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Tether announced Thursday that KPMG U.S. completed the company's first full independent financial statement audit, issuing an unqualified opinion on Tether International's 2025 financials and confirming that reserves backing USDT exceeded liabilities by $6.814 billion at year-end.

The distinction between this and what Tether has published before matters more than the headline number. Attestations, which Tether has relied on since 2021, are limited to a snapshot in time, built on a scope the company itself defines, and carry no binding opinion from the accounting firm performing them. A full audit is different in kind: KPMG examined Tether's complete financial statements, transactions, systems, valuations, counterparties, and ownership records, and — notably — physically counted and inspected every individual gold bar Tether holds, verifying existence and identifying information directly rather than relying on custodian reports. The audit covered a balance sheet that includes more than $141 billion in direct and indirect US Treasury exposure, alongside gold and roughly $60 billion in bitcoin, according to Arkham Intelligence data cited by outlets covering the announcement; Tether's own statement did not break out its bitcoin position. CEO Paolo Ardoino called it the "largest inaugural financial audit in history," and noted that critics had spent years insisting an audit of Tether's scale could never actually be completed.

The audit result gave both sides of Tether's long-running credibility debate something to point to. Supporters treated the $6.8 billion surplus and KPMG's clean opinion as vindication after years of unresolved scrutiny. Critics were quicker to note that gold verification, however thorough, addresses only one reserve category, and that KPMG's own network has previously audited firms that later collapsed under fraud allegations — a reminder that a clean audit opinion narrows the range of open questions without eliminating all of them.

The credibility question Tether just answered first became unavoidable in October 2024, where we covered a public accusation that Tether was "a $120 billion scam" with no audit ever completed — a claim that gained traction precisely because it was, at the time, factually true: no independent audit existed, only quarterly attestations Tether itself commissioned. That gap persisted even as Tether pursued a US-facing pivot, with Blockhead reporting last September that Tether launched USAT, a dollar stablecoin built for American compliance through Anchorage Digital, after a 2021 New York Attorney General settlement first forced the company into a regime of quarterly attestations without an admission of wrongdoing. This audit is the step that gap-filling campaign had been building toward.

USDT's market capitalization has passed $180 billion, and Tether has become one of the largest private holders of US government debt globally — a scale where "trust us" stopped being a sufficient answer for regulators and institutional counterparties years ago. A single audit doesn't retroactively resolve every past criticism, and the audited entity is a Tether subsidiary rather than the parent company. But it does convert the central question that's followed Tether since 2017 — do the reserves actually exist — from something only Tether could answer into something a Big Four firm has now put its own name behind. Whether that's enough for the regulators still watching USDT's compliance status under the GENIUS Act, given Tether issues the token from outside the US, is the next question the audit alone can't settle.

Following the launch of buyback-and-burn programs for BTT and WIN, JST completed its fourth major token burn, while SUN rolled out a comprehensive upgrade to its buyback mechanism. 

With these initiatives now operational, TRON’s flagship assets have officially entered a deflationary era. This sends a clear message to the broader crypto market: TRON is anchoring its tokenomics in economic reality. By converting actual protocol revenue into real benefits for token holders, TRON is reinforcing its ecosystem flywheel and steering the entire ecosystem toward real value creation. 

TRON’s Core Assets Enter Deflationary Era as Network-Wide Buybacks Go Live By taking protocol revenue to repurchase tokens on the open market and permanently remove them from circulation, TRON’s four flagship assets—JST, SUN, WIN, and BTT—are adopting a mechanism similar to traditional equity buybacks, with the potential to support long-term token value.

JST, an essential asset across TRON’s DeFi segment, has spearheaded the buyback wave. As of July 17, it has completed its fourth major buyback-and-burn round, removing a cumulative total of 1,711,249,863 JST from circulation, which accounts for 17.29% of its total supply.

