Nine straight weeks of gains. The S&P 500 closed Friday near 7,585, within a whisker of its all-time high, while the Nasdaq tagged 26,989, capping a month in which the index gained roughly +8%. The Dow crossed 50,995. The tape looked risk-on. But read the fine print: the macro backdrop spent the week quietly tightening its vice grip. Core PCE rose to 3.3% YoY in April, Q1 GDP was revised down to +1.6%, and the freshly sworn-in Fed Chair Kevin Warsh inherited a bond market that is now pricing rate hikes by December. That is the week in one breath: AI demand is genuinely historic, inflation is genuinely stubborn, and the two facts are on a collision course.

Dell Confirms the Supercycle Is Broadening

The single most consequential event of the week did not involve a fund holding directly, and that is precisely why it matters. DELL reported fiscal Q1 Thursday after the bell and produced what Morgan Stanley's hardware analyst called, without hyperbole, one of the most impressive quarters he had ever seen in his time covering hardware. Quarterly revenue soared nearly 88% year over year, with AI server revenue alone increasing 757% from a year earlier to $16.1 billion, while adjusted EPS of $4.86 obliterated the $2.94 consensus. The stock surged +32% Friday for its best single day ever.

Dell exited fiscal Q1 with an AI server backlog of $51.3 billion, up from $43 billion at the end of Q4. The company bumped full-year FY27 revenue guidance to a range of $165–$169 billion, from $138–$142 billion previously. That is not a guidance raise, that is a category redefinition. And critically for this fund: among Dell's major AI infrastructure clients are CoreWeave, Honeywell, and Samsung Electronics. CRWV was tagged in the earnings report as a demand driver. The AI capex cycle is not slowing, it is broadening from silicon to systems.

Macro Double-Header: GDP Revised Down, PCE Revised Up

Thursday delivered the week's heaviest macro payload on a single day and the market largely shrugged, which tells you something about where conviction currently sits. Real GDP grew at an annualized rate of +1.6% in Q1 2026 according to the BEA's second estimate, a downward revision of 0.4 percentage points from the advance estimate, primarily reflecting weaker investment and consumer spending. The internals, however, are not uniformly soft: business investment in equipment and structures surged at a +10.4% annualized pace in Q1, the fastest in nearly three years, driven in part by aggressive AI infrastructure spending.

PCE inflation climbed to 3.8% YoY in April, up from 3.5% in March. Core PCE, the Fed's preferred gauge, rose to 3.3% YoY, up from 3.2% in March. Both prints came in line with estimates, which is the problem: the market expected it to be bad, it was bad, and there is no obvious catalyst for improvement in May given Middle East energy dynamics. Corporate profits tell a quietly concerning story beneath the surface, profits from current production grew by only $40 billion in Q1, a dramatic deceleration from the $247 billion increase in Q4 2025.

Kevin Warsh Takes the Helm: The Rate Path Reprices

Kevin Warsh was sworn in as Federal Reserve Chair and bond investors wasted no time betting he will prioritize inflation-fighting credibility, with traders now pricing the Fed as virtually certain to start raising rates by December. This is not a minor calendar event. Governor Christopher Waller, a Trump appointee who earlier this year advocated for rate cuts, said Friday that the Fed's next move is now just as likely to be a hike. The shift reflects Middle East-driven inflation, a resilient US economy, and an AI investment boom, all of which have fueled concerns that inflation could remain stuck above the 2% target.

The 10-year yield closed Friday near 4.44%, the 30-year flirted with 4.98%. For this fund, that is an important signal: long-duration growth equities face a stiffer headwind if Warsh validates the hawkish reprice in his first public remarks. Watch the language carefully. A Fed pivot to hiking bias would compress PLTR multiples the fastest, which is the key risk for the highest-multiple software names heading into June.

