Duration Reprices Before Direction Does

Markets rallied for a second straight day. Tech led. Nvidia climbed ahead of earnings. But the week's real story is not price action. It is timing. The Supreme Court struck down IEEPA tariffs. A market for refund claims is forming faster than the refunds. Power access is gating AI buildouts before tenants show up. Loan prices sit near par even as software equities reset double digits. 

When policy, grids, and AI collide at once, the binding factor is not capital. It is how long sponsors can finance the wait.

Translate the noise into deal behavior. Fewer deals clear cleanly, and the ones that do demand tighter terms, higher return bars, and stronger backing. Duration gaps widen discounts first. Liquidity tightens second. Standards rise third. Buyers circle last. This is not a debate about whether value exists. It is a debate about when value converts to cash. That sequence governs this edition.

Every time you swipe your card, up to 3% vanishes into banks and payment processors.

That adds up to $100+ billion a year.

But what if I told you there's a breakthrough altcoin that could eliminate these fees entirely?

One project has created something revolutionary: instant, secure transactions that cost pennies instead of dollars. No credit card companies. No banks. No middlemen.

It’s already processing billions in transactions, and institutions are quietly paying attention.

Most investors haven’t noticed yet.

See why this altcoin could change how money moves.

© 2026 Boardwalk Flock LLC. All Rights Reserved. 2382 Camino Vida Roble, Suite I Carlsbad, CA 92011, United States. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Readers acknowledge that the authors are not engaging in the rendering of legal, financial, medical, or professional advice. The reader agrees that under no circumstances Boardwalk Flock, LLC is responsible for any losses, direct or indirect, which are incurred as a result of the use of the information contained within this, including, but not limited to, errors, omissions, or inaccuracies. Results may not be typical and may vary from person to person. Making money trading digital currencies takes time and hard work. There are inherent risks involved with investing, including the loss of your investment. Past performance in the market is not indicative of future results. Any investment is at your own risk.

The signals below are not forecasts. They are mechanisms already in motion. Each one reveals the same pattern: duration is being financed before economics are fully proven.

The White House rolled out a Ratepayer Protection Pledge during the State of the Union. Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft, Oracle, OpenAI, and xAI will sign pledges to build, bring, or buy their own power for AI data centers at a March 4 event. 

The pledge confirms what the grid already shows. In PJM's region, capacity prices surged from roughly $29 to $329 per megawatt-day in one auction cycle. Demand from hyperscalers is strong, but local utilities, grid queues, and permit timelines control the clock. Longer grid timelines raise carry costs, push out revenue, and compress margins for builders. 

Value flows to those who already hold powered land and permit ties. The rest wait in line.

Investor Signal 

Power sourcing and grid access are the new deal gates. Model them before tenant ramp. If the megawatts are not locked, the timeline is not real.

Equity markets spent February marking down software and services firms as AI fears spread. Credit has not moved. UBS puts 25 to 35 percent of private credit books at high AI risk, mostly in tech and business services. The bank sees default rates rising up to 4 percent in private credit by late 2026, with $75 billion to $120 billion in fresh losses across levered loans and private credit. 

Yet loan prices sit near par, even for B-rated tech names. The repricing is not showing up in spread blowouts. It shows up in slower deal flow, stiffer covenants, and rising refi friction. New documentation is incorporating tighter maintenance tests and higher pricing floors, particularly for B-rated sponsor-backed borrowers. Borrowers delay. Lenders tighten. The signal lives in structure, not in headlines.

Investor Signal 

Screen sponsor-backed borrowers for 2026 to 2028 refi risk. The repricing shows in covenant resets and deal gaps. Watch flow, not spreads.

Not in Nvidia. Not in Oracle. Not in the stocks filling your newsfeed. 

50-year Wall Street veteran Marc Chaikin built the indicator inside every Bloomberg terminal, and right now it's showing him something most investors are missing entirely. 

The Smart Money has rotated into a completely different group of stocks. 

Marc and CNBC legend Jon Najarian just recorded a free briefing revealing exactly what's happening and their #1 stock to buy today.  

Click here to watch.

Nvidia beat on every line. Revenue hit $68.1 billion, up 73 percent year over year. Data center sales climbed 75 percent to $62.3 billion. Guidance for the first quarter of $78 billion cleared the Street by more than five billion. Hyperscaler capex for 2026 could near $700 billion. 

The supply side of the AI buildout is locked in. But big spend does not answer the question private markets ask: when does it convert to durable, payable cash? Nvidia proves demand. It does not prove timing. The gap between capex and cash return is where marks, covenants, and exit rails face their test.

Investor Signal

Split the spend signal from the timing signal. Capex proves demand, not the path to cash. Price the gap.

Private markets are pricing time. The Supreme Court struck down IEEPA tariffs, and traders moved fast to buy discounted refund claims from firms that cannot wait. Claims now trade near 40 cents on the dollar, up from 10 to 20 cents before the ruling. Still well below par. The gap reflects uncertainty around administrative capacity and legal sequencing, not just policy reversal.

The pool is vast. Roughly $130 billion in tariff revenue sits with the feds, and some counts push the total past $175 billion. One baby product maker sold half of a $15 million claim to a hedge fund just to free up working capital. Small importers sell at deep cuts because they need cash now. Large balance sheets hold for par. The market splits by patience, not by legal merit.

This is real-time liquidity change. Buyers lend against the clock, and the discount functions as a live read on filing backlogs, court bandwidth, and political drag. Claims pricing looks more like structured credit than simple bills owed.

The same timing tension runs through AI-exposed lending. Equities marked down software borrowers hard this month. The tech software ETF dropped more than 10 percent in February alone. But loan prices barely moved. UBS calls it the fourth of nine innings. The shift has started, but most of the move sits ahead.

Refi risk is the channel. Borrowers push off new deals. Lenders demand harder terms and stiffer covenants. New issuance slows before spreads blow out. The lag is built in, because loans reprice at maturity and refi windows, not daily like stocks. For sponsor-backed software and services borrowers with 2026 to 2028 maturity walls, the window is already closing.

Across tariff claims, power-gated projects, and AI-exposed loan books, the market asks one question: who can finance the wait? One clean deal can reopen the new-issue pipeline. A weak one stalls flow for a quarter. Early court guidance on refund filings can tighten or widen discounts in days. The same applies to grid permit rulings and covenant waivers.

Sponsors must plan for longer holds and slower payouts. Equity checks rise as leverage appetite falls in timing-heavy sectors. Stronger groups with locked power, varied revenue, or patient capital buy from sellers who cannot carry the clock. Weaker platforms face forced exits at marked-down prices. The edge belongs to those who build for time, not just for value.

Investor Signal

Duration is repricing across policy, power, and credit. Price the calendar. If cash takes longer, structure must make up the gap.

During a private gathering of Wall Street elites, I was one of two people selected to speak with Elon personally.

As a result, my research now leads me to believe Elon will announce the SpaceX IPO on this date:

March 26, 2026. Circle it on your calendar.

I'm sharing an "access code" that lets anyone grab a pre-IPO stake before it happens. This is your invitation to the biggest wealth-building event of the decade.

Click Here to See how to Get Your "SpaceX Access Code"

The market is shifting from "AI is a growth story" to "AI changes the timing math and the credit box." When holds stretch, discounts widen, terms tighten, and buyers circle. 

This is the regime now. Not a crisis. A filtering. 

Capital still flows, but it flows to sponsors who control the clock. The edge is not calling the story. It is knowing who can finance the calendar, hold covenants, and convert cash before the pressure compounds. 

The advantage sits with sponsors who can finance duration, protect covenants, and convert cash on their own timeline.