An Obvious Sign We're Getting Closer to an AI Top
I'm not going to definitively say the market top is in... But we just witnessed some very "top-ish" behavior.
It all has to do with a shoe company...
If you don't know Allbirds, it's a direct-to-consumer brand of high-quality, eco-friendly shoes. The business was founded in 2015 by former pro soccer player Tim Brown and biotech engineer Joey Zwillinger.
Early on, Allbirds' Wool Runner sneakers took the market by storm... A 2016 Time magazine article dubbed them "the world's most comfortable shoes." And high-profile devotees ranged from Leonardo DiCaprio to Barack Obama.
By the time the company went public in 2021, it was worth more than $4 billion.
But Allbirds has struggled in the years since... Its biggest customer base was Silicon Valley, where Allbirds became part of the unofficial "uniform" for tech venture capitalists. Then these folks moved on to the latest footwear trend.
Revenues fell 15% in 2023, 25% in 2024, and another 20% last year. Even at its height, the company never earned an annual profit.
In late March, Allbirds sold its footwear business to a brand-management company for just $39 million – pennies on the dollar.
But that doesn't mean the company is done.
On April 15, management announced that Allbirds is now an AI company.
The company said it raised $50 million in financing to "pivot its business to AI compute infrastructure, with a long-term vision to become a fully integrated GPU-as-a-Service (GPUaaS) and AI-native cloud solutions provider."
That's a lot of impressive-sounding words. And the shift comes with a fancy new name: NewBird AI.
Behind it all, there are no customers... no hardware... and no real, specific plan.
Yet, it was enough to send the stock soaring nearly 600% in a single day.
Since then, the market has come to its senses (at least a little). The stock is well off its highs. But it's still up about 180% since before the AI announcement.
You typically see crazy market action like this at a top...
Think back to beverage company Long Island Iced Tea, which we wrote about late last year.
To recap, Long Island Iced Tea cashed in on the 2017 bitcoin craze. It decided it would stop selling iced tea, change its name to Long Blockchain, and focus on cryptos.
The word "blockchain" was enough to nearly triple the company's value in a matter of days. Like Allbirds with AI, Long Blockchain had absolutely no ties to blockchain and no experience with it. It had no crypto-related business plan.
As you might have guessed, the pivot didn't work for long...
Bitcoin peaked on December 17, 2017 – just four days before Long Island Iced Tea became Long Blockchain. It then fell roughly 83% over the next 12 months. Take a look...
Long Blockchain's stock fared even worse. It fell about 95% by the time Nasdaq booted Long Blockchain off its exchange in April 2018. The company no longer exists.
We suspect NewBird AI will follow a similar path.
When you see struggling companies trying to exploit the latest market craze, it's a warning that there's probably far too much greed in the market – and the next move is likely much lower.
The Allbirds pivot to AI is a clear sign that this AI bull market is starting to get frothy.
I don't think we're at peak euphoria yet, since there is still a lot of fear in the market... But if we see more non-AI companies abandon their businesses to focus on AI (and if the market rejoices and rewards those moves), then that's the ultimate sign we need to get out.
To learn more about where this AI boom could be headed, I suggest you hear what my friend Marc Chaikin and Silicon Valley insider Jeff Brown have to say.
Tonight at 8 p.m. Eastern time, they're hosting a free webinar. They'll tell you about a paradigm shift in AI that could reset the market... cause "Magnificent Seven" shares to plummet... and define the true winners of the next AI era.
Just for attending, you'll get a free stock recommendation. To learn more and reserve your spot, click here.
What We're Reading...
- Something different: Long-distance runner Sabastian Sawe broke an iconic sub-two-hour barrier.
Here's to our health, wealth, and a great retirement,
Dr. David Eifrig and the Health & Wealth Bulletin Research Team
April 29, 2026