T.G.I.F.

Since it's Friday and the markets are closed for the weekend... I thought it was a good time to show you this!

Take Away the A.I. Stocks and What's Left? 

A Healthier Market Than You Think!

What the S&P 500 looks like without the Magnificent Seven — and why Canadians should be watching the other 493 companies, not the seven everyone talks about.

Here is a thought experiment worth doing with real numbers: Take the S&P 500, remove the A.I. trade... Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Tesla, the so-called Magnificent Seven... and look at what remains! 

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The exercise sounds academic. 

It isn't! 

The S&P 500 without AI stocks turns out to be a different market entirely, and in 2026 that difference has become the single most useful diagnostic tool an observer of the North American economy can have!

A Third of the Index Is Seven Companies:

Start with the scale of the problem. As of July 2026, the Magnificent Seven carry a combined market value of roughly $22 trillion... about one-third of the entire S&P 500. 

That weight has hovered between 32% and 35% for the past year. 

Put another way: when you buy a plain index fund believing you own "the market," a third of your money is riding on seven companies whose valuations rest largely on a single technological bet!

This is not a normal state of affairs. 

Concentration at this level exceeds anything seen at the peak of the dot-com era, and it means the daily movement of the index tells you more about sentiment toward one trade than about the health of the American economy!

The Tale of Two Markets in 2026:

Now remove those seven names and watch the picture change. There is an exchange-traded fund that does exactly this... the Defiance Large Cap ex-Mag 7 ETF, ticker XMAG, which holds the S&P 500 minus the seven. 

Its performance this year against the full index is instructive:

• The Magnificent Seven, measured by the Roundhill MAGS ETF, peaked in late October 2025 and have been drifting downward since — falling as much as 12% at points this year.
• The full, cap-weighted S&P 500 has been dragged down with them, off roughly 4% at the spring lows.
• The other 493 companies... some analysts have started calling them the "Impressive 493" have held nearly flat to modestly positive.

And beneath that flat aggregate number, the old economy is having a genuinely good year. 

By late winter, energy stocks were up more than 23%, basic materials nearly 18%, consumer staples over 15%, and industrials about 14%. 

Healthcare and even residential construction have joined the advance. 

Money is not fleeing the stock market... it is rotating out of the crowded A.I. trade and into everything else!

What the Market Without A.I. Stocks Actually Tells Us:

Three conclusions fall out of the numbers.

First, the underlying American economy is in better shape than the headline index implies. The 493 trade at far more ordinary valuations. Their anchors... JPMorgan, Exxon Mobil, Johnson & Johnson, Walmart... are companies with decades-long records of dividends backed by real cash flow. 

The famous warnings about the S&P 500's stretched valuation are overwhelmingly a statement about seven stocks... not five hundred!

Second, the index is no longer a mirror of the market. Because the seven still account for roughly a third of the index's weight, a bad day for Nvidia moves the S&P 500 more than a good quarter for a hundred mid-sized industrial firms. 

Investors who believed they held a diversified portfolio have, in fact, been holding a concentrated technology bet with a long tail of other companies attached.

Third, the unwind... so far... is orderly! The feared scenario has always been that an A.I. correction takes the whole market down with it. 

What has actually happened through mid-2026 is a rotation... capital leaving the seven and finding a home in energy, materials, financials, and staples. 

This is the "broadening out" that market veterans like Ed Yardeni predicted when he ended his buy call on big tech last December, arguing that the AI story could only continue if its benefits spread to the companies buying the technology, not just the ones selling it!

What Can Be Done With This Information:

For an ordinary investor, the toolkit is straightforward and already exists. 

Equal-weight index funds, the largest being the Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight ETF (RSP), assign each of the 500 companies the same 0.2% weight, cutting Magnificent Seven exposure from about 35% to roughly 1.4% while keeping full exposure to American large caps. 

Funds like XMAG exclude the seven outright! 

Neither is a prediction that A.I. stocks will crash; both are simply ways to own the market without owning quite so much of a single trade. (The usual caveat applies.... this is a description of the instruments, not investment advice!)

But the more valuable use of the ex-A.I. market is diagnostic, and this is where the Canadian interest comes in.