Data shows that JST’s total buyback value across four rounds has surged past the $94.62 million mark, exhibiting explosive round-over-round growth. This surging capital scale vividly highlights a leap in JST’s underlying revenue generation, reinforcing TRON’s firm resolve toward a model of absolute deflation. 

As JST sets the pace, SUN.io—another key pillar of TRON’s DeFi ecosystem—has completed a major upgrade to its buyback mechanism, unlocking greater on-chain transparency. SUN’s buyback mechanism now draws its funding from an expanded range of SUN.io’s product suite, including SunSwap V2, SunPump, and SunX.

Since the launch of its buyback initiative on December 15, 2021, SUN.io has executed 51 consecutive, uninterrupted burn rounds, permanently removing 678,547,188.32 SUN from circulation—making up 3.4% of the total supply. Furthermore, it launched a dedicated buyback-and-burn dashboard on April 22 this year, allowing global investors to witness firsthand how protocol revenue translates into sustainable value growth. 

Building on this momentum, BitTorrent, the world’s premier decentralized network infrastructure provider, and WINkLink, the first decentralized oracle network on TRON, introduced their own buyback and burn programs in July. 

To fund these initiatives, WINkLink will allocate 100% of its revenue to repurchasing WIN, while BitTorrent will utilize the entirety of the revenue generated from its decentralized business to buy back BTT. Both projects are slated to officially commence their burn phases in Q4 2026. 

JST Leads the Charge as TRON’s Core Infrastructure Tokens Rally in Unison Among the four projects, JST stands out as the clear leader in the scale and volume of its buyback and burn program. JustLend DAO’s robust revenue base provides the foundational support, with its Energy rental operations accounting for 70% of the allocated funds. Concurrently, accrued stability fees from USDJ were tapped for the very first time to supply the remaining 30%, marking JST’s successful establishment of a diversified, multichannel value capture framework. 

Catalyzed by strong deflationary expectations, JST is undergoing an explosive realignment with its intrinsic value on the secondary market. Since the inception of its buyback and burn, the token’s price has surged over 200%, breaching the $0.1 mark on July 10 to hit a recent historic high that sits 50% above its Q1 peak. Both the eye-watering Q2 trading volume of $3.27 billion and this significant price appreciation are directly underpinned by genuine revenue growth. Together, these metrics cement JST’s position as a premier growth and value asset, offering unparalleled certainty within the TRON DeFi ecosystem. 

Building on JST’s momentum, SUN—the native token of SUN.io, another core DeFi engine on TRON—is exhibiting remarkable resilience in both price and trading volume, bolstered by continuous enhancements to its deflationary mechanics. 

As of July 29, CoinGecko data indicates that SUN has maintained a steady upward trajectory over the past month, posting a solid 10% gain. Its impressive $640 million in Total Value Locked (TVL) and $440 million in 7-day trading volume demonstrate robust capital retention within the protocol. This steady price appreciation, underpinned by deep liquidity, further cements SUN’s position as the bedrock of the TRON ecosystem’s trading hub.

In parallel, with the official launch of their buyback and burn programs in July, WIN and BTT—dual engines of TRON’s infrastructure—have shown tangible value realization. Catalyzed by this mechanism, both assets have demonstrated strong price resilience. As of July 29, driven by the announcement of its “100% Real-Revenue Buyback & Burn” initiative, WIN has rallied approximately 22.5%. Meanwhile, BTT has also found a strong base of support amidst price fluctuations. Together, these two infrastructure pillars are working in lockstep with the broader DeFi ecosystem, driving sustainable, synergistic growth across the network.

Beyond Hype and Narrative: How TRON is Redefining Value Accrual Through Real Yield TRON has evolved far beyond a standard Layer 1 network into a highly cash-generative, on-chain financial engine. With active user accounts approaching the 400 million mark and Total Value Locked (TVL) comfortably exceeding $27.0 billion, the network now hosts over $90 billion in stablecoin supply, with its diverse business lines continuously generating protocol revenue every day. 

