Speaker · Updated
Malcolm Ethridge: latest market views
Capital Area Planning Group
Summary
Malcolm Ethridge is Managing Partner at Capital Area Planning Group, a boutique financial planning and investment management firm based in Washington, D.C. He is a CFP and a CNBC on-air contributor.
Chorus has 11 views from Malcolm Ethridge across 2 episodes on CNBC Halftime Report and CNBC Closing Bell since October 19, 2026. Their latest calls: bullish on Cerebras Systems; bearish on CoreWeave, Meta Platforms and Netflix.
Where they stand
Their latest bullish or bearish call on each company.
- Cerebras SystemsBullish ·
- CoreWeaveBearish ·
- Meta PlatformsBearish ·
- NetflixBearish ·
What they talk about most
The latest views
Newest first. Every quote is checked against the episode's transcript.
CoreWeaveBearish
CoreWeave's neocloud model is at risk if capital tightens and hyperscalers walk back commitments.
If capital becomes scarce, the commitments made by hyperscalers and AI labs could be broken. Microsoft already backed away from a European data center project, leaving neocloud companies holding the bag. Malcolm sees this as the core question for CoreWeave, which must raise debt and equity to deliver in a high-rate environment.
“I'll take it a step further and say what happens when we've gotta walk back some of those commitments. Who gets left holding the bag?”at 10:19
CNBC Halftime Report: The AI Race Deepens as Access to Capital Shrinks: Your Next Move 10/22/26 ·
Meta PlatformsBearish
Meta's cash-flow-negative spending will be punished; he is bearish and doubts its enterprise AI bet.
The market now has a zero-tolerance stance toward hyperscalers going cash-flow negative, and Meta's earnings call showed this, with the stock down 5%. Malcolm also reads the early earnings-call timing as a sign of a coming debt or equity raise, and says Meta is betting the house that enterprises will choose its models over Anthropic and OpenAI. He says the outcome of that bet is still unknown.
“I wish I shared you guys enthusiasm over Meta, but we've seen now there's a zero tolerance policy for companies, hyperscaler companies going cash flow negative.”at 10:45
CNBC Halftime Report: The AI Race Deepens as Access to Capital Shrinks: Your Next Move 10/22/26 ·
Cerebras SystemsBullish
Cerebras is a beaten-down AI chip stock with latency tech and cybersecurity upside; he is buying the dip.
Cerebras has fallen to an all-time low of about $1.10, down 71% from its high, because most of its revenue is tied to OpenAI. Malcolm argues that Cerebras has already proven it can solve the latency problem inside data centers. That matters for agentic cybersecurity systems that run autonomously, where latency can decide whether an attack is caught. He expects more partners beyond CrowdStrike, which is its main partner so far, across a large cybersecurity TAM. He is adding to a full position at this discount.
“So this is probably the most speculative name that I own personally, but I'm also looking at an opportunity to own a chip stock that I think it was at $1.80 the October 1.”at 16:54
CNBC Halftime Report: The AI Race Deepens as Access to Capital Shrinks: Your Next Move 10/22/26 ·
Enterprise AI adoption & AI software
Enterprises are cutting AI token spend and shifting to cheaper open models, which threatens AI capex payoff.
CFOs have finally gained control of corporate budgets and are telling teams to stop spending at all costs on AI and to cut token usage. JP Morgan is moving work from frontier models to cheaper open models. An exec there said staff were spending more on tokens than their annual salaries, which they realized was absurd. Companies are moving from experimenting to deploying AI responsibly, and that pullback raises doubts about whether hyperscaler spending will pay off.
“The other side of that equation that we haven't talked about any at all, which is absolutely ludicrous, is what happens when the companies buying these products refuse to spend the money to buy the products anymore.”at 20:46
CNBC Halftime Report: The AI Race Deepens as Access to Capital Shrinks: Your Next Move 10/22/26 ·
NetflixBearish
Netflix's turnaround is delayed by declining ad sales, despite the stock being near its worst.