The performance gap between the seven and the 493 is a real-time gauge of whether the A.I. correction stays contained or turns systemic. 

Watch the tripwire: as long as the 493 keep grinding higher while the seven deflate, what we are witnessing is a sector repricing... painful for index holders, but not a repeat of 2000 or 2008. 

If the 493 begins rolling over as well, it means the damage is spilling over into the broader economy through reduced capital spending, a shrinking wealth effect, and tighter credit!

That distinction matters enormously north of the border. 

A.I. data-centre construction has been one of the few forces propping up American GDP growth. 

A contained unwind leaves U.S. demand for Canadian energy, lumber, metals, and manufactured goods largely intact… and note that the sectors leading the 2026 rotation, energy and materials, are precisely the sectors where Canada sells! 

A systemic unwind, by contrast, would hit Canadian exports just as the country works its way out of its technical recession, though it would likely also accelerate the rotation into Canadian federal bonds that has already been underway as global investors look for alternatives to U.S. assets.

The Bottom Line:

Strip the AI stocks out of the S&P 500, and you find a market that is neither euphoric nor collapsing... just an ordinary economy, reasonably priced, going about its business! 

The bubble, if that is what it is, lives in seven names! 

The information in that split is more useful than any forecast... it tells you where the risk is concentrated, gives you the means to step around it, and... for those of us watching from Canada... provides an early-warning system for whether America's A.I. reckoning will stay on Wall Street... or arrive at our loading docks!

Keep your eye on the 493. They are the real market!

TOO LITTLE... TOO LATE!

We should look at this every day to remind us that there are still some sane people down there!!!!!

Of course... when I.C.E. starts executing people on the streets... It's hard to keep that in mind!

TARIFFS!

How will the Canadian government spin the fact that Canada will not be able to trade with the US without any tariffs?

By S.D. Hargreaves: THE Impolite Canadian! 

I think you’ve missed the point completely.

Canada doesn’t want to trade with the U.S at all anymore! 

Canada doesn’t need to spin anything, because Canada only deals in the truth and facts, a foreign concept to the Red-Hat Nazi Party running the U.S. 

The U.S. is untrustworthy and a highly volatile authoritarian regime, being run by Trump, the most corrupt, egotistical, serial liar in U.S. history. 

Maybe you should be thinking about that instead of all the delusional ways you can hurt Canada. We don’t obey your dictator, we don’t respect your dictator, we despise your dictator, and we are thoroughly disgusted by your dictator. 

U.S.-imposed illegal tariffs (yes, they are illegal, as deemed so by the World Trade Organization) and the subsequent illegal trade war are somewhat the least of Canada’s worries when you consider the very real threats made on our sovereignty, which Canadians need to take seriously. 

You need to understand that it isn’t that the U.S. doesn’t need anything from Canada, it’s that Trump’s regime doesn’t want to pay for Canadian exports anymore. 

Trump wants to amplify the U.S.’s already predatory nature, undermine our economy and simply take everything from Canada! 

By everything, I mean all our natural resources. 

Trump’s tariffs on Canadian goods are nothing more than bullying and diversionary tactics. 

Two can play at diversionary tactics. As Trump turns the White House into a gaudy brothel, with gold-coloured paint everywhere, and paves over the famous White House rose garden, Canada is signing new trade deals around the world, deals that will end certain exports to the U.S. 

While Trump is busy playing army guy by putting nuclear weapons on the roof of the White House, we are expanding our military exponentially and buying military equipment and weaponry from countries other than the U.S. such as the Saab JAS 39 Gripen. 

We have even committed to producing our own military equipment, because we have all the resources needed to do so. 

We do all of this as we ignore Trump’s trade deal deadlines and continue to boycott U.S. goods/products and travel to the U.S. 

As for his tariffs, there is not one country that doesn’t incur some form of tariffs, taxes, duties or levies on exports.

In any case, those picking up the tab for tariffs aren’t foreign exporters like Canada, etc., but U.S. consumers. 

This could even include the very industries that the Trump regime wants to shield if imported raw materials and components end up costing more. 

And they are! 