Rather than letting these earnings sit idle, TRON is channeling its yield back into the ecosystem. Through comprehensive buyback and burn programs across JST, SUN, BTT, and WIN, TRON has built a self-sustaining value flywheel, routing network revenue straight back to its community and token holders. 

Right now, TRON’s ecosystem flywheel is spinning at full tilt. These four flagship projects aren’t isolated bets in separate verticals—they interlock, each one reinforcing the others in a genuine, self-compounding business loop. And what keeps that loop turning is relentless, disciplined engineering at the protocol layer.

Q2 2026 brought a sweeping wave of upgrades across the board. JustLend DAO shipped its SBM V2 isolated pool and plugged directly into Binance Wallet. SUN.io slashed energy costs with a router contract overhaul. BitTorrent made its boldest move yet, launching BTTInferGrid to stake a claim in decentralized AI compute. WINkLink kept scaling its price feed coverage. Individually, these read as incremental UX refinements; collectively, they build the deep, frictionless infrastructure that TRON’s massive liquidity pools depend on. 

This model creates a compounding flywheel effect: as circulating token supply tightens and persistent buyback demand accelerates, a self-reinforcing value loop takes shape—one designed to attract capital regardless of broader market sentiment. JST’s sustained burn program represents merely the opening act. Together with the revamped SUN buyback framework and the upcoming BTT and WIN repurchase schedules, TRON’s entire asset stack is now fully aligned around systematic supply deflation as a core growth strategy. 

TRON Eco Team Email:[email protected] Singapore Disclaimer: TheNewsCrypto does not endorse any content on this page. The content depicted in this Press Release does not represent any investment advice. TheNewsCrypto recommends our readers to make decisions based on their own research. TheNewsCrypto is not accountable for any damage or loss related to content, products, or services stated in this Press Release.

@BNBChain and @RobinhoodCrypto have each crossed 500,000 unique Real-World Asset (RWA) holders, marking what is shaping up to be the most significant mass adoption event for on-chain securities since the sector's 2025 pilot stage.

Two Chains, One MilestoneThe simultaneous crossing of the 500,000-holder threshold by both networks is notable for different reasons. BNB Chain built its RWA base steadily over time, adding 395,000 new stock token holders over the past year, more than any other chain. As of late June 2026, BNB Chain hosted more than 709 tokenized stocks and ETFs, ranging from household names like Nvidia and Micron to newer listings like Circle's CRCL.

Robinhood Chain's trajectory was far more compressed. The chain launched its public mainnet on July 1, 2026, reaching its holder milestone just 25 days later , after Robinhood introduced Stock Tokens, agentic trading, and a broader DeFi product suite at its London event. Robinhood Chain is built on the Arbitrum framework as a permissionless Ethereum Layer 2, purpose-built for on-chain finance involving tokenized equities.

Tokenized stock holders surged 448% to 1.4 million in six months across all chains, with BNB Chain and Robinhood Chain each commanding roughly 500,000 holders. That near-parity is remarkable given that Robinhood Chain only went live around July 1, 2026, meaning it captured its entire share in roughly six weeks.

Value and MomentumHolder counts tell part of the story, but value locked adds important context. Real-world asset value sitting on BNB Chain reached approximately $3.89 billion by mid-2026, making it the second-largest blockchain by RWA total. Combined, the two networks are on track to exceed $4.2 billion in tokenized commodity and securities value.

Robinhood Chain surpassed 420,000 RWA holders and $1.3 billion in TVL just six weeks after its Ethereum Layer 2 mainnet launch. A dozen tokenized stocks, led by GameStop, Nvidia and SpaceX, are now each clearing at least $500,000 in daily volume, with several surpassing $1 million.

Robinhood Chain does not have a native token. Instead, activity on the chain revolves around tokenized RWAs and DeFi protocols that have integrated with the network. When 420,000 wallets hold RWAs on a chain with no token incentive, that is a stronger signal of organic demand than most crypto metrics can claim.

