Everything becomes infinite, except the stuff we dig up

Disclosure: S3 Consortium Pty Ltd and its associated entities may hold direct or indirect interests in securities referred to in this publication and may receive fees or other forms of consideration from entities mentioned. These interests and arrangements may create a potential conflict of interest in the preparation of this material.

The information contained in this communication is provided for general information purposes only and may relate to speculative investments. It does not constitute financial product advice, and has been prepared without taking into account your personal objectives, financial situation or needs. You should consider obtaining independent financial advice before making any investment decision.

Any forward-looking statements are uncertain and not a guaranteed outcome.

A terrible week for the global sunscreen industrial complex.

This week AI assisted a big-pharma company (Moderna) to develop a skin cancer vaccine that works.

The company went up nearly 200% (adding $44BN market cap).

No more skin cancer.

...and it looks like early signs that AI may actually eventually help us all live forever.

People living forever? I went further down that rabbit hole this week.

Humans living for a couple of hundred years is actually a LOT closer than I expected but it doesn't make the mainstream news... just yet.

Here is what I found out:

Aging is now treatable (yep seriously) Scientists have recently found the “switch” that makes cells grow old and worked out how to turn it off.

The first age-reversal treatment is already happening in humans RIGHT NOW - it’s being tested in people's eyes, with FDA approval. Old cells are learning to work like young ones again.

Our bodies (the cells) still remember being 20 years old. Turns out it's possible to force cells into doing the work to stay young - like riding a bike they never forget how.

AI has collapsed timelines - Drug discovery that used to take decades now takes just a few months.

The world's richest men are all funding immortality startups. Bezos, Sam Altman and others are pouring billions into the same anti-aging race. Makes sense because when you already own everything else, time is the only thing left to buy.

(this interview with a longevity researcher was a pretty good listen, it's an Aussie guy too - listen here)

There are even reports of people on current age reversing drugs and drug trials giving a chunk of their daily longevity medicine to their dog or cat every day (turns out this is actually quite common - source)

I've now been telling my parents if they can just hang on for five more years then AI breakthroughs on aging should be able to roll them back to 30 year olds.

It was nice to come out of my gold, silver and commodities echo chamber for a few hours.

Or maybe I never left...

Let's assume this “people living for hundreds of years” thing suddenly roars into all our lives as quickly and pervasively as the “previously inconceivable" AI has since 2023...

“People living for hundreds of years” supports an “all commodities boom”

I’ll explain why in a second.

Including why it's not just the biggest commodity boom in human history at the end of this journey that matters...

but it's all the commodity booms we meet along the way to get there.

Yes - somehow I managed to shoehorn the exciting progress made in humans living for hundreds of years to support my thesis that we are entering an “all commodities boom” on a scale we have never seen that will drive up small ASX resource stock prices.

(tune in next week for how I explain to my wife that the parking ticket I just got also tells me we are entering an all commodity boom)

So a bad week for big sunscreen - but it was a great week for small ASX stocks in gold, silver and critical minerals (and for human immortality).

The charts and headlines are screaming that the gold and silver “debasement trade” is back - great for gold (up 6% this week) and silver (up 5% this week).

And when gold and silver prices go up - gold and silver stock prices go up with them.

Gold was the standout performer this week.

Why?

The debasement trade is back it seems (where everything “physical” goes up in price relative to the USD because the USD depreciates, especially gold and silver)

1. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US Government would 2x its debt buybacks. Buying debt with more debt = more USD pumped into the system = good for gold. (source)
2. The market didn't really react the way he would have liked so the next day he signalled the US would do “whatever it takes” saying that the Treasury has a “big toolkit”. (source)
3. Then old clips of US Vice President JD Vance started resurfacing where he questions whether or not the US dollar’s reserve currency status actually benefits America. (source)
4. US federal debt passed US$40TN this week - Then an old clip of President Trump resurfaced where he says US$24TN of debt is “the point of no return” - ... (source)
5. Then the founder of the world’s biggest hedge fund (Ray Dalio) said investors should sell government debt and buy gold saying a US debt crisis could be “as little as three years away”. (source)

(he specifically calls out Bessent’s buybacks saying that's the type of thing a government does before a debt crisis)

US$40 Trillion of debt is a hard place to come back from especially with interest rates where they are today...

(the yearly debt repayments are ~$1trillion - over 20% of yearly government revenue - not ideal)

The only way to get out of this debt (that voters will accept) is to "grow the economy out of it”.

And we see that to mean “print into existence” an economic growth miracle from AI (infinite intelligence) and robotics (infinite labour)...

and the extreme economic growth that comes with it.

At any cost. (Printy McPrintface)

Infinite intelligence plus infinite labour will allow the entire (now immortal?) human race to design and build anything they want - almost instantly.

...assuming they have the materials with which to build it.

Eventually leading to the biggest resource boom the world has ever seen.

