News
Market news, earnings recaps, and daily moves in AI and semiconductor stocks.
US strikes on Iran paused. Oil fell more than 3%, and Micron (MU) and Nebius (NBIS) rose over the weekend
US Central Command has gone two straight nights without striking Iran, and a Defense Department source told CNN operations are on a hold. Polymarket puts an effective ceasefire at 75% by August 31. US markets were shut all weekend, but the tokenized stock market never closed, and it spent Sunday buying the AI trade and selling oil.
SoundHound (SOUN) is paying $42.8 million for LivePerson. LivePerson's own bankers valued its equity at almost nothing.
SoundHound AI (SOUN) cleared its last regulator on July 20 and LivePerson (LPSN) stockholders vote August 20. The proxy puts the price at $42,784,532.64, well under the figures circulating, and both of its valuation analyses value LivePerson's equity at de minimis.
Samsung just signed a $200 billion deal with Broadcom (AVGO), a 32-year TSMC (TSM) customer.
Samsung Electronics signed a memorandum with Broadcom on July 24 covering more than $200 billion of work over five years, through 2030. Broadcom has had TSMC make its chips since 1994, and about 95% of the wafers it outsourced last year came from there. Samsung's foundry holds 6.5% of the world market against TSMC's 72%, and Seoul had closed for the week before any of it was announced.
The busiest stock on Hyperliquid isn't Nvidia. It's SK Hynix (SKHY), and it out-traded Ethereum
Real world assets did $25.1 billion on Hyperliquid in the week of July 13 to 19, out-trading crypto on the venue for the first time. The busiest contract is not Nvidia or Tesla. It is SK Hynix, which passed Ethereum for second place on the whole exchange, and whose Nasdaq listing (SKHY) fell 8.8% on Friday.
Korea's stock market has been forced to pause 41 times this year. All of 2008 had 26.
Kospi set off 41 sidecars between January 2 and July 24, more than the 26 it set off in all of 2008 and far more than the 3 it managed in all of last year. Circuit breakers have fired 7 times in 2026 against 13 in the market's entire history since 2000. Most Korean analysts blame the Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix leverage ETFs that listed in May, but one state research institute says that is the wrong target.
Nvidia (NVDA) and 34 other companies told Washington not to restrict open-weight AI. OpenAI signed a day late. Anthropic still hasn't.
The Open Weights and American AI Leadership letter asks Washington not to restrict AI models anyone can download. It went from 25 signatures to 35. OpenAI added its name after sitting out the launch, Google's CEO backed it without signing, and Anthropic declined to comment. Update, July 27: the list has since grown to 133 names, and both Google and Amazon signed.
Solar stocks fell again Friday, July 24. T1 Energy (TE) is down 58% since June 2, Enphase (ENPH) 49% and First Solar (FSLR) 36%
The Invesco Solar ETF closed 31% below its May 29 record. Enphase and SolarEdge have lost close to half their value since June 2. The July 4 construction deadline, the expired 25D homeowner credit and a pending Section 232 polysilicon ruling are the drivers.
A record 944 billion won ($644M USD) divorce ruling lifted SK Telecom as SK Hynix fell 8.34% (July 24, 2026)
A Seoul court ordered SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won to pay Roh So-young 944 billion won ($644M USD), the largest property division in Korean history. SK Telecom closed up 0.50% on a day Kospi fell 5.72%, because a smaller award means he is less likely to sell SK Inc stock and more likely to lean on subsidiary dividends. SK Hynix, three steps down the same ownership chain, fell 8.34%.
Vietnam and China now pay the same US tariff rate. Nike (NKE) and Deckers (DECK) built years of sourcing strategy on the gap between them.
New Section 301 tariffs took effect Friday, putting Vietnam and China at the same 12.5% rate for the first time. Nike, Deckers, Columbia, Gap, Ralph Lauren and Under Armour all have heavy Vietnam manufacturing exposure.
Jensen Huang's first-ever post on X was an open-weights AI letter. Nvidia (NVDA) and Microsoft (MSFT) both signed it, along with 23 other companies.
Jensen Huang joined X in June and stayed silent for weeks. His first post was a joint industry letter on open AI models, signed by 25 companies including Microsoft. OpenAI, Anthropic, Google and Amazon did not sign.
Verizon (VZ) jumped 2.7% on record profit margins and a subscriber beat. A $1 billion Google deal got buried in the same call.
Verizon's Q2 2026 earnings brought record EBITDA margins, a subscriber beat and a $1 billion-plus dark fiber deal with Google buried in the same call. Shares climbed as much as 2.7% on the earnings, not the deal.
Elon Musk thanked Micron (MU) by name on Tesla's earnings call this week. That's what a real memory shortage looks like.
