Sam Badawi
Stock Analyst, Creator of Origins of Alpha & Quarterly Conviction
Fintech's slide looks like a broad rotation out of the sector rather than isolated company weakness, as investors buy the largest beneficiaries of the AI infrastructure buildout. SoFi is down 43% year to date, with similar weakness at Klarna, Shift4 and Toast, as capital leaves fintech, software and emerging markets for semiconductors, networking, memory and AI infrastructure names such as Nvidia, Broadcom, Micron and Nebius. SoFi CEO Anthony Noto said the decline bothers him. x.comÂ
Rising long-term yields threaten SoFi and other fintechs. The US 10-year yield is at its highest in about 30 years, and 10-year yields in Japan, Germany and the UK are also at highs, with Japan's at 2.91%, the highest since 1996. Klarna is the first casualty of this uncertainty, and it will hit SoFi and every other fintech. x.comÂ
SoFi will not get a tech multiple, so it will likely underperform about 90% of tech companies over the next five years despite being a great company. Its tech platform never grew into a larger, higher-margin share of revenue, leaving it a fast-growing bank, and its guidance includes no rate cuts. It has underperformed the S&P 500 and especially the Nasdaq 100 since its 2020 SPAC listing. x.com x.com x.com x.com x.com x.comÂ
A clearing of the gloomy environment will make lending stocks the next multibaggers. SoFi, Upstart and Klarna are down now, much as many cybersecurity stocks were before rising two- to fourfold in under six months. Better Home & Finance (-75% YTD), LendingTree (-55%) and Rocket (-47%) join them among lending names whose current prices will look dirt cheap in 2028-2029. x.com x.comÂ
SoFi is overvalued because it is just a bank, as it has been since inception. Member growth of 518% over five years while the stock fell 21%, cited by @StockSavvyShay, does not make it an opportunity, since the stock was extremely overvalued five years ago and subscriber growth does not justify the valuation. The fintech sector is trading poorly with little investor interest, so waiting means years of mediocre returns. x.com x.com x.com x.com x.comÂ
Financing strain threatens smaller AI-related plays. Elon Musk says debt markets have nearly closed to firms without substantial non-AI-data-center revenue. Neoclouds, energy, HVAC, electronics and builders will be a much smaller field in a year; its 'guppy' plays can be shorted here toward zero. CoreWeave, IREN and Vertiv look troubled, perhaps Nebius; Ouster, Applied Digital, Ultra Clean, Cipher Digital, WhiteFiber, TeraWulf and IPG Photonics too. x.com x.comÂ
SoFi's expanding financial ecosystem now has eight businesses above $100 million in annualized revenue, a shift from its student-loan origins that makes its next decade incredibly bullish. Crypto products rose from 63,441 in Q4 2025 to 503,070 in Q3 2026, nearly 8x in three quarters. It is still early, but crypto could become another valuable piece of the ecosystem. x.com x.comÂ
Businesses tied to retail spending, such as Robinhood and SoFi, look vulnerable, with AI given as the reason. Part of their growth should also be discounted as inflation. x.comÂ
The Nasdaq 100's bottom for this move is not in yet, even if tech makes new highs later this year. The recent semis and tech crash blew up the Situational Awareness fund, and more forced unwinds by stressed funds are likely, as in 2022 when 3AC and Celsius were not the end. Martin Shkreli shares a report that two more AI hedge funds, AIPR and VARA, are down 30-50% this month. Prices still have a way to go before retesting the spring range for a bounce. x.com x.com x.comÂ
Fintech tops the list of over-punished sectors likely to offer some of the best opportunities over the next few years. Its 50-70% drawdowns reflect a sentiment and macro reset, not a fundamentals collapse, as higher rates, cooler retail trading and a shift to safer assets crushed multiples for SoFi, Robinhood, Affirm, Coinbase, Sezzle and PayPal. Meanwhile SoFi expects 30%+ revenue growth, Robinhood's engagement is rebounding and PayPal generates massive free cash flow. Not every name will win. … Show more
SoFi is struggling and its leadership's blockchain push looks like a substitute for a real plan. CEO Anthony Noto calls blockchain the fix for archaic financial infrastructure, but SoFi is caught between sector rotation and agentic AI. Bulls cite $1.2B of net revenue, a pre-operating-expense metric, yet SoFi's profit margin is about 14% versus Robinhood's 42%, and it spends about 4x as much on sales and marketing. Its new stablecoin launched with a $60k transaction, years behind Circle. x.com … Show more
