Stock Split Hype: Congrats, You Own More Shares of the Same Overpriced Nothing

AI has been carrying the market, sure. But let’s give credit to the other hero of this rally: the stock split, Wall Street’s most celebrated non-event.

Several high-profile splits have been announced this year, and investors are treating each announcement like the company just invented cold fusion. It didn’t. A stock split is arithmetic. You own the same slice of the same pie, just cut into more pieces. If you had 10 shares at $1,000 and now have 20 at $500, congratulations — your net worth changed by exactly zero dollars. Yet the market routinely pops these stocks on announcement, because a meaningful chunk of investors apparently can’t do division.

So why do companies split? Usually optics. A three-figure share price “feels