Musk thanked Micron on Tesla's earnings call, Intel's CEO called memory its biggest supply constraint the next day, SK Hynix's CEO sees a shortage into the next decade, and CXMT is about to IPO into all of it.
Kospi fell 5.72% today. Chinese financial media says the selloff crossed into China and the US too. (July 24, 2026)
Kospi fell 5.72% Friday as Middle East tension pushed oil above $100 a barrel and traders priced in a real chance the Fed raises rates instead of cutting them. A Chinese financial outlet says Korea's leverage ETF unwind is now dragging Chinese and US chip stocks down with it.
SK Hynix (SKHY) reports July 29, and it will most likely be the best quarter the company has ever had
SK Hynix (SKHY) reports second quarter earnings on July 29, and analysts think it will most likely be the best quarter in company history. Profit is expected to be almost six times what it was a year ago, with a profit margin that would be a new record. The demand is coming from artificial intelligence, and it now reaches more than just one kind of chip.
Cybersecurity keeps pulling in money. Palo Alto Networks (PANW) trades at 291 times earnings.
Cybersecurity spending looks as durable as anything in this market, and a wave of M&A backs it up: three public companies gone in a year, the biggest a $21.1 billion Palo Alto Networks deal for CyberArk. But Palo Alto itself trades at 291 times earnings and CrowdStrike's price-to-earnings ratio is negative. Here's the market-cap breakdown of the 21 stocks left standing, and why the category and the stocks aren't the same bet.
All seven Magnificent Seven stocks fell today. Here's where that money actually went (July 23, 2026)
All seven Magnificent Seven stocks were red by late morning Thursday, led by Tesla's 14% drop on an earnings miss and Alphabet's close-to-7% slide despite beating estimates, on another capex raise. Amazon and Meta sold off too ahead of next week's reports. The money didn't just leave, it rotated: into defense on Lockheed's earnings beat, and out of quantum, SaaS and space.
Tesla (TSLA) and Alphabet (GOOGL) are falling hard. The rest of the AI trade isn't (July 23, 2026)
Tesla and Alphabet kept falling through Thursday morning even as chipmakers, neoclouds and photonics stocks held up fine. Oil topped $100 a barrel after Trump threatened to bomb Iranian infrastructure over any new attack on shipping.
Kospi rose 4.4% today. Alphabet's (GOOG) bigger spending plan is why. (July 23, 2026)
Kospi rose 4.4% Thursday, its third straight day of gains and its first close back above 7,000 in five trading days. Alphabet raised its own AI spending plans, easing fears that Korea's memory chip demand was peaking, and foreign investors piled into SK Hynix in particular.
Nokia (NOK) spiked almost 9% on earnings, then reversed. AI and cloud sales doubled, but reported profit fell to a loss
Nokia's Q2 2026 net sales rose 8% and AI and cloud sales more than doubled, but reported operating profit swung to a loss and reported EPS hit exactly zero, on accelerated restructuring charges. NOK spiked as high as $11.17 in early trading before reversing back near Wednesday's close.
Hedge fund Millennium disclosed a new 5.2% stake in Ameresco (AMRC) the week the stock hit its lowest point of 2026
Millennium Management's fresh 5.2% stake in clean-energy developer Ameresco (AMRC), worth about $42.5 million, was disclosed the same week the stock touched its lowest weekly close of 2026. The company is also building a still-early data center power business, including a partnership with CyrusOne.
Alphabet (GOOGL) raised AI capex to $205 billion, its third hike this year. Nvidia (NVDA) and Broadcom (AVGO) barely moved after hours
Alphabet raised its 2026 capex guidance to $195-205 billion during Wednesday's call, its third increase this year, and GOOGL fell as much as 5% in extended trading. But the chip and power stocks that are supposed to benefit from that spending, Nvidia, Broadcom, TSMC, Micron, Vistra and Constellation, barely moved.
Korean overdraft debt grows 4.5 times faster on Kospi crash days than rally days
A Seoul Economic Daily analysis of five major Korean banks found overdraft account balances grew 4.5 times faster on days Kospi fell than on days it rose, as retail investors borrowed to buy the dip during this summer's volatility.
Alphabet (GOOGL): cloud growth hits 82%, and its AI spending just doubled
Alphabet's Q2 2026 results answered the question this earnings week was supposed to settle. Google Cloud grew 82%, capital spending on AI infrastructure more than doubled to $44.9 billion for the quarter, and the reported 298% profit jump comes with an asterisk worth reading before you believe it.
GE Vernova (GEV) raised its cash forecast by $5 billion and fell 8% (July 22, 2026)
GE Vernova raised its 2026 revenue and free cash flow forecasts and reported an 88% jump in orders, but earnings missed and the wind unit's losses widened. The stock fell about 8%.