Malcolm has been defensive, thinking the story may be as bad as it gets and that downgrades have already come. The earnings figure that bothers him is declining ad sales. Netflix had got into ad sales well, so a decline in that number makes him question any turnaround anytime soon.
“The one thing in the earnings that I really didn't love that is starting to make me question the stock turnaround anytime soon is the declining ad sales numbers.”at 28:16
CNBC Halftime Report: The AI Race Deepens as Access to Capital Shrinks: Your Next Move 10/22/26 ·
Space economy
Warming to space stocks; sees space as an obvious place where AI deployment starts to make waves.
Ethridge says he is starting to warm up to the space sector because of what guests on the show have been discussing. He calls space one of the most obvious places where the deployment phase of AI starts to make waves. He offers no specific company data or numbers, so the case is thin.
“Well, I like the space. I'm starting to warm up to the space based on what these guys are talking about. I think it's one of the most obvious places that the deployment phase of AI starts to actually make waves.”at 37:38
CNBC Halftime Report: The AI Race Deepens as Access to Capital Shrinks: Your Next Move 10/22/26 ·
Healthcare is one of the most obvious places where AI deployment will start to make waves.
Malcolm is warming up to health care after hearing CEOs talk about how AI is speeding up data use and generating growth. He thinks the sector is one of the most obvious places where AI deployment starts to show results, which bodes well for many of its names.
“I think it bodes well for a lot of the names in the sector. ... I think it's one of the most obvious places that the deployment phase of AI starts to actually make waves.”at 37:38
CNBC Halftime Report: The AI Race Deepens as Access to Capital Shrinks: Your Next Move 10/22/26 ·
Earnings growth slowing from 37% toward 11-20% would hit the market hard.
Ethridge expects growth to decelerate from about 37% toward 20%, 11% or 15%, which is far below the current rate. He thinks the trend is down and will cause the market to react badly. He argues the current earnings period could be as good as it gets, since the companies must borrow more to keep spending, and he doubts earnings will hold up.
“we're probably talking about a deceleration from 37% earnings growth for the year down to whatever the number is, 20%, 11%, 15%... is going to have a meaningful impact on this market.”at 13:42
Wait for big tech earnings before buying the Nasdaq; avoid chasing the drawdown now.
Ethridge says investors should be cautious because of the borrowing concerns and the likely earnings slowdown. He would not buy a Nasdaq index position at this level and would wait until big tech reports. He would only consider buying a beaten-down name he likes, and he expects earnings to tell the market more than usual.
“I wouldn't step in and buy, like, a Nasdaq per se right here. I'd wait until we start to get earnings from the big tech companies first.”at 14:29
AI-driven bond issuance is getting pricier with weaker covenants, so investors should be skittish.
Ethridge says the companies issuing bonds to fund AI spending still find buyers among big money managers, but they must pay higher rates and accept better covenants for investors. He argues this is weaker than it was in March and April. That is why he thinks investors should be skittish, given that the market has disliked additional borrowing since the summer.
“they are still getting issuances taken up by the bigger money managers, but they're also having to increase the rates that they're offering. They're also having to bake in better covenants”at 14:29
Enterprise AI adoption & AI software
Companies that integrated AI internally will drive ROI and a market reacceleration into 2027.
Ethridge argues that the infrastructure builders' cloud growth may not lead the market out of the next downshift. He thinks the next leaders are companies that have integrated AI into their own operations over the past 18 to 24 months. He expects the market to reaccelerate into 2027 once that return on investment shows up.
“Maybe we're moving to where the companies that have been able to integrate AI into themselves for the last twenty four months... And that's where you see the market start to reaccelerate into 2027.”at 19:53
Shows
- CNBC Halftime Report · 1 episode
- CNBC Closing Bell · 1 episode
Ask your AI what Malcolm Ethridge thinks
Chorus gives Claude, ChatGPT and other assistants every view Malcolm Ethridge has shared on the shows it covers, next to everyone else's. Ask where they stand, what changed, and who disagrees.
Chorus reports what speakers said. It isn't investment advice.