The broader RWA market provides further context. The number of RWA holders across all chains has grown to 1.09 million, up from around 375,000 a year ago. The concentration of roughly half of all those holders across just two chains underscores how dominant @BNBChain and @RobinhoodCrypto have become in shaping the next phase of on-chain finance.

Sources:
Crypto Briefing: Tokenized stocks reach 1.4M holders, up 448% in six months
CoinDesk: Robinhood Chain's real-world assets jump fivefold as tokenized stocks start trading in size
Crypto Briefing: Robinhood Chain surpasses 420K RWA holders in six weeks

10 best sugar stocks to buy nowCosan NYSE: CSAN reported a narrower net loss for the second quarter of 2026 as the Brazilian conglomerate advanced debt-reduction, divestment and cost-cutting efforts designed to simplify its holding-company structure.

Net loss totaled BRL 320 million for the quarter, an improvement from the prior-year period. Fernando Tinel attributed the improvement primarily to better financial results, lower effective income-tax and social-contribution expenses, reduced general and administrative costs, and the continued non-recognition of Raízen’s results. Those factors more than offset a BRL 233 million one-time impairment related to the Terminal de Uso Privado São Luís.

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Debt Reduction and Asset Sales Cosan said expanded net debt declined 20% from the first quarter to BRL 9.2 billion at the end of June. Expanded gross debt fell to BRL 16.5 billion, down about BRL 2.7 billion from the prior quarter and roughly BRL 9 billion from the end of 2025.

The company said it made approximately BRL 8.8 billion in principal payments since the beginning of the year, including full prepayments of bonds maturing in 2029, 2030 and 2031, along with early amortization of debentures and commercial notes. The actions reduced debt maturities scheduled for 2028 by more than BRL 2.5 billion, Cosan said.

At quarter-end, the company’s debt had an average maturity of 6.2 years and an average cost of CDI plus 1.15% annually. Tinel said the decline in net debt was driven by proceeds from Compass’ initial public offering, dividends from investees and yields on financial investments.

Compass’ IPO, completed through a secondary share offering, generated BRL 2.3 billion in net proceeds for Cosan during the first half. The company also announced an agreement to sell part of Radar’s Mato Grosso land portfolio for BRL 1.85 billion. Cosan expects its indirect share of proceeds to total approximately BRL 586 million at closing, which is expected by Oct. 30, subject to customary conditions.

Separately, Cosan signed an exclusive letter of intent to fully divest its stake in the Terminal de Uso Privado Porto São Luís. The proposal calls for BRL 300 million at closing and could include an indicative earn-out of BRL 50 million for each additional berth added through future port-capacity expansion.

Coverage Outlook and Lower Overhead Cosan’s debt service coverage ratio stood at 0.2 times on a last-12-month basis, down 0.2 times from the prior quarter. Management said the result reflected the timing of dividend and equivalent distributions from investees, which are more heavily concentrated in the second half of the year, and the fact that lower financial expenses from debt prepayments have not yet been fully reflected in the metric.

The company began providing a year-end outlook for the ratio and expects it to reach between 0.8 times and 1.2 times by December. The forecast assumes BRL 1.2 billion to BRL 1.8 billion in dividends and equivalent distributions during 2026, including up to BRL 586 million related to the Radar transaction. Potential future divestments under evaluation are not included in the projection.

Cosan also reported a roughly 36% decline in general and administrative expenses, or BRL 49 million in savings, during the first six months of 2026 versus the same period a year earlier. The company announced plans to delist its American depositary shares from the New York Stock Exchange and intends to pursue SEC deregistration in the future as part of its simplification agenda.

Marcelo Martins said management expects to pursue further reductions in overhead as the holding company becomes leaner. Rafael Bergmann said the ADS delisting should make operations simpler over time, although Cosan will continue meeting SEC obligations during 2026 while the deregistration process is not complete.

