Perhaps in a first for global markets, a blog post sent Wall Street into a tizzy at the start of the week.
A rogue Substack post went viral, literally putting the doom in scrolling and hitting harder than any earnings miss.
The culprits, Citrini Research, dropped a thought-provoking piece titled "The 2028 Global Intelligence Crisis."
Framed as a fictional macro memo from the future, it paints a chilling picture: AI adoption will accelerate so fast that white-collar jobs vanish almost entirely, consumer spending collapses from the jobs losses, ghost GDP – corporate paper profits that never enter the broader economy - inflate stats but not the wallets. Result: A deflationary doom loop kicks in with no brake.
What started as a hypothetical quickly went viral across the US. By Monday, fear was feeding on itself.
Software names took a hammering as the long-flagged risk of AI-driven subscriptions began to bite, with tools like Claude increasingly replacing entire software stacks - and, apparently, capable of hooking up 7000 robot vacuum cleaners worldwide to your home PS5 controller and broadcasting everyone’s built-in cameras.
Workday, CrowdStrike and Datadog all shed more than 7 per cent. The mighty Salesforce and ServiceNow also dropped over 4 per cent. Even the payments giants weren't spared – Amex and Mastercard plunged more than 6 per cent.
Sure, the post isn't a prediction; it's merely one of the potential outcomes, but it would seem reality has certainly landed somewhere between the Y2K conspiracies and the 2008 GFC.
History, however, is always the best thing to look at in scenarios of innovation. And humanity has a habit of creating new jobs and industries from tech upheaval.
With AI moving at warp speed and software service companies already wobbling under disruption fears, the timing of the blog post landed like a gut punch.
All things tech – including biotech - are seriously suffering this year. The info tech index is down 15 per cent in a month as the redundancies sweep in. The ASX’s own tech sector is down a staggering 40 per cent in less than 6 months.
It should come as no surprise, then, that an Aussie AI innovator headed our Runners cavalcade this week. Bringing up the rear were a few Runners regulars from the exploration ranks, spanning our beloved goldies through to the critical mineral darlings of tungsten and rare earths.
HUBIFY LTD (ASX: HFY)
Up 275% (0.8c – 3c)
Finishing with a flurry and nabbing the Bulls N’ Bears Runner of the Week is AI managed services provider Hubify Limited, after it raised $250,000 on Friday via a strategic placement at – wait for it - a 425 per cent premium to the 0.8c closing price.
The company says, despite its strong debt-free position of more than $3 million, it would take the funds at a premium to invest straight into beefing up its AI capabilities through HubLab – an Australian AI framework powered by US-based regulatory tech platform Labyrinth AI.
HubLab is designed as the safe, speedy operating layer that lets AI run inside heavily regulated enterprise and government systems without triggering boardroom paralysis.
As part of the push, Hubify inked its first partnership with HubLab, signing a master services agreement to deliver AI integration and deployment services to big enterprise and government clients.
The deal hands Hubify an equity stake in HubLab, together with an option to lift its interest further down the track, positioning it to become a go-to managed services partner for global AI providers.
In short, the deal opens the door to charging upfront deployment fees and high-margin recurring revenue streams – the holy grail for any services outfit.
Hubify simultaneously dropped a set of seriously strong half-year results.
EBITDA jumped 84 per cent alongside net operating cash flows rocketing 191 per cent - helped by an 8 per cent drop in total expenses. And while headline revenue dipped 7 per cent to $8.3 million from a deliberate cull of low-margin legacy clients, high-margin recurring revenue climbed to 91 per cent of the total mix.
Debt-free, cash-rich and laser-focused on AI advisory, in a week when the rest of tech was bleeding, Hubify was busy printing cash.
BESRA GOLD LTD (ASX: BEZ)
Up 121% (7.7c – 17c)
Slotting into second place is junior gold explorer Besra Gold, which finally got the conditional green light from the Sarawak government in Malaysia for its mining lease at the Bau Gold project.
It's a big de-risking milestone for the company's flagship asset after years in the waiting room since its listing back in late 2021.