Meanwhile, the hellscape the U.S. has become... continues to get worse. Masked ICE agents run racist raids with impunity, literally rounding up people simply because they are brown. 

Washington is crawling with the National Guard and military! 

Mass protests against Trump are popping up everywhere as he continues to weaponize the government against U.S. citizens and destroy democracy. 

Your economy is mediocre at best and heading towards a recession, inflation rates are steadily rising, all while Trump and his billionaire cronies get richer. 

Trump, sick with moral decay, breaks, defies and outright ignores the law, yet the U.S. has the highest rate of incarceration in the entire free world, and still, the filthy scumbag and multiple-time convicted orange felon has never seen the inside of a jail cell. 

Trump sues media outlets when they call him out on his bullshit, tell the truth, or paint him in a negative light, as he absolutely deserves to be. 

I find that to be a particularly chickenshit move. 

Trump is a treasonous rat and traitor to your country. 

The U.S. used to hang people for treason; now you celebrate it like spineless cowards. 

Worst, and most disgusting of all, Trump is a filthy pedophile, a sexual abuser and a rapist, and MAGA seems just fine with that, creating and accepting lie upon lie to defend him. 

What a disgraceful and sickening fucking display. 

Nothing is the truth unless it comes out of Trump’s smug face, or the fork-tongued mouth of that Nazi Barbie, Karoline Leavitt, right? 

The U.S. is rotting from the inside. 

Rotten with hate, prejudice, discrimination, intolerance, racism, greed, corruption, indecency, deceit, misogyny and the list goes on, but you’re more worried about how the Canadian government will spin the fact that Canada will not be able to trade with the US without any tariffs? 

I think you’ve got your priorities really mixed up fella. 

Pay more attention to removing the rot and trying to salvage what’s left of your toilet of a country before running your mouth about others. 

Until then, there is no benefit or point to your question; it just makes you look truly stupid and embarrasses you!

S.D. Hargreaves:

***

Which 10 states are considering joining Canada?

It doesn't matter what states are discussing joining Canada. All 50 can discuss it all they want, but it is extremely unlikely that Canada will accept any of them.

What Americans do not understand is that the two cultures are much too different for a union to make sense.

Canada is NOT interested in having one or more states as part of confederation. From an American point of view any state joining Canada would require fundamental changes on the part of the state.

For example, American states are constitutionally sovereign. As part of this sovereignty, they have their own criminal laws and court systems.

On the other hand, the Canadian system is one in which responsibilities are divided between the federal government and the provinces. There is only one criminal law and one court system.

For all intents and purposes there is no overlap between the federal and provincial governments although the federal government does often provide funding in provincial areas that have a national benefit such as healthcare and post secondary education.

Yet another lie from Don-the-Con is that Canadians would benefit by becoming part of the U.S. He cites healthcare and taxes as benefits.

In fact, those are two of the major reasons not to become part of the United States. At best, the U.S. insurance risk management system is rated 34th in the world. Canada is ranked much higher and has far better outcomes.

Canada's overall tax burden is among the three lowest of the developed countries, lower than the U.S.

Overall, Canada is moving forward, becoming one of the leading nations of the world. On the other hand, the U.S. is sinking, already a second level country heading for third-world status.

There are enormous advantages for U.S. states and Americans in becoming part of Canada. All the disadvantages accrue to Canada and Canadians.

Thanks for finally showing interest in Canada but it's too late. Canada isn't interested.

You elected Trump, now live with the consequences.

By Brenton Harding:

What are the chances that Canada will go back to relying on the U.S. after tariff issues are resolved?

 Guest Post by Dale Josef:

What are the chances that Canada will stick with its new trade partners instead of going back to relying on the U.S. after tariff issues are resolved?

Let’s employ an analogy:

Suppose your girlfriend empties your bank account, crashes your car, kills your dog, gets you fired at work, burns down your parent’s house, then says, “sorry”.

Are you going to take her back?

We practically spit in the face of Canada’s prime minister.

We threatened to invade their country.

A whole lot of other things went down. It’s all in the news.

Canadians are among the most relentlessly polite people of all time. But even they have their limits.

The entire world is shocked at the uncultured, ignorant louts we’ve become.

