Charts of the Week: Sportsbook Spending Accelerating During the NFL Season With the NFL season now underway, we dive into a deeper analysis of how sportsbook trends during the season have changed over the past…

Summary: (1) We continue to field many questions on home & housing related retailers given the pop in rates and slowdown in transactions. We update our analysis of price inflections across top markets. While prices…

The Optimal Advisory Cost Factor accelerated on y/y basis for the 12th week in a row. For the year, costs are up (+21% y/y, up from +3.5% y/y in early July) primarily on energy costs….

We remain cautious on META, up >10% on >2.5M downloads of Muse and growing distribution partners (SHOP, PYPL, CART, EXPE). Offering new ways to expand its advertising reach and integrate into new customer journeys including…

Charts of the Week: Women’s Sports Valuations Present Opportunity With franchise valuations continuing to increase across the Sports Ecosystem, one consistent theme in our discussions is determining which sports are next to follow the rapid…

Optimal Advisory is pleased to bring you an updated Consumer Staples Briefing Book with 40+ pages and 100+ charts. September real-time spending trends improved this month as only 7/19 proprietary Optimal staples subsectors inflected negatively…

Gen Z traction and mix are critical leading indicators given long-term demographic share shifts; in September’s analysis of 102 companies across sectors we note diverging trends in UA, MCD, GPC, DPZ, BROS, WING, GME. We…

Summary: (1) Many client conversations last week about the 9/16 release of August Retail Sales. In summary, the “robust topline summer” is indeed mostly price (and gasoline), neither of which will change in the short-term…

The Optimal Advisory Cost Factor accelerated on y/y basis for the eleventh week in a row as energy prices remain significantly higher. For the year, costs are up (+18.9% y/y, up from +3.5% y/y in…

We hosted our AI Infra dinner yesterday featuring discussions with key company leaders. Below are three things we learned at our dinner. Cybersecurity was the clearest area of agreement on AI-driven disruption, with consensus on…

Charts of the Week: NCAAF and “Return on NIL Spend“ Following our Elite Athlete Perspective on Brands we are having many conversations about NIL and how it impacts brands and their decision tree. Today we…

Figure 1: Change and Impact of AI Across Consumer in September 2026 Source: Optimal Advisory analysis, Similarweb In this September report, we update our analysis across 112 consumer names (see Figure 1). We calculate both…

Over the last 18 months notable attacks have occurred at Coca-Cola / Fairlife, Target, Kering, Harrods, The North Face, LVMH, Under Armour, United Natural Foods, Chanel, and dozens more. The stakes are high and rising….

Summary: (1) Why the increasingly cautious tone on some consumer behaviors from management teams as they report? We think a key shift within our analysis of Consumer Sentiment data shows a new, softer spending mindset….

The Optimal Advisory Cost Factor accelerated on y/y basis for the tenth week in a row as crude oil passes $100/barrel this week. For the year, costs are up (+17.6% y/y, up from +3.5% y/y…