March 22, 2026 

Elon just filed a shocking patent that could rock the world 

BONUS: The Consumer Cliff Is Here — But the Best Short May Not Be the One Everyone Is Naming 

_{A message from our friends at Banyan Hill Research (Sponsor)}

Elon just filed a shocking patent that could rock the world

Dear Reader, 

I just uncovered the craziest – and most astonishing – thing I’ve ever seen. 

It’s a new Tesla patent that could rock the world. 

In this new patent, Elon describes a new “keyhole surgery-like process” for powering technology. 

Take a look…

Sounds bizarre – until you realize what it actually means. 

It means Elon may have just solved the biggest problem facing America right now. 

If I’m right, this breakthrough could ignite a $3 trillion industrial revolution – and make Elon Musk the most powerful man on the planet. 

We got a clue when Tesla’s board offered Musk a $1 trillion contract… the biggest in corporate history. 

Wall Street still hasn’t connected the dots. 

April 22nd – I believe Elon will make this breakthrough public. 

According to my research, a handful of tiny companies that I believe are tied to his secret project could skyrocket. The gains could be historic. 

I’ve never seen anything like this in my 30 years in tech and finance. 

I put the story together in a short video as fast as I could right here… so you could see it before the rest of the world does. 

Regards, 

Ian King
Chief Strategist, Strategic Fortunes 

_{BONUS ARTICLE}

After Lululemon’s Crash, Traders Are Hunting the Next Consumer Casualty

Every so often, the market rediscovers an old truth with dramatic flair: 

A premium consumer stock can look invincible right up until the moment management admits growth is slowing, margins are under pressure, and the customer is no longer willing to pay up the way Wall Street assumed. 

That was the message from Lululemon this week. 

The company issued a 2026 outlook below expectations, warned of a roughly $380 million gross tariff impact, and revealed that fourth-quarter gross margin fell 550 basis points, including a 520-basis-point tariff hit. Reuters also noted the company is dealing with softer spending, a lack of design freshness, rising competition, and no permanent CEO in place. 

That is how premium-multiple consumer stories break. 

Not necessarily through a collapse in revenue. 

But through the loss of the market’s faith that the brand still deserves a premium in the first place. 

Lululemon’s current stock price tells you how far that reset has already gone. Shares are now around $162.82, giving the company a market cap of about $19.35 billion and a trailing P/E of roughly 11.3x. That is a very different stock from the one investors used to pay a luxury-like multiple for. 

So now traders are asking the obvious next question: 

Who is next?

And that is where the discussion becomes more interesting — and more dangerous. 

Because the “consumer cliff” is real, but it is not hitting every company the same way. 

What Lululemon Actually Taught the Market

The easy takeaway is that the consumer is weakening. 

The more useful takeaway is more specific: 

The market is no longer willing to forgive premium brands when growth slows, product momentum fades, and tariffs or promotions begin to erode the margin structure.

Look closely at Lululemon’s setup and the pattern is clear. 

The company guided 2026 revenue to $11.35 billion to $11.50 billion, below the $11.52 billion analysts expected, and projected EPS of $12.10 to $12.30, below the $12.58 consensus. Reuters also reported that the company is trying to restore full-price sales growth in North America by increasing product newness, reducing SKUs, and rebalancing inventory — corporate language that usually means the assortment has lost some urgency and the merchandising machine needs repair. 

That is not merely a macro problem. 

That is a multiple-compression problem. 

The market can tolerate soft consumers. 

It has a harder time tolerating soft consumers and fading brand heat and rising costs at the same time. 

Lululemon has also lost nearly two-thirds of its value over the past two years, according to Reuters, as design missteps and weaker brand freshness fed market-share losses. That is not a routine retail wobble. It is a reminder that once investors stop seeing a company as a category-defining growth asset, the re-rating can be brutal. 

That is why the “retail apocalypse” theme is back. 

But it should not be applied with a paint roller. 

The Consumer Cliff Is Real — but It Is Uneven

This is not a world where every consumer-facing company is rolling over together. 

Reuters has shown that some companies are clearly feeling pressure from strained discretionary spending and inflation-sensitive shoppers. At the same time, other premium brands are still producing real growth, especially if they have fresh product cycles, international expansion, and customers willing to absorb price increases. 

That is the key distinction for traders. 

A successful short in this environment is not “any expensive consumer name.” 

It is a company with some combination of these traits: 

• slowing North America demand, 
• margin pressure from tariffs or promotion, 
• a brand that may be peaking, 
• consensus expectations still too high, 
• and a valuation that has not yet fully reset. 

Lululemon fit that profile almost perfectly before the selloff. 

The harder question is whether Deckers, especially through the HOKA narrative, fits it now. 

Is Deckers/HOKA Really the Next Great Short?

This is where I think traders need to be careful. 

Yes, Deckers is a premium branded consumer company. Yes, HOKA has been one of the hottest footwear stories of the cycle. Yes, any market obsessed with “what breaks next” will naturally start circling recent winners. 

But the latest actual operating data do not yet look like Lululemon’s. Not even close. 

Deckers reported fiscal third-quarter 2026 revenue of $1.958 billion, up 7.1%, with diluted EPS up 11% to $3.33. HOKA brand sales rose 18.5% to $628.9 million, UGG sales rose 4.9%to $1.305 billion, DTC sales increased 8.1%, and international sales rose 15%. The company also raised full-year guidance, including HOKA growth to a mid-teens percent increase and full-year EPS to $6.80–$6.85. 

That is not the profile of a consumer company driving toward the edge of a cliff. 

That is the profile of one still executing. 

Even Reuters’ January report, which acknowledged macro volatility and strained discretionary spending, still described Deckers as benefiting from strong demand, new product innovation, increased promotions, and full-price selling, with shares up about 15% after the report. 