Investee Performance Rumo: Transported 23.8 billion revenue ton-kilometers, up 9% year over year, supported by grain volumes in its North and South operations. EBITDA was BRL 2.3 billion, broadly stable from the prior-year period. Excluding insurance indemnities and an equity-income reclassification, EBITDA would have risen 4%, Cosan said. Compass: Distributed volume was stable year over year. Weaker industrial demand in chemicals, steel and ceramics was offset by residential and commercial performance with higher margins. EBITDA increased 5%, supported by Edge’s load-optimization initiatives. Moove: EBITDA more than doubled from the first quarter amid supply disruptions associated with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Management cited inventory management, higher sales volume and revenue growth. EBITDA was down 6% from a year earlier because the comparison period included insurance recoveries and other one-time effects tied to a fire at an industrial complex in Rio de Janeiro. Radar: Performance was affected by the revaluation of part of its portfolio following the announced land disposal and lower net operating revenue, with lower ATR prices affecting lease contributions. Management also noted that Raízen’s out-of-court reorganization plan was approved by 81.6% of its financial creditors. Martins described the approval as an important step in Raízen’s turnaround process.

Portfolio and Management Changes During the question-and-answer session, Martins said Cosan continues to pursue the previously announced sale of part of its Rumo stake and is in discussions with potential buyers, but did not provide additional details. He said the company is not currently considering an IPO for Moove or a sale of its Moove stake.

Management said Radar remains a valuable portfolio and that Cosan intends to monetize assets when valuations are appropriate, rather than liquidating them at any cost.

Martins also discussed leadership changes, saying Maria Rita and Rafael Bergmann decided to leave amid the restructuring and reduction of holding-company expenses. He welcomed Cesario back to the company, saying he had previously spent eight years with Cosan before leaving in 2017.

About Cosan (NYSE:CSAN)Cosan Limited NYSE: CSAN is a Brazilian diversified energy and logistics group focused on agribusiness, fuels, and infrastructure. Its core activities include the cultivation of sugarcane, production of ethanol and sugar, generation of bioelectricity from bagasse, and distribution of fuels under the Raízen joint venture with Shell. Through its subsidiary Moove, Cosan is a leading global producer of base oils and lubricants, while Comgás serves as one of Brazil's largest natural gas distributors.

Founded in 1936 in the state of São Paulo, Cosan has grown through organic expansion and strategic acquisitions.

This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to [email protected].

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Buried in the European Commission's MiCA review consultation, open until August 31, is the question that decides whether global stablecoins can exist in Europe at all: should the regulation "continue to be open to multi-issuance models?" The bureaucratic phrasing conceals a two-year institutional brawl. On July 9, the European Parliament voted 390 to 86 to back multi-issuance with safeguards, rejecting a push from the European Systemic Risk Board, chaired by Christine Lagarde, to shut the practice down. The ECB side has not conceded. Nobody has, because the word at stake is fungible, and fungibility is the entire product.

Multi-issuance is how a global stablecoin squares MiCA with reality. Circle became the first global issuer authorized under MiCA, through France, in 2024; Paxos issues its Global Dollar through a Finnish entity-launches-in-the-eu). A USDC minted in Paris and a USDC minted in Boston are the same token at the same price, redeemable anywhere. Break that fungibility and you do not have a global dollar with an EU license. You have an EU token that happens to share a name with one.

Frankfurt's nightmare scenario is specificThe ECB's objection is a run-dynamics argument, stated plainly in its November Financial Stability Review: when an EU entity and a third-country entity jointly issue a fungible coin, the EU issuer may hold "insufficient reserve assets under the supervision of EU authorities to fulfil the combined redemption requests." The ESRB's version, from the Reuters reporting that surfaced the fight last October: in a run, "investors will choose to redeem in the EU, since it has the strongest safeguards." Europe wrote the world's most protective redemption rights, and those rights make its reserves the run's front door. Global holders converge on the redemption window with the best guarantee, and the guarantee is Europe's.

