Anthropic's investor talks, Workday's stock surge, Apple's new facility and more in Morning Squawk

AI and deal headlines dominated: Databricks closed a $5 billion funding round at a $190 billion valuation for enterprise AI, while Silver Lake talks to buy Workday helped shares surge nearly 18% in a single day. In policy, a federal trade court upheld Trump’s removal of the de minimis loophole, eliminating the tax-free treatment for imports valued under $800. Meanwhile, Anthropic’s CFO-led investor outreach for a potentially “historic” IPO remained high-level with no valuation or financial specifics discussed, keeping near-term optimism tempered.

Analysis

RDDT’s near-term setup is flow-driven rather than fundamental: forced ownership can support the tape for days to a couple of weeks, but once passive demand is absorbed the stock reverts to a monetization/valuation story. The risk is that investors confuse index-related buying with durable conviction; if ad growth doesn’t reaccelerate, the post-event multiple can compress quickly even if the shares stay mechanically bid in the short run.

WDAY is the cleaner special situation, but the market is pricing the possibility of a sponsor backstop without yet knowing whether the buyer can underwrite the AI narrative risk embedded in the business. If a process is real, private equity can pay for cash flow stability; if it is just exploratory, the gap-up is vulnerable because the move is almost entirely headline premium, not earnings revision. This is a classic 1-4 week catalyst with high giveback risk.

The bigger structural signal is regulatory and supply-chain, not the press-release headlines. Tightening low-value import rules is a slow-burn headwind for cross-border merchants and low-ticket marketplaces, while domestic logistics and compliant retailers gain modest pricing power over 6-18 months. AAPL’s domestic manufacturing optics buy political insurance more than incremental EPS; the consensus is probably overstating the operating impact and understating the option value around tariffs, procurement, and policy access. On AI, the market remains fixated on private model-company financing, but the more reliable listed winners are the picks-and-shovels supply chain names where capex converts into earnings, not narratives.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Long RDDT vs short XLC for the next 2-3 weeks to express the inclusion flow without taking broad tech beta; take profits once the post-inclusion volume impulse fades. Falsify if RDDT cannot hold the gap through the first rebalance window and relative volume normalizes.
• Do not chase WDAY after the rumor gap; wait for either a formal bid/process disclosure or a 1-2 week retracement, then use a limited-risk call spread rather than outright stock. If no confirmation emerges, fade the premium rather than pay for optionality.
• Add a watchlist alert on low-ticket import-exposed e-commerce/marketplace names and domestic parcel/logistics for the de minimis change; the trade should be entered only after earnings show actual margin/GMV drag or benefit. This is a months-long catalyst, not a day trade.
• Treat AAPL as a policy-hedge name, not a catalyst long: hold only on weakness if the market starts pricing tariff or sourcing optionality, but do not pay up for the manufacturing headline alone. Falsify if management comments fail to translate into any measurable CapEx, gross margin, or regulatory advantage over the next 2-3 quarters.