And then there is valuation. 

Deckers now trades around $100.43 with a market cap of roughly $15.1 billion and a P/E of about 14.5x. That is not screamingly expensive. In fact, after prior drawdowns, it is much less of a premium-multiple consumer stock than the narrative around HOKA’s popularity might suggest. 

So if the trade idea is “short the next high-multiple consumer darling,” Deckers may no longer fit the cleanest version of that setup. 

Could it still fall if the entire market derates consumer discretionary again? Of course. 

But a good short usually requires more than broad anxiety. It requires fragile fundamentals plus fragile expectations. 

Right now, Deckers has neither in the way Lululemon did. 

What Traders May Be Missing About HOKA

The HOKA debate is really a debate about duration. 

The short thesis says:
HOKA is a fashion-heavy running brand that has enjoyed a spectacular adoption curve, but all hot footwear brands eventually cool, and once growth decelerates, the market will punish the parent company. 

That is not crazy. 

But you have to compare it with the numbers you actually have, not the numbers you fear might arrive later. 

At the moment, HOKA is still posting high-teens growth, helped push Deckers’ quarter past expectations, and remains part of a business generating healthy full-price selling and strong cash return capacity — including a share repurchase expectation of more than $1.0 billionthis fiscal year. 

In other words, HOKA may eventually become shortable. 

But that is different from saying it is the best short now. 

The smarter way to watch Deckers is to monitor for the first meaningful signs of deterioration: 

• HOKA growth slipping from high teens toward single digits, 
• DTC momentum rolling over, 
• heavier promotions becoming necessary, 
• U.S. growth turning negative, 
• or management guiding more cautiously than current numbers justify. 

Without those signals, the short is mostly a bet that “a good story has gone on too long.” 

Sometimes that works. 

Often it is expensive. 

If Not Deckers, Then Where Is the Risk?

The better hunting ground may be in names where the premium remains high and the growth narrative is already beginning to wobble. 

One example is On Holding. 

Reuters reported that On expects 23% annual sales growth in 2026, down from 30% in 2025, and the stock still dropped as much as 14% even though fourth-quarter sales rose 22.6% and adjusted EBITDA increased 31.8%. The company expects gross margin of at least 63% and says its premium positioning remains intact. 

That is an important clue. 

When a company delivers strong reported numbers but the stock still sells off on a slowdown from 30% to 23% growth, the market is telling you expectations remain demanding. That is how a premium-multiple consumer name becomes vulnerable even before the operating business truly breaks. 

Nike, by contrast, is a different case. It is still dealing with brand and growth issues, but its current valuation — around 39.5x earnings per the finance snapshot — reflects a very different setup from the newer premium-growth names, and its problem is already well known to the market. 

Lululemon, meanwhile, looks less like the next short and more like the stock that already wasthe short. At around 11.3x earnings, much of the multiple damage has already happened, even if the business still has operational problems to solve. 

That leaves traders with a more nuanced conclusion: 

The next big downside move in consumer may not come from the most famous damaged brand. 

It may come from the still-beloved premium grower that starts missing by just enough to crack the illusion. 

The Macro Backdrop Makes This More Dangerous

There is another reason this theme matters now. 

Reuters recently argued that “the lost art of short selling” may be coming back as investors begin questioning frothy valuations more broadly. The piece pointed to signs that optimism in high-flying sectors is being tested and warned that informed skeptics can help drag prices back toward real 

That matters for consumer stocks because the macro backdrop is no longer especially forgiving. 

Tariffs are biting.
Inflation has not disappeared.
Consumer confidence has wobbled.
And even affluent shoppers are becoming more selective about where they spend. 

Lululemon’s report explicitly reflected tariff pressure and softer demand across cohorts, while Reuters’ coverage of other consumer companies this year has shown price resistance and more value-seeking behavior even in categories once thought more resili 

So the next leg down in consumer is unlikely to be caused by one bad quarter alone. 

It will come from the intersection of weaker demand, weaker pricing power, and weaker investor patience. 

That is exactly the sort of setup short sellers look for. 

My Read on the Trade

If you force me to rank the setup, I would frame it this way: 

Lululemon taught the market what a premium consumer de-rating looks like when the story cracks. But after the damage, it is no longer the cleanest sh 

Deckers/HOKA is the name people want to target because it is visible, premium, and fashionable. But the latest numbers still show strength: 7.1% total revenue growth, 18.5%HOKA growth, 11% EPS growth, and raised guidance. That makes it a dangerous short unless the next data point changes materia 

The more interesting vulnerability is in any premium consumer stock where investors are still paying for durability and acceleration — and where even a modest slowdown could trigger a Lululemon-style multiple reset. On is one example worth monitoring because the market already showed sensitivity to decelerating growth despite strong operating resu 

So the “consumer cliff” is real. 

But the opportunity is not to short every brand with a nice logo and a premium price point. 

It is to identify where expectations are still high enough to break. 

Bottom Line

This week’s lesson is simple: 

The market has stopped giving premium consumer brands the benefit of the doubt. 

Lululemon’s selloff was not just about one weak forecast. It was about the death of easy assumptions — that high-income shoppers would remain resilient, that full-price demand would hold, and that premium brands would always deserve premium multip 

But that does not automatically make Deckers the next Lululemon. 

For now, Deckers still has growth, still has guidance momentum, and no longer has the sort of extravagant valuation that makes a short effortl 

The better trade may be to stay selective and wait for the next premium consumer stock where the fundamentals start slipping before the multiple has reset. 

That is where the real money tends to be made. 

Disclaimer: This editorial is for informational purposes only and should not be considered investment advice. Always conduct independent research before making financial decisions.

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