 23.24 22.75 23.05 +0.21 Inuvo Inc. 152,363 4.85 4.25 4.385 -1.065 Birks Group Inc. 151,689 0.6516 0.63 0.64 +0.0019 Tecogen Inc. (New) 149,531 9.48 8.51 9.435 +1.075 Orla Mining Ltd. (new) 145,703 10.48 10.24 10.24 -0.12 Integra Resources Corp. 144,508 1.61 1.59 1.5901 +0.0101 Cornerstone Strat.Val.Fd Inc. 141,578 8.14 8.12 8.1356 +0.0156 Myomo Inc. 141,032 1.985 1.8292 1.975 +0.185 Indonesia Energy Corp. Ltd. 130,997 2.9697 2.8249 2.84 -0.09 InfuSystems Holdings Inc. 117,998 8.25 7.66 8.185 +0.665 KAIROS Pharma Ltd. 114,249 0.96 0.9304 0.9564 -0.0036 Hyliion Holdings Corp. 113,714 1.56 1.4801 1.56 +0.07 Galiano Gold Inc. 104,168 1.55 1.51 1.52 +0.02 Theriva Biologics Inc. 101,045 0.3927 0.37 0.3749 -0.0151 Obsidian Energy Ltd. 98,502 5.885 5.74 5.7412 -0.0888 Lineage Cell Therapeutics Inc. 97,674 0.989 0.953 0.9604 +0.0096 Gran Tierra Energy Inc. 94,656 3.8725 3.795 3.80 -0.03 Vantage Corp. 91,644 4.85 4.78 4.80 -0.03 IGC Pharma Inc. 91,513 0.337 0.33 0.3323 -0.0067 GoldMining Inc. 89,656 0.82 0.8093 0.8093 -0.0003 OS Therapies Inc. 88,495 1.785 1.7301 1.7301 -0.0199 Cel-Sci Corp. 88,174 8.49 7.65 7.8188 -0.4112 Platinum Group Metals Ltd. 83,955 1.58 1.555 1.5609 -0.0191 Perspective Therapeutics Inc. 76,269 3.75 3.575 3.63 0.00 EMX Royalty Corp. 75,732 3.07 3.01 3.055 +0.035 Cornerstone Total Return Fund 72,103 7.85 7.83 7.845 +0.015 Milestone Scientific Inc. 70,028 0.6363 0.6049 0.6149 +0.01 Sachem Capital Corp. 62,344 1.1569 1.11 1.1451 -0.0149 Calidi Biotherapeutics Inc. 61,307 5.7566 5.15 5.1984 -0.5616 Imperial Oil Ltd. 58,814 85.79 84.68 84.75 -0.19 Mega Matrix Inc. 58,669 3.95 3.8009 3.885 +0.115 Gamco Gl.Gold Nat.Res.&Inc.Tr. 53,811 4.59 4.5698 4.58 0.00 Western Copper & Gold Corp. 54,005 1.25 1.23 1.25 0.00 IT Tech Packaging Inc. 53,596 0.208 0.205 0.2052 +0.0002 Cboe Global Markets Inc. 53,226 252.54 248.09 252.37 +2.87 Signing Day Sports Inc. 53,193 1.38 1.34 1.37 0.00 Brazil Potash Corp. 51,147 1.70 1.60 1.65 +0.03 Impact Biomedical Inc. 50,689 0.60 0.5654 0.5747 -0.0132 Metalla Royalty&Streaming Ltd. 48,179 4.30 4.23 4.26 +0.09 Trilogy Metals Inc. 45,619 1.53 1.46 1.525 +0.025 Trio Petroleum Corp. 43,505 1.19 1.1101 1.1298 -0.0102 Protalix BioTherapeutics Inc. 43,319 1.56 1.52 1.56 +0.05 Gencor Industries Inc. 39,791 14.665 14.30 14.66 +0.09 SunLink Health Systems Inc. 39,081 1.08 1.00 1.075 -0.005 New Found Gold Corp. 37,995 1.64 1.60 1.635 +0.035 Dolly Varden Silver Corp. 35,510 3.70 3.61 3.64 +0.02
- EA forecasts quarterly bookings below expectations on cautious gamer spending
Jul 29, 2025
By Zaheer Kachwala
(Reuters) -Electronic Arts forecast second-quarter net bookings below Wall Street expectations on Tuesday, pressured by uncertain consumer spending on its core sports portfolio amid a challenging economic environment.
With shifting U.S. trade policies threatening to push inflation higher, gamers have become more cautious with discretionary spending.
EA said the bookings forecast includes a four percentage point year-over-year headwind, due to changes in recognizing returns from the Ultimate Edition of "FC 26", which will be booked in the third quarter.
Earlier this month, EA launched "College Football 26", hoping to build on the success of last year’s edition, which became one of the best-selling titles of 2024.
However, analysts warned that growth comparisons for "College Football 26" may be challenging, given the breakout success of its predecessor, which revived the franchise after a more than 10-year hiatus.
The company said it expects a more "normalized curve" for College Football sales, partially offset by the launch of "Madden NFL 26".
Its shares were up more than 1% in extended trading.
EA last week unveiled the first trailer for "Battlefield 6", placing a big bet on the title to reinvigorate the franchise after the previous installment fell short of fan expectations.
"With Battlefield competing in the shooter category this year after not releasing a title for four years, we think Battlefield stands to benefit more than Call of Duty does in the back-half of 2025," D.A. Davidson & Co analyst Wyatt Swanson said.
Battlefield competes with Activision Blizzard (NASDAQ:ATVI)’s "Call of Duty" franchise, which has long-been the dominant player in the first-person shooter genre.
"Battlefield 6" is set to launch in EA’s current fiscal year with analysts expecting the game to sell millions of copies.
EA forecast second-quarter bookings of between $1.80 billion and $1.90 billion, below analysts’ expectations of $2.01 billion, according to data compiled by LSEG.
For the first quarter, EA reported bookings of $1.30 billion beating estimates of $1.29 billion.