It is a coherent scenario, and the counterargument is equally concrete: reserves can be sized and ring-fenced to EU circulation, issuers rebalance across entities in practice, and the EBA told Reuters in November that existing MiCA tools, applied with safeguards, can carry the risk. The Commission's spokesperson was blunter still: MiCA already provides "a robust and proportionate framework." Market authorities versus monetary authorities, competitiveness versus sovereignty, with the file sitting in Brussels.

The formal machinery behind the fight matters because it fixes the calendar. The systemic-risk board's recommendation, adopted in September and published in October, asked the Commission to act by the end of 2025; a Council working document circulated to member states argued MiCA "lacks dedicated tools" for the multi-issuer model. The Commission instead folded the question into its scheduled review, published the consultation in May, and its report is due by mid-2027 with legislation after. Deadlines, in Brussels, are a form of answer: the ECB asked for action in months and received a process measured in years.

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The asymmetry underneath the argumentWhat gives the fight its edge is how little Europe has built on its own side of it. All MiCA-compliant euro stablecoins together total about €674 million, growing fast but standing at roughly a fifth of one percent of the dollar-stablecoin market. Circle's USDC alone circulates $77 billion. The ECB counts dollar-denominated coins at 99% of all stablecoin supply. Nineteen authorized issuers operate under MiCA, and the volume that matters still runs through two American brands. Restricting multi-issuance would not conjure euro coins into existence. It would ring-fence the dollar coins Europeans already use, with consequences the Ledger Insights analysis states precisely: even ring-fenced, local reserves could be drained in a crisis as holders elsewhere rush to redeem, and a hard split invites the one outcome everyone claims to oppose, the same coin trading at different prices inside and outside the EU.

The register beneath the fight is modest either way: 19 authorized issuers of e-money tokens under MiCA as of March, issuing 29 tokens, with Circle's EURC, at $430 million, the largest euro coin. The euro complex is growing at triple-digit rates, which Brussels cites as vindication, from a base that rounds to zero against the dollar complex, which Frankfurt cites as the emergency. Both citations are accurate. A regime one year into operation is being renegotiated over a market share it never had time to win, because the currency at stake is the one Europe prints.

What a safeguarded settlement would mean in practice is already legible in the consultation's questions. An EU treasurer's USDC would redeem through EU-authorized platforms, making exchanges and custodians the border checkpoints; issuers would carry reserve-rebalancing duties sized to EU circulation, monitored by the EBA, whose staff has already sketched the liquid-asset expectations; and the third-country entity on the other side of the fungibility promise would need a home regime Brussels recognizes. Global coins would survive with more paperwork and a standing dependence on EU-US regulatory relations, which, for an instrument marketed as borderless, is its own kind of verdict.

Tether's absence frames the stakes from the other side. The largest stablecoin on earth skipped MiCA entirely, was delisted for EEA users by Binance in March 2025, and is still being removed from platforms, with Revolut dropping USDT for EU customers this month. MiCA already fenced out the coin that would not comply. The current fight is over the ones that did comply, which is why it stings: the issuers being threatened with ring-fencing are the regulation's own success stories. Circle's policy chief Patrick Hansen makes exactly that point about the review: it "does not signal MiCA's failure" but the scheduled maintenance of a young regime.

The digital euro is standing just offstageNo reading of this fight is complete without the project the ECB actually wants. In October the Governing Council put dates on the digital euro: a pilot in mid-2027 and first issuance in 2029, conditional on the legislation passing. Executive Board member Piero Cipollone's speeches braid the threads together explicitly, warning that dollar stablecoins could gain a foothold in European retail payments while pitching the digital euro as the European public option. Every warning about multi-issuance run risk doubles as an exhibit in the digital euro's case file. That does not make the warnings wrong. It does explain the enthusiasm with which they are delivered.

