Nike is going through a bad patch, and its share price has done very poorly. It hit an all-time high in November 2021, but has almost halved since then. After a good pandemic, when many people took up jogging, sales have moderated and inventory challenges have persisted.

We encourage you to hold tight, and wait for better days. Nike is one of the world's pre-eminent consumer brands, and is strongly associated with the trend towards more active lifestyles and more casual dress. That's called athleisure - informal, comfortable clothing designed to be suitable both for exercise and everyday wear.

As a sign of how convincing Nike's marketing efforts can be, the German national football team has just ended a 77-year sponsorship deal with Adidas, and switched to Nike. That's Marc-Andre Ter Stegen in the photo below, wearing Nike-branded FC Barcelona gear. From 2027 onwards, he'll wear Nike kit in goal for Germany.

Nike CEO John Donahoe said they aimed to rebrand both the men's and women's national teams and "to make their athletes global heroes. When Nike brings our best, no one can beat us."

Apple has been taking some heat recently from regulators in Europe and the US. The most recent allegation has come from the US Department of Justice (DOJ) who have filed a civil lawsuit against Apple suggesting that they have monopolised the smartphone market by discouraging any innovation that threatens their own business. This has resulted in less choice for consumers, slow competition and increased consumer costs.

The experts think that this will take at least 3 years to play out and many believe that not much will come out of it. Remember that there are current DOJ cases against Google, Meta and Amazon so this kind of thing is not new and not necessarily surprising. The irony is that those three companies own the super apps that are supposedly being discriminated against by Apple's monopolistic behaviour.

Politicians like fiddling with powerful businesses, but the US has a strong legal system that has a bias towards supporting corporates. We are not overly concerned about recent developments. If we were worried about legal issues we would never have urged you to own any of the big tech stocks because there is always something they are in trouble for. That is what happens when you reach the size and scale that they have.

And who knows, if Trump and the Republicans win control of Congress at the end of the year this kind of meddling by federal authorities might be swept aside. My point is, there are so many potential outcomes. Apple is massive and will find other avenues to grow and build their services business if need be, including deeper use of AI applications.

They certainly have the balance sheet to take on these legal cases and potential fines without moving any sort of needle. We advise you to hold your Apple shares through thick and thin, that has certainly been the best advice with regard to this great business over the last decade.

A client asked me yesterday if we should be worried about some tech insiders selling shares. For example, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos recently sold $8.5 billion worth of Amazon stock, and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg sold $175 million of his company holdings.

Every time insiders sell stock, inflammatory news articles pop up. For Bezos and Zuckerberg, these are largely insignificant amounts compared to what they still own. In Zuckerberg's case, his NAV fluctuates more on a daily basis than the value of these disposals. He needs the money to meet his annual charity obligations. Bezos' sale is a bit bigger, but he got clearance to do these sales last year already. He's retired and needs the cash for boats, houses and rockets.

I remember the fuss made when Koos Becker sold about 70% of his Naspers holding in 2015. He also needed cash for retirement, to buy wine farms and a pay a massive tax bill. About a year later Naspers was over 50% higher.

Maybe there is a correction coming and those insiders know something we don't, but I doubt that. I think it has more to do with insiders being disinclined to sell shares in 2022 and 2023 due to terrible tech-stock prices. They are catching up now.

We are long term investors and are more concerned about where share prices will be ten years from now. That's determined by business growth and earnings levels. Both Amazon and Meta have very solid fundamentals.

Early disease detection is always helpful. Blood-based screening test detects 83% of people with colon cancer - An encouraging clinical trial.

Longevity enthusiasts are pushing rapamycin. Transplant patients are already receiving these benefits - Rapamycin can modify cell communication.

Japan's Topix and Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index are little changed. China's Shanghai Composite Index and Australia's S&P/ASX 200 Index are down 0.4%.

US futures are very marginally in the green this morning and the Rand is steady at just below R19 to the US Dollar.

So it's all quiet on the eastern and western front. Turn off your computer and go for a walk. Keep calm, and coast through to Easter.