The stances below are c8alpha's editorial distillation of Kevin Simpson's public commentary — television, podcasts, and interviews — compiled by automated transcript analysis and dated to the episode they came from. They may lag the speaker's current view and may contain extraction errors. Text in quotation marks is verbatim from the episode; everything else is our paraphrase. Kevin Simpson is not affiliated with c8alpha and has not endorsed this page. Nothing here is investment advice.
Raw direction-aware returns on public statements — long calls credited when the price rose, shorts when it fell, shorts capped at −100% — in a rising market this mostly measures who was long, not who has skill. Returns run from the stance date; calls are rarely closed publicly, so fixed 90-day / 180-day / 1-year horizons are used. A horizon shows only once it has fully matured, and only at 5+ scored stances. “% correct” is the share of those scored calls whose direction-aware return was positive at the horizon — in a rising market a bullish call is correct by default, so read it beside the market, not alone.
Every tracked call with at least one matured horizon: the rows behind the Returns
line above. A dash is a horizon that has not matured yet.
2026-10-29
BKNG
bullish
CNBC (uncut) · uncut_tv
Booking Holdings has been oversold on AI disintermediation fears but trades at just 13.5x forward earnings with a dividend, active buyback, and management integrating AI to absorb the agentic threat — potential baby-out-with-bathwater setup into earnings
“bookings has been destroyed with this disintermediation play with AI. I think there's an opportunity here”
CNBC uncut 2026-10-29 12:27 ET (5 min)
2026-10-06
NFLX
owns
CNBC Halftime Final Trades · video
Content challenges are fully priced in at depressed valuations with low expectations, and a push into sports and live entertainment could be the turnaround catalyst; Goldman's target implies meaningful upside
“some times good things happen to cheap stock”
Half Time Report guests share their top stock picks... I analyze those picks in the last segment.
2026-10-06
UNH
bullish
CNBC Halftime Final Trades · video
UnitedHealth is a turnaround story with improving fundamentals — bought at $370, guidance raised to $19.50-$20 for the year, and buying ahead of next week's earnings to capture the recovery
“UNH is a turnaround story and the fundamentals are starting to improve”
Half Time Report guests share their top stock picks... I analyze those picks in the last segment.
2026-10-06
GOOGL
owns
CNBC Halftime Final Trades · video
Google's diversified business across cloud, TPUs, and Waymo provides long-term staying power even if agents erode search, making the agent-bypass concern an overhyped reason for underperformance
“I love the diversified business. I'm still in here”
Half Time Report guests share their top stock picks... I analyze those picks in the last segment.
2026-10-06
NVDA
bullish
CNBC Halftime Final Trades · video
Nvidia now pays and grows a real dividend, making it a legitimate dividend-growth compounder where earnings growth drives dividend growth — a genuine holding in a dividend-growth portfolio, not just an AI speculation
“show me a big buyback story show me a dividend growth story show me a commitment to shareholders”
Half Time Report guests share their top stock picks... I analyze those picks in the last segment.
2026-07-10
META
bullish
CNBC Television · video
Meta has shifted from blind AI spend toward a monetizable path — selling excess compute capacity like AWS/Azure — which diversifies it beyond advertising and justifies re-entry.
“they're going from just blindly spending to a path, at least, for how they can produce revenue within this AI ecosystem”
90d +7.8%
The state of the tech trade as SK Hynix opens for trading
2026-07-03
NFLX
bullish
CNBC Halftime Final Trades · video
Netflix has retraced to the same price level it held in February when it walked away from the Warner Bros. Discovery deal, offering a re-entry ahead of the next identifiable growth catalyst
“I think this is a great opportunity to get in before their next growth catalyst”
90d -10.7%
CNBC HOST PUTS TOM LEE ON THE HOT SEAT + Josh Brown's Top picks in 1st segment(07/02)
2026-01-02
V
bullish
Seth Klarman · video
Visa's Circle stablecoin partnership is both offensive and defensive — turning a previously perceived competitor into a high-margin collaboration — and this opportunity is not yet reflected in the stock price.
“it's offense and defense…an exciting opportunity that I agree is not baked into the stock”
90d -13.0% · 180d +1.7%
CNBC's Investment Committee's Top Picks for 2026: Amazon, Sabra and Visa
2026-01-02
AMZN
bullish
Seth Klarman · video
Amazon's flat 2025 represents a reset, with AWS growth, robotics-driven cost savings, advertising, and logistics efficiency set to close the gap between share price and fundamentals in 2026.
“I think that the trajectory for Amazon is playing catch-up”
90d -7.4% · 180d +6.7%
CNBC's Investment Committee's Top Picks for 2026: Amazon, Sabra and Visa
2025-07-29
MRK
bullish
CNBC Halftime Committee · video
Proactive $3B cost-cutting program and pipeline diversification reduce dependence on Keytruda ahead of the 2028 patent cliff, making this a long-term buy
“I love the proactivity of the $3 billion in price cuts”
90d +7.5% · 180d +32.4% · 1y +63.0%
'Halftime' Committee Stocks on the Move: UnitedHealth, Merck, Royal Caribbean and Spotify