Cipollone's February speech in Rome made the linkage nearly explicit, warning that dollar stablecoins could gain a foothold in European retail payments while presenting the digital euro as the public option built on European infrastructure. His earlier catalogue of stablecoin risks, runs, fire sales of reserve assets, ran through the same speeches that advanced the digital euro timeline. The two files are formally separate and rhetorically inseparable, and every institution in the fight understands the choreography.

Where this landsThe formal path is now fixed: consultation closes August 31, the Commission's review report is due by mid-2027, legislation follows. The Parliament's lopsided vote signals where the political center sits, and the likely landing zone is visible in the consultation's own questions, multi-issuance preserved, wrapped in safeguards, reserve rebalancing obligations, redemption gates through EU-authorized platforms, perhaps equivalence requirements for the third countries involved. The Skadden reading of the options lists exactly those mechanics, and the consultation's own safeguard questions add third-country equivalence regimes, the tool the EU reaches for when it wants leverage over foreign supervisors. That would put Washington in the loop: a GENIUS-regulated US issuer wanting EU fungibility would need its home regime blessed by Brussels, the mirror image of the comparability determinations the GENIUS Act demands of foreign issuers. Two blocs, two rulebooks, each holding a key to the other's market, is where global stablecoin regulation was always going to land.

The technical question, who redeems what, where, in a run, is real, and answerable with arithmetic and ring-fencing. The political question underneath is harder: whether Europe can live with the dollar's private rails winning on European soil under a European rulebook. The GENIUS Act settled America's stablecoin fight in a summer. Europe, characteristically, has scheduled its own for 2027, and in the meantime every euro of growth in that €674 million tells Frankfurt time is not neutral. Fungibility will probably survive the review; a 390-to-86 Parliament and a Commission on record that MiCA suffices are hard to overturn with a scenario, however coherent. What fungibility now carries is a price tag, denominated in safeguards, reserve rebalancing duties, redemption gates, equivalence tests, and the invoice arrives with the 2027 legislation. Europe regulated stablecoins first and is discovering the sequel obligation: regulating first means renegotiating first, in public, with the market watching the drafting.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury has issued a notice of proposed rulemaking, soliciting public comments on the payment stablecoin regulatory framework under Section 3 of the GENIUS Act. Per the legislation, starting January 18, 2027, any individual issuing payment stablecoins in the U.S. must obtain a federal or state license; digital asset service providers are prohibited from offering foreign-issued payment stablecoins unless the foreign issuer has the technical capability to comply with U.S. laws and reciprocal arrangements. Starting July 18, 2028, all payment stablecoins that service providers offer or sell to persons within the U.S. must be issued by a licensed issuer. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated, “Trump and Congress passed the GENIUS Act, establishing a landmark framework and clear rules for payment stablecoins, and the Treasury is moving quickly to implement it.” The core of this proposed rule is to define the specific meanings of “issuing payment stablecoins in the U.S.” and “offering or selling to persons within the U.S.,” clarifying for the industry when a license is required and how to operate compliantly in the U.S. market. The public may submit comments within 60 days of the notice’s publication in the Federal Register. This rulemaking builds on a prior notice issued by the Treasury last September, marking the transition of stablecoin regulation from a framework act to the implementation of enforceable rules, which will directly impact the compliance paths of major stablecoin issuers including USDC and USDT, as well as trading platforms.

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Key Takeaways Petrobras Q2 earnings rose 168.8% as record production, stronger exports and Brent pricing boosted results.Petrobras hit record output of 3,336 MBOE/d as new units ramped up and operational efficiency improved.Petrobras generated $12.25B in operating cash flow, with 82% of $5.29B capex directed to upstream projects. Petroleo Brasileiro S.A., or Petrobras (PBR - Free Report) , reported second-quarter 2026 earnings per ADS of $1.72, up 168.8% from 64 cents a year ago and above the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.52. The 13.2% earnings surprise reflected stronger production, exports and Brent pricing.

