Commentary
Meme mania is sweeping through the US stock market again, but this time it's trillion-dollar companies that can distort and sink entire equity markets, says Shuli Ren for Bloomberg Opinion.
The SpaceX logo and a rising stock graph are seen in this illustration on Jun 5, 2026. (Image: Reuters/Dado Ruvic)
19 Jun 2026 05:58AM
HONG KONG: During the COVID-19 pandemic, meme mania swept through the US stock market, short-squeezing and shuttering high-profile hedge funds. That is nothing compared to what we are witnessing in the agentic AI era.The latest breed is different. They are not struggling video-game or cinema chains - you might remember GameStop and AMC Entertainment - but trillion-dollar companies whose sheer size alone can distort and sink entire equity markets. These mega-caps are destined to become meme stocks, because traditional valuation methods don’t apply. It’s meaningless to talk about the earnings trajectory of SpaceX given the fantastic dream trillionaire Elon Musk is selling. Fans are simply paying for a Musk premium, believing that they will be as handsomely rewarded as the early backers of Tesla. South Korea’s memory chipmakers Samsung and SK Hynix are equally impossible to value. They operate in a volatile industry where a business cycle can be as short as two to three years. As a result, any subtle shift in the perception of the length and magnitude of the cycle can move the needle. Samsung, for instance, was valued at 26 times forward earnings in early 2023 before crashing to only eight times a year and half later.