The approved lease covers Besra’s Jugan deposit, with a solid 13.5 million tonne resource at 1.7 grams per tonne (g/t) for 721,000 ounces of gold.
The real prize lies in the broader Bau project in East Malaysia, which boasts a sprawling 53 million-tonne system running at 1.3g/t gold for 2.28 million ounces contained.
Throw in an exploration target stretching from 4.9 to 9.3 million ounces, and the plan now is to hit the accelerator on exploration across the tenure.
With gold prices sitting white-hot around $7200 an ounce, the timing couldn't be better for Besra's hefty stash to catch a bid.
The Jugan lease is conditional, mind you, and there's no firm word on timing or outcomes for other renewal applications still in play. However, the market's buzzing with hope that this could be the spark to send the whole project airborne in line with the metal's run.
EUROPEAN RESOURCES LTD (ASX: ERE)
Up 94% (1.7c – 3.3c)
Rounding out the Runners podium is rare earths explorer European Resources, riding high after some fresh outstanding results from its Korsnäs rare earths project in Finland.
The company says it has hit its best intersection yet in diamond drilling at the highly enriched magnet rare earths project, just as the thorny issue of tight European rare earths supply steals the limelight.
The standout hole delivered a 31.5-metre hit grading 4902 parts per million (ppm) total rare earth oxides (TREO) from 98.5m, including punchy higher-grade slices of 8.5m at 10,414ppm TREO and 4.5m at 14,003ppm TREO, or 1.4 per cent rare earths.
The results confirmed strongly NdPr-enriched apatite-monazite mineralisation, with extra intervals such as 5.0m at 5707ppm from 55m and 2.6m at 9983ppm TREO from 114m.
The company reckons the chunky widths above 1 per cent TREO and the more processing-friendly apatite-monazite mineralisation tick all the right boxes. It validates passive seismic as a highly effective targeting tool for REE-bearing systems at Korsnäs, giving the project a genuine edge heading into future campaigns.
An orientation passive seismic survey has already lit up another target, with more seismic and follow-up drilling lined up in the Southern Zone.
Once all assays roll in, the next round of drilling can be cranked out using the seismic targeting to maximise magnet rare earths supply for the European market.
Assays for the remaining holes are pending, but the program has already delivered on its goals: proving near-mine continuity, hitting priority structures and stacking on meaningful tonnage at solid grades.
COSMOS EXPLORATION LTD (ASX: C1X)
Up 87% (15c – 28c)
Pulling off the impressive back-to-back Runners inclusion is Bolivian lithium hopeful Cosmos Exploration, which has kept the green candles firing with eight straight days without a loss.
The company, of course, cracked the lithium big leagues last week. Through a partnership with state-owned Yacimientos de Litio Bolivianos (YLB) and its privately owned EAU Lithium group, Cosmos is planning to develop industrial lithium production facilities for Bolivia’s salt flats.
It seems the good news continued to spread, so much so that the market overlords down at the ASX stepped in on Thursday to put an end to the party – as they usually do – demanding an explanation for why/how their share price could possibly keep going up.
Cosmos seized the opportunity to raise some capital, saying it would be back on the boards by Monday with a response for the ASX, alongside a fresh placement and an agreement to exercise unlisted options.
The company’s real rocket fuel remains the development pathway hinging on Vulcan Energy's VULSORB direct lithium extraction (DLE) tech, over which EAU holds exclusive rights.
That DLE kit has already been proven on brines from multiple Bolivian salt flats and could unlock one of the planet's largest lithium resources – an estimated 23 million metric tonnes buried in the Uyuni, Coipasa, Empexa and Pastos Grandes flats, representing roughly 22 per cent of known global supply.
The Bolivian government is all-in on developing these assets as lithium prices bounce back into the spotlight, turning it into a massive economic play for the country.
Cosmos, which locked an option to fully acquire EAU back in December, is folding it into its wider lithium portfolio and this week the shares more than doubled once again.
Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@businessnews.com.au
By Andrew Todd
