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- This Space Stock Is Selling Shovels for the Orbital Gold Rush
This Space Stock Is Selling Shovels for the Orbital Gold Rush
Noah Zelvis
March 03, 2026
Everyone loves the moonshot story.
The better trade is the company that gets paid whether the mission is a satellite, a science project, or a national security “do not screw this up” contract.
Today’s long pick is building a real space business: more launches, more recurring services, and a growing role in the behind-the-scenes infrastructure that makes the modern world work.
Think less sci-fi, more invoices.
Domestic Buildout (Sponsored)
Last century, power was built in oil refineries.
Today, it’s built-in rare-earth processing.
While most investors focus on mining, the real leverage sits in the midstream step that turns raw materials into finished metals and magnets used across defense and advanced technology.
That capability is limited outside China.
One North America based processor is working to build an integrated domestic pathway from mining to finished magnets, with operations based on North American soil.
If execution continues and the market begins to recognize the strategic value of this supply chain, the stock could see meaningful upside.
Read the full breakdown.
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Photonics
NVIDIA Drops $4B On The Companies That Make Light-Speed Chips
NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) is investing $2 billion each in photonic product makers Lumentum and Coherent to bring light-based technology deeper into its data center chip ecosystem.
The deals include multibillion-dollar purchase commitments from Nvidia, as well as future capacity and access rights to advanced laser and optical networking products from both companies.
Photonics has emerged as a critical technology for chipmakers seeking to boost processing speeds as AI inference workloads demand faster, more efficient data movement.
NVIDIA is locking in supply before the bottleneck becomes a problem.
Manufacturing Muscle Is Part Of The Deal
The investments are not just about product access.
Both Lumentum and Coherent will use the capital to fund research and development, expand capacity, and build out U.S. manufacturing operations.
NVIDIA is essentially funding its own future supply chain.
NVIDIA Keeps Buying The Layers Others Ignore
While competitors focus on chip design and software, Nvidia is investing in the physical infrastructure that makes everything faster.
Photonics sits at the intersection of networking and computing — exactly where AI data centers hit their biggest performance walls.
NVIDIA is not waiting for suppliers to scale on their own. It is financing the buildout and securing priority access at the same time.
That is how you stay ahead when everyone else is chasing the same compute ceiling.
Pro Hardware
Apple Just Merged Two Dies Into One Monster Chip
Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) announced its M5 Pro and M5 Max chips, both built on a new Fusion Architecture that combines two dies into a single system-on-a-chip.
The design packs an 18-core CPU, a scalable GPU, a Media Engine, a Neural Engine, a unified memory controller, and Thunderbolt 5 into one package.
The CPU now includes six super cores and 12 new performance cores, delivering up to 30% faster performance on pro workloads compared to the previous generation.
Both chips are a significant step up from the 14-core M4 Pro and 16-core M4 Max.
The GPU And Memory Gains Are Massive
The GPU scales up to 40 cores, each with a Neural Accelerator, pushing peak AI compute to over 4x that of the previous generation.
Overall graphics performance is up 20%, and ray-tracing workloads improve by as much as 35%.
M5 Pro supports up to 64GB of unified memory at 307GB/s bandwidth, while M5 Max pushes to 128GB at 614GB/s. These are workstation-class specs inside a laptop chip.
Apple Is Targeting Serious Workloads
The M5 Pro is aimed at data modelers, sound designers, and STEM professionals who need heavy CPU and GPU performance with large memory pools.
The M5 Max targets 3D animators, app developers, and AI researchers running maximum compute workloads.
New MacBook Pro models powered by these chips are available for pre-order tomorrow, with availability starting March 11.
Apple is making it clear that its silicon roadmap is not slowing down.
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Cloud Infrastructure
Amazon Bets $50B That OpenAI Needs Its Cloud
Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) has entered a multiyear strategic partnership with OpenAI, committing up to $50 billion in the company with an initial $15 billion tranche and an additional $35 billion tied to future conditions.
The deal makes AWS the exclusive third-party cloud distribution provider for OpenAI Frontier, its enterprise agent platform.
AWS and OpenAI will co-develop a Stateful Runtime Environment powered by OpenAI models, available through Amazon Bedrock.
OpenAI will also consume 2 gigawatts of Trainium capacity through AWS infrastructure, deepening its reliance on Amazon's custom silicon.
The Compute Commitment Is Enormous
On top of the partnership terms, OpenAI is expanding its existing compute agreement with AWS by $100 billion over the next eight years.
That is a staggering volume of cloud demand locked into Amazon's infrastructure for nearly a decade.
The two companies also plan to develop customized AI models for Amazon's consumer-facing applications.
This means OpenAI technology could eventually power experiences across Alexa, shopping, and other Amazon products directly.
Amazon Is Playing Cloud Landlord And AI Partner At Once
This deal positions AWS as the infrastructure backbone behind one of the most important AI companies in the world.
Amazon gets long-term compute revenue, distribution leverage, and access to frontier AI models all in one agreement.
Amazon's sending a clear signal that the company's AI-first strategy is accelerating.
Amazon is not just building AI tools — it is becoming the platform on which the biggest AI companies run.
Poll: Which money moment changed behavior most? |
Recent Tech Movers
SailPoint (NASDAQ: SAIL)
The Permission Slip Stock for the Corporate Internet
If you’ve ever joined a new job and instantly gotten access to things you absolutely should not have, this is the cleanup crew.
SailPoint lives in the land of “who should have access to what,” which gets messy fast as companies add contractors, apps, bots, and AI agents that never sleep.
