Welcome to Titan’s Take, our POV on the latest.
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"Practically not a barrel of oil could get to a railroad without Rockefeller's consent." Historian Ron Chernow, describing Standard Oil's control
When a mega-tailwind arrives, the question is always how to invest capital to play the trend. Often, the less obvious bet can be a winning hand. One of our favorite questions to ask: where's the chokepoint?
Take air travel. It has enjoyed secular tailwinds for decades. The supply chain can be dramatically oversimplified to four steps: (1) parts becoming (2) airplanes, leased to (3) airlines, departing from (4) airports.
The most visible steps, (3) and (4), dominate the conversation. "I have a Delta flight (3) taking off from LaGuardia (4)." But the earlier, less glamorous step was the greatest chokepoint in the chain. TransDigm, the airline parts supplier at step (1), if bought at IPO, returned 31% annually for 19 years…162x your money.
Artificial Intelligence is the present mega-tailwind, unlike anything that has come before. Yet the same question applies: somewhere in the supply chain, where's a chokepoint?
The AI steps, drastically oversimplified: (1) mine sand, (2) refine it into silicon wafers, (3) fabricate those wafers into chips, (4) assemble chips into systems, (5) pack those systems into data centers, (6) sell access to that compute as cloud, (7) train models on top of that cloud, (8) and deliver intelligence to your pocket as Claude & ChatGPT. (Observation: it's pretty wild that we've turned sand into thought.)
Steps (7) and (8) have dominated the headlines. Anthropic, OpenAI, you know the names. But where is a chokepoint earlier in the chain? One answer: the glue between steps (3) and (4). Optics.
Optics is the technology of moving data using light instead of electricity. Inside a data center, servers need to talk to each other constantly and at enormous speeds. The faster AI models get, the more data needs to move between chips, racks, and buildings. Copper cannot keep up. Light can, powered by optical networking. Hello, chokepoint!
Like airline parts, optics is unglamorous, largely invisible to the consumer, and increasingly impossible to route around. That makes optical networking less of a bet on any single company and more of a toll road on the entire AI buildout.
Optics has been such a high conviction chokepoint for us, that we initiated positions across Titan Flagship & Opportunities. The optical networking market has responded accordingly, take Ciena (CIEN) for example.
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Then as of recently we initiated positions in Offshore via Nokia and Tower Semiconductor. Nokia is, in our view, the only Western full-stack optical platform. Tower is one of three foundries on the planet capable of manufacturing silicon photonics at scale, with 70% of its new capacity already contracted through 2028.
Together, they give Titan exposure to a chokepoint layer of AI.
Yes, the models are important.
Yes, the chips are too.
But so are the pipes that make all of it work.
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From Aahana Chatterjee, Vice President, Titan Wealth Advisory
"At Titan, we use the three A's: Automated, Active, and Alternatives. Hunting for differentiated AI investments lives in our Active bucket. Our trio of long-only strategies, Flagship (large cap), Opportunities (small cap), and Offshore (international), is how we express our views in stocks across the world. If you're looking to add active exposure to your portfolio or want better active management during the AI supercycle, give us a shout.” |
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Titan Global Capital Management, Inc. PO Box 4668 | PMB 85274
New York, New York 10163-4668 US © 2026 Titan, All rights reserved.
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As of the time of publishing, TransDigm Group Incorporated (TDG) and Ciena Corporation (CIEN) are holdings in Titan's Flagship strategy; Nokia Corporation (NOK) and Tower Semiconductor Ltd. (TSEM) are holdings in Titan's Offshore strategy; and as of 4/30/2026, OpenAI and Anthropic, Inc. make up 9.29% and 2.96% of the ARK Venture Fund, respectively.
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