Iran Ceasefire: The Oil Price Wildcard

Reports emerged Thursday that the US and Iran had agreed to a 60-day memorandum extending the ceasefire and beginning the process of restoring vessel flows through the Strait of Hormuz, though President Trump had not yet signed off on the deal. Crude oil ended Friday near $87.93 for front-month US crude. That is lower than the intraday spikes earlier in the week but still elevated relative to pre-conflict levels. The ceasefire memo is fragile: Trump's own messaging oscillated between optimism and a threat to resume strikes within a single trading session.

For the fund's power names, the arithmetic is straightforward: a durable Hormuz reopening would ease natural gas prices and reduce the urgency premium in the power grid narrative. A ceasefire collapse sends energy back toward $100 and validates the nuclear baseload thesis even harder. VST and CEG win either way over a 12-month horizon, though the path to get there still matters.

CRCL: The Moat Is Being Tested

The fund's Digital Finance Rails pillar had the roughest week. Circle Internet Group slid from its May high near $140 to an intraday low of $98 on May 28, with the three-week peak-to-trough drawdown reaching approximately 30%. The thesis pressure is real and worth naming clearly: SoFi launched a national-bank stablecoin on May 27, joining JPMorgan, Mastercard/BVNK, and Tether USAT on the GENIUS Act lane in just four months. The framework intended to crown Circle is instead functioning as an on-ramp for every large-balance-sheet institution to compete on equal regulatory footing.

The CRCL thesis depends on whether Circle's Circle Payments Network and USDC distribution scale faster than bank-issued stablecoin entrants can erode its market share. Spot Bitcoin ETFs have also posted 9 consecutive sessions of net outflows through May 28, with cumulative redemptions exceeding $2 billion since May 14, and the May 27 outflow of $733.4 million was the largest single day since February. Pillar conviction is intact; near-term sentiment is clearly deteriorating.

What This Week Changed

AVGO is the cleanest expression of the week's signal. Dell's quarter did exactly what a thesis-confirming data point should do: it demonstrated that hyperscaler and enterprise AI capex is accelerating, not plateauing. AVGO's custom silicon exposure to that capex wave, through its hyperscaler ASIC programs, is the most concentrated expression of that demand in the AI chip complex.

The Calendar That Could Move Everything

The most important number of the next five trading days is Friday's May Nonfarm Payrolls report. If the labor market is still running hot, above 150K new jobs, unemployment below 4.1%: Warsh has cover to signal hike readiness without triggering a recession panic. A soft print (below 100K) reopens the rate-cut narrative and gives growth equities a tailwind. There is no scenario where this print is ignored.

Also on deck: ISM Manufacturing (Monday) and ISM Services (Wednesday) will give the first June read on whether the economy is still absorbing 3.8% headline PCE with any grace. Fed speakers are active all week: Vice Chair Jefferson and New York Fed President Williams are both scheduled, and their language on the inflation-vs-growth trade-off will set the tone for whether the December rate-hike pricing hardens or softens. No FOMC meeting until mid-June, but every speech next week will be parsed as a dry run for the June statement.

On the earnings front: the AI print season is winding down, but Salesforce (CRM) reports Wednesday, a meaningful read on enterprise software demand that will color the PLTR thesis review. Watch whether Salesforce's Agentforce commentary accelerates or flattens from last quarter. If enterprise AI adoption is stalling at the application layer, PLTR's multiple justification weakens further.

Finally, keep one eye on Hormuz. Trump had not yet signed off on the 60-day ceasefire memorandum with Iran as of Friday's close. If he does sign it next week, energy will pull back further and risk appetite broadens. If negotiations fracture, oil spikes back toward $95+, rates rip higher, and the fund's power names benefit while growth multiples compress. That binary is the single largest exogenous variable for June.

This document is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. All information is believed to be from reliable sources but is not guaranteed as to accuracy or completeness. Investing involves risk, including the possible loss of principal. The Nova X Convergence Fund is a private investment account and not a registered investment vehicle. Nothing herein should be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any security. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Published May 30, 2026.