That will ALSO need giant commodity bull runs to JUST get us to the start line.

And extreme money printing to make it all happen (good for gold and silver)

All will be explained in about 15 seconds after this insufferable reminder that I was probably right about the small end of the market coming back starting in July:

Silver finished almost bang on US $69 (hehehe) - up 5% for the week.

(source)

The past performance is not and should not be taken as an indication of future performance. Caution should be exercised in assessing past performance. This product, like all other financial products, is subject to market forces and unpredictable events that may adversely affect future performance.

Gold was a standout performer - up 6% for the week.

(source)

The past performance is not and should not be taken as an indication of future performance. Caution should be exercised in assessing past performance. This product, like all other financial products, is subject to market forces and unpredictable events that may adversely affect future performance.

Both starting from almost exactly July 30th.

Both pulling small ASX gold and silver stocks up with them.

Great for my prediction that the small end of the market would start running from July.

(not to mention for our “silver September 2025” when we added 4 silver stocks to our Portfolio)

The basket of our stocks on each theme were up (on average) this week:

And the worms tracking (on average) which way each thematic basket is moving since July 30 are still supporting my “the small end of the market will run again starting in July” prediction:

So a great week for small ASX stocks in gold, silver and critical minerals.

Ok, enough of that.

Biggest commodity boom in human history? Here’s what things might look like over the next 10 years.

So how are humans living forever combined with AI (infinite intelligence) and robotics (infinite labour) going to lead to the biggest commodity bull run the world has ever seen?

AND lots of commodity bull runs just to even get there?

And why is the $40 trillion USA government debt going to see the USA print money to make sure they rapidly achieve extreme economic growth through AI and robotics?

Here’s what the next 10 years might look like:

Intelligence becomes free and infinite (AI). Not just cheap... literally free. A million Nobel-level minds running in a datacentre, thinking 100x faster than you, 24 hours a day, for the price of the electricity.

Labour becomes free and infinite (robots). Billions of humanoid (and other) robots that never sleep, never strike, never take a sickie - don’t even need to take a quick dump mid-shift.

(no more lost productivity from 9:58am sudden market open poos while skulking in the office toilet cubicle looking at your watchlist)

Musk reckons 10 billion robots by 2040. Some think it's 100 billion by the 2060s. Currently in 2026 I already have one robot:

Disease gets solved. The entire 21st century's worth of medical progress, compressed into a decade. Cancer. Alzheimer's. Genetic disease. Heart disease. Gone.

No one dies anymore, except from old age...

Then aging gets solved. Lifespan doubles. Then doubles again. People stop dying of being old.

It even looks like age REVERSING is on the cards:

Work becomes optional. With infinite intelligence and labour, no one will need to work. People will need a hobby. Like growing your own tomatoes even when the shop sells them for nothing. Or playing sport. Or watching TV. Or travelling.

You can think of and design anything you want, and it just... appears. Want a house? Describe it. The AI designs it overnight, the robots build it by Friday. Want a boat, a hospital, a city? Same process. Same week.

Nobody is “poor”. Goods and services cost approximately nothing, because labour costs nothing anymore.

Bored humans with infinite free time will start banging each other a LOT more... meaning more kids. Everyone has no job to do and can get anything they want - instant infinite free time = more human fraternising, and we know where THAT leads. At home, no more “not tonight, honey, I’m too tired from work” = more and more kids.

Human race numbers explode and more and more “stuff” is needed

Then it starts compounding. AI designs a better AI. That AI designs a better one again. Robots build better robots, and those robots build better robots again - each generation smarter, faster and cheaper than the one that built it.

No design meetings. No budget approvals. No waiting for someone to get back from lunch or from the toilet cubicle after market open.

Progress stops happening at “human speed” and starts happening at machine speed - the next generation arriving in months, then weeks, then days.

And it's infinite - every person and every country in the world has access to it.

(and $40 trillion dollar debts fade away into the background - all that money printing to deliver this economic miracle was worth it)

Sounds great - infinite intelligence, infinite labour, infinite lifespan.

There's just one small problem with the whole picture.

The one thing that is NOT infinite in this scenario.

You still have to build everything out of “something”: minerals, metals and materials - physical “stuff”.

Commodities - finite natural resources.

If (nearly) everything is infinite - here’s how the FINITE part of this equation might play out:

Now fast forward to 2030...

Let's assume this all plays out like I've outlined above, and we now enjoy infinite intelligence, infinite labour and infinite lifespans.

Here’s what every country will probably try and do at roughly the same time (based on how far along they are on their AI and robot buildout).

Remember China's Industrialisation (2000-2012) and the eye watering commodities bull run off the back of it?

The biggest construction boom in human history - this one happened in our lifetime.

China built the equivalent of every American city, simultaneously, in about 15 years.

(they did it the old fashioned way with human labour - they were in a sweet spot of available labour with their population and other factors)

Iron ore went from $30/tonne to $190/tonne.