The bullish angle is simple: as companies try to automate more work, they need to control the keys to the kingdom, or they end up automating the breach too.
This is not the flashiest corner of tech, but it tends to stay funded because getting hacked is a career-limiting event.
Actionable take: If you like boring-but-important software, this is one to watch on pullbacks.
It tends to trade on enterprise spending vibes, so red market days can hand you better entries.
Five9 (NASDAQ: FIVN)
The Call Center Stock Trying to Put Hold Music Out of Business
Five9 is trying to make customer service less of a slow-motion meltdown.
The pitch is that companies want fewer angry calls, shorter wait times, and agents who can actually solve problems instead of reading scripts like they’re stuck in 2004.
The market likes this story when AI is framed as “better service, lower costs, and fewer humans doing repetitive tasks.”
The risk is that customer-support budgets can wobble when companies tighten belts, and competition is always lurking.
Still, if AI makes contact centers more efficient, this category stays relevant.
Actionable take: Treat this as a sentiment stock. It can move sharply when the market gets excited about AI-driven productivity. Use smaller sizing and add only when the tape is friendly.
AppLovin (NASDAQ: APP)
The Mobile Ad Stock That Keeps Finding Your Wallet
AppLovin is basically the engine behind a lot of “free” apps that somehow make money. When mobile ads are strong, this kind of business can look unstoppable.
When advertisers get cautious, it can feel like someone turned off the faucet.
The upside is that mobile attention isn’t going away, and ad tech winners tend to scale fast when they’re in a good cycle.
The downside is you’re always one macro wobble away from advertisers hitting pause, and the stock can trade like it’s had three coffees too many.
Actionable take: If you’re in, respect volatility. This is a name that can overshoot both directions. For builders, wait for a market-wide dip rather than chasing green candles.
Strategic Insight (Sponsored)
In a bombshell interview, Elon Musk declared that AI and robotics are "the only thing" that can solve America's $38 trillion debt crisis.
He predicts it will happen within three years. One Wall Street veteran has identified
a single fund at the center of this AI buildout - and you can get in for less than $20.
See what Musk didn't tell you
The Long Pick
Rocket Lab (NASDAQ: RKLB)
Why This One Keeps Showing Up in the “Real Space Business” Conversation
Rocket Lab is one of the cleaner ways to play space without needing to believe every headline about moon bases and asteroid mining.
The key is that it’s not just about launches.
The bigger story is building a space company with multiple revenue streams: launching payloads, building satellite components, and increasingly acting like a space infrastructure supplier.
That matters because space spending is getting more “real economy” and less “cool demo.” Governments want resilient communications.
Companies want satellites that power everything from mapping to connectivity. And everyone wants more launches without betting their mission on one rocket and a prayer.
Rocket Lab’s sweet spot is being credible enough to win business, but still small enough that growth can move the needle.
Scorecard You Can Use
Launch cadence matters: More launches isn’t just hype. It’s proof of execution, reliability, and demand.
Services add stickiness: If you’re not only launching rockets but also helping build what goes on them, you’re not living quarter-to-quarter on a single revenue line.
Space is becoming infrastructure: Satellites aren’t a novelty anymore. They’re part of how the modern world runs.
Optionality without total fantasy: You get upside from new programs and contracts, but the story isn’t dependent on one mythical breakthrough.
Why the Tape Cares
Space is finally shifting into a phase where the winners look like industrial companies with tech upside. Investors tend to reward businesses that:
execute reliably,
expand into adjacent services, and
create recurring demand instead of one-off events.
If you see a company moving from “launch provider” to “space systems platform,” the market starts treating it less like a science project and more like an operator.
What Could Spook It
Execution risk: Rockets are not software updates. One bad event can shake confidence.
Lumpy revenue: Contracts and timing can create noisy quarters.
Competition: Space is cool again, which means more rivals want the same checks.
What to Watch Next
Launch rhythm: Are launches becoming more consistent and predictable?
Backlog quality: Are contracts growing and diversifying across customers?
Services mix: Any sign that satellite components and related services are becoming a bigger piece of the pie.
Margin story: As the business scales, does profitability improve or stay stuck in reinvest mode?
Actionable Take
Builders: This is a “buy the boring progress” name. Consider adding on broad market dips or after any overreaction to a scary headline, as long as the execution trend stays intact. Size it like a high-volatility growth play, not a sleepy dividend stock.
Traders: Respect the headline risk. Space names can gap on news. If you’re trading, use levels and stops, and don’t marry it.
Bottom line: This isn’t just a rocket story. It’s a space infrastructure buildout story. If launches keep stacking and services keep scaling, the market may keep re-rating it from moonshot to business.
Everything Else
🤖 Honor is teasing a robot phone at MWC, because apparently the next upgrade is your handset developing a personality.
🍏 Anthropic is pushing Claude deeper into Apple apps, making “my phone suggested it” the new way decisions get made.
📱 Xiaomi rolled out the 17 Ultra, keeping the annual tradition alive where your camera gets smarter and you still mostly take pictures of lunch.
🇦🇺 Australia is hinting it may come for app stores and search in the AI era, basically telling Big Tech to keep its hands where regulators can see them.
🇮🇳 Amazon is cutting seller fees in India to juice growth, a classic “we love margins… but we love volume more” move.
That's our coverage for today; thanks for reading! Reply to this email with feedback or any tech stocks you want me to check out.
Best Regards,
—Noah Zelvis
Tech Stock Insider