Together with Public

We’ve TOUCHED DOWN IN TEXAS! Thanks for your patience with this week’s newsletter posting.

We’re thrilled to see some of you at the Rich Habits Retreat later today and Saturday! If you live in or around Austin, Texas — we’ve got a few tickets remaining. We can’t wait!

A quick breakdown — in case you don’t have the time.

Semiconductors are now driving the entire market.

The market is becoming increasingly concentrated — and semiconductors are at the center of it. Chip stocks now make up 16.1% of the S&P 500, a record high, and that figure has tripled since the 2022 bear market. Even more notable, semiconductor exposure is now 11 percentage points higher than the peak reached during the Dot-Com bubble, underscoring just how dominant this theme has become.

At the same time, traditional defensive sectors — energy, healthcare, staples, and utilities — now represent just 19.2% of the index, near multi-decade lows and below even 1999 levels. And that multi-decade low representation is inclusive of the rally we’ve seen year-to-date (shown below).

The gap between growth (AI/semis) and defense continues to widen, and if current trends persist, semiconductors could surpass defensive sectors in total weight as soon as next year.

Today’s Rich Habits Newsletter is brought to you by Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public, you can build your portfolio for the long haul with stocks, options, bonds, crypto, and more.

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👉 Episode 167: The New Investing Playbook: Geopolitics First

In this week’s Monday-morning episode of the Rich Habits Podcast (linked here) — Austin and Robert break down the biggest shift happening in markets right now: geopolitics is no longer background noise… it’s the main driver.

With global tensions rising, trade relationships shifting, and governments playing a more active role in the economy, this episode explores how investors should retool their investing playbook heading into the back-half of 2026.

Here’s what they covered…

The bigger message: the investing playbook is changing. Understanding geopolitics isn’t optional anymore — it’s essential to navigating where capital flows next.

👉 Q&A: $325K in META, Budgeting for a Vacation Home, & Direct Indexing

Here’s a link to the Q&A episode that was posted on Thursday.

You can submit questions for these episodes by asking them inside of the Rich Habits Network, replying to this email, or sending us a DM on Instagram.

The Rich Habits Podcast is available on Spotify, Apple, iHeart, YouTube, and wherever else you get your content!

Daily AI usage is surging and non-users are shrinking quickly.

Consumer adoption of AI is clearly moving from experimentation to habit. As of April, 24% of consumers say they use AI “often,” up from just 17% in November, while the share of people who say they never use AI has dropped sharply from 26% to 17%.

What’s most important here isn’t just the growth — it’s the shift in behavior. Fewer people are sitting on the sidelines, and more are integrating AI into their daily workflows, whether that’s for search, productivity, or content creation. The “rarely” bucket is also growing, suggesting a steady pipeline of new users moving toward more frequent usage.

This is how real platform adoption happens — slowly at first, then all at once. And if this trend continues, it reinforces the idea that AI isn’t just hype… it’s becoming a core layer of how consumers interact with technology.

We’re seeing a record 43% of underwater car buyers stretching into 84-month (7-year) loans, with the average monthly payment now at $932 — the highest ever.

Let me be blunt: just because you can afford the payment doesn’t mean you can afford the car. Extending a loan to seven years doesn’t make it cheaper — it just hides the true cost while you sit on a depreciating asset that you likely owe more on than it’s worth.

I’ve seen this mistake over and over again. People prioritize the monthly payment instead of the total cost, and that’s how you end up stuck — financially and mentally.

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Disclaimer: This is not financial advice or a recommendation for any investment. The content is for informational purposes only, you should not construe any such information or other material as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

Disclosure: This content is sponsored by NEOS Investments. The creator is compensated by NEOS to discuss NEOS ETFs. This content is for informational purposes only, and is not personalized investment, tax, or legal advice, and does not constitute an offer to buy or sell any security. Investing involves risk, including possible loss of principal. Before investing, carefully review the NEOS ETFs prospectus at neosfunds.com.