BHP went from $5 to $50. RIO $15 to $122. FMG from 10c to $12.

Copper hit record highs.

Junior ASX explorers became 10-baggers on the back of iron ore and coal.

China went from basically zero to 48,000km of high speed rail in 12 years.

The material bill for just the rail: 133Mt of steel, 1.6Mt of copper, 1.3Mt of aluminium - and 1,413Mt of gravel, sand, cement, steel, fly ash and water in concrete engineering alone. (Source)

While delivering the ASX the biggest commodity bull run in our lifetimes.

Well in 10 years’ time with infinite intelligence and infinite labour accessible to all...

India (1.4BN people) will probably want to do something similar to what China did.

So will Indonesia (280M people), Nigeria (230M people), Brazil (213M people)...

The rest of South America? The Rest of Africa? The rest of Asia?

Even rich countries that struggle to build stuff today will get on the infinite building bandwagon:

USA, UK, Australia... the EU?

It will be like the 2008 China buildout commodity bull run times 10x.

This is just one example.

With infinite intelligence and infinite labour - EVERY country will quickly want their own bridges, updated electricity grids, robot fleets, military rebuild, advanced weapons etc. ASAP

AND...

Every person on earth will want their own smart phone, air conditioning, bigger house, 5x robots, two electric cars.

PLUS

People will live forever too AND there will be more of them, so times all this by billions more people on earth, all wanting the same stuff.

THAT is what a commodity hungry future will look like.

And commodities are finite - which could lead to the biggest commodity run in human history.

The biggest commodities run in human history coming? We will need commodity runs just to even get there, starting today.

Again, it's not just the biggest commodity boom in human history at the end of this journey that matters...

but it's all the commodity booms we meet along the way to get there.

The commodity double whammy here is that to get the human race to this future state where everything EXCEPT commodities is infinite.

...will need a lot of commodities.

A huge amount of commodities needed JUST to get to the “infinite everything” starting line.

The infinite intelligence needs semiconductors and a datacentre to live in.

(silicon, gallium, germanium, indium, copper, steel, concrete, water)

The datacentre runs on electricity.

(uranium, gas, coal, silver, silicon, steel, rare earths)

The electricity comes down a wire.

(copper, aluminium, electrical steel, nickel, lithium, graphite)

The robots have bodies. The bodies have motors and batteries and magnets in them.

(steel, aluminium, copper, lithium, nickel, cobalt, graphite, manganese, neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium, terbium)

Multiply by billions of robots.

And every one of those things comes out of a hole in the ground.

Each stage is a BIGGER commodity story than the one before it.

So BEFORE we even get to the biggest commodity bull run in human history (the one where robots build anything we want for free), we need the above commodity runs to happen first.

...And now add the people who stop dying

8.3 billion people today. Adding about 70 million a year.

Now change two things:

1. Nobody dies. The death side of the ledger goes to near zero. Every single person who's alive stays alive, and stays a consumer, forever.

2. Nobody works, everyone bangs = more kids. Every reason people put off having kids - cost, career, time, housing, not enough hours in the day - just evaporates. Raising a kid is basically free and effortless when you've got five robots and an infinite income.

So population growth doesn't slow down. It goes the other way.

10 billion? 15 billion?

And every single one of them arrives into a world where they've been told, correctly, that they can have anything they want.

Fifteen billion immortal people.

Each with a materials footprint an order of magnitude bigger than a rich westerner's today.

All demanding it at the same time.

And because nobody dies, no footprint ever gets retired.

(Yes this is the most optimistic possible reading of everything and there's about six ways this doesn't happen, but even some version or permutation of this still is positive for scarce and finite commodities.)

So every single input to the modern economy becomes unlimited.

Except one.

There is a fixed amount of copper in the Earth's crust. A fixed amount of nickel, lithium, uranium, neodymium, dysprosium.

When intelligence is free, and labour is free, and design is free... the only thing left with a “price” is the stuff you physically dig up.

Commodities become the last scarce thing on Earth.

In this world, (aside from the obvious new minerals discoveries and building of new mines) I think recycling metals from old robots, data centres, scrap and electronic waste is going to be huge (check out our metals recycling stock ION).

I also reckon somebody is going to have a crack at asteroid mining too... just wait till the first ever billion dollar asteroid drilling assays come back as dusters or a just “technical success”.

The money lost by the first asteroid drilling investors will even make the biggest ASX exploration scoundrels blush.

(F*ck it - I’m in)

Now of course, I could be completely wrong about all of this. AI might plateau. The robots might stay in the demo videos. Commodity prices can and do go down as well as up, and a thesis being correct over 10 years doesn't stop our Portfolio stocks getting smacked in the next 6 months.

But with this one - it feels like it could be another case of not wrong... just early?

See you next week, and have a great weekend

Next Investors