All because of one ill-bred, ill-mannered, self-absorbed narcissist.

You know, he of the cotton-candy locks, carefully combed to look messed up.

He kowtows to our enemies and slaps the faces of our allies.

He is not a man that anyone takes seriously, except for the fact that he sits on a seat of immense power. In that way, he is indeed scary, like a toddler with a hand grenade. 

But nothing he says is taken seriously.

Our former allies know now that the United States cannot be trusted. It’s going to take a very long time to earn that trust again, if ever.

All the cred we garnered by emerging from WWII on the winning side AND as the world’s only superpower is now all gone. We pissed it all away, thanks to one psychopath lying his way to two electoral wins.

Congratulations, MAGA. We’re now the world’s pariah. Thanks to you. You voted for him even when you knew what he would do. How did you know? Because he told you. And you went ahead and voted for him anyway.

You fucked up the world.

THIS... is why the United States got it wrong!

The answer is simple folks...!

As it currently stands, the Government of the good ol' U.S. of A. is a "triumvirate" of three elements... or branches:

A government consisting of a (1) Legislative Branch, and (2) Executive Branch, and a (3) Judicial branch!

￬

B U T !!!

The way they SHOULD have set it up is with:

1.  Business!          2. Government!         3. Unions!

I know it's easy being an armchair critic, kids... but it's worth a bit of thought! 

(Yes, I know all three figures are men... but those are the pictures I managed to find for these three groups... and if that's an issue for you... too bad!)

No flags please... we're Canadian!

 I was in Sarnia yesterday for my weekly visit to my 99-year-old mother... when I decided to drive under the "bridge" (border) to see if the chip truck was open for the season yet...

On either side of the border (U.S. and Canada), there are two huge flagpoles with the Canadian and American flags on them! (see pictures)

(American Side)

***

The American side still had their two flags flapping in the breeze... (see above), but the Canadian side was EMPTY... ...and they just put a Canadian flag on another pole on the south side of the bridge!

That left us with just this flag on the north side of the park by the chip truck!

By the way... going under the bridge for FRIES... was described by McLean's magazine as one of the best 100 things to do in Canada! (That's either really good... or really bad... depending on what you think is fun!!!)

DUMP TRUMP!

Q:  To what extent is the United States dependent on Canadian products? 

A:  Are there any comparable American alternatives to these products?

• America imports 60% of its crude oil from Canada, at an average **discount** of 15%. That discount has applied for close to 4 decades, minimum. Roughly 80% of vehicle fuels used in the US are derived from this CANADIAN-SUBISIDIZED oil. The closest substitute your refineries can handle comes from Venezuela. I’m sure the orange stain won’t mind buying from them at all.
• 50% of aluminum consumed in the US comes from Canada. There are few alternatives as aluminum takes a god-awful amount of electricity to produce. Canada has shit-tons of hydroelectric power that we use to make aluminum.
• That same hydroelectric power generation is so plentiful, that we export most of the rest to the US, which keeps the grids along the east coast and into the mid-west humming. No Canadian hydro means rolling blackouts across a third of the US.
• 80% of potash used in fertilizer is sourced from Canada. Canada is the world’s largest producer, having a full third of global production. The next two largest producers are russia and China, and put together, they produce ALMOST as much as Canada does by itself. You could try and buy half the output from both of them, or all the output from one, I guess.
• Canada exported almost 3–trillion cubic feet of natural gas, which helps keep the Midwest and Northeast states warm and generates a significant amount of electricity. According to your own sources, natural gas accounted for 43.1% of your total generating capacity last year.
• A full quarter of the uranium you use annually comes from Canada. The ore is of unusually high purity too. That’s another quarter of your generating capacity going down, and 18.6% of electricity is produced by nuclear.

In order to replace any of these would require a huge amount of work. 

You could build a dozen aluminum smelters to pick up the slack from Canada alone, but you still need electricity to run them. And you can see the problems with that. 

More pressing is finding new ways to heat your houses, fertilize your fields and afford to drive anywhere. 

The “good guy” discount Canada has been giving the US for five decades is going to end... so you can expect your local gas prices to rise by an average of 15%, regardless of what the orange-stain does now.

M Spicer.