Revenues jumped 59.8% year over year to $33,607 million and beat the $30,831 million consensus estimate by 9%. Total oil, NGL and natural gas production reached a record 3,336 thousand barrels of oil equivalent per day (MBOE/d). 

PBR Upstream Gains From Output and PricingExploration & Production revenues surged 58.2% year over year to $22,785 million. Segment net income attributable to Petrobras shareholders more than doubled to $8,250 million from $3,974 million, while adjusted EBITDA rose 77% to $15,874 million.

Brazil oil and NGL production climbed 15.2% to 2,689 MBOE/d. Growth reflected higher operational efficiency, the ramp-up of Maria Quitéria, Alexandre de Gusmão and P-78, and the start-up of P-79.  The strong upstream backdrop was also evident across major integrated peers. Chevron (CVX - Free Report) reported second-quarter production growth of more than 200,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day sequentially, while ExxonMobil Holdings (XOM - Free Report) achieved record Permian production of more than 1.8 million barrels of oil equivalent per day. 

Petrobras Refining Benefits From Higher ThroughputRefining, Transportation and Marketing revenues advanced 63.4% year over year to $32,351 million. Net income attributable to shareholders rose to $1,920 million from $217 million, and adjusted EBITDA increased to $3,562 million from $1,080 million.

Oil products output increased 10.9% to 1,918 thousand barrels per day, while refinery utilization reached a record 101.2%. Oil products imports fell to 67 thousand barrels per day, the lowest quarterly volume on record. Refining strength extended beyond Petrobras. Chevron recorded more than 1 million barrels per day of U.S. refinery throughput, while ExxonMobil posted record second-quarter diesel production as constrained global refining capacity supported margins. 

PBR Gas Unit Posts Higher ProfitabilityGas and Low Carbon Energies revenues increased 10.6% year over year to $2,406 million. Segment net income attributable to Petrobras shareholders rose to $190 million from $88 million, while adjusted EBITDA climbed 77.5% to $419 million.

Natural gas sales volume increased 7.1% to 45 million cubic meters per day. Petrobras also introduced a Brent-linked price band mechanism for natural gas contracts, setting minimum and maximum limits to reduce exposure to international price volatility.

Petrobras Profit Growth Outpaces Higher ExpensesConsolidated net income attributable to shareholders rose 120.3% year over year to $10,428 million. Net income excluding one-off events increased 170% to $11,073 million, while adjusted EBITDA excluding one-off events advanced 95.1% to $19,959 million. The reported income statement showed quarterly gross profit of $19,493 million.

Operating expenses increased to $5,240 million. Higher taxes related to crude oil exports and lower foreign-exchange gains partly offset stronger operating performance. Cost discipline remained an industry theme as well. Chevron reached $3 billion of structural cost reductions six months early, while ExxonMobil lifted cumulative structural cost savings since 2019 to $16.3 billion. 

PBR Cash Flow Supports Investment and Debt ReductionPetrobras generated $12,250 million of operating cash flow in the quarter as higher production and sales strengthened cash generation. Capital expenditures totaled $5,291 million, with 82% directed toward Exploration & Production projects.

The Rank #4 (Sell) company ended June with gross debt of $70,806 million and net debt of $60,388 million. Petrobras continues to prioritize production growth and capital discipline while advancing major projects. For comparison, Chevron generated $15,433 million of adjusted free cash flow in the quarter, while ExxonMobil reported $23,555 million of cash flow from operations, highlighting the strong cash-generation environment across large integrated energy producers.

You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

17.8.2026 16:22

Americký konglomerát Berkshire Hathaway a hedge fund Pershing Square Capital Management zveřejnily čtvrtletní zprávu 13F.

Berkshire Hathaway Americký konglomerát Berkshire Hathaway, v jehož čele stojí Greg Abel, pokračoval v nákupech akcií společnosti Alphabet, a to jak třídy C, tak třídy A. Akcií třídy C přikoupil 23,6 mil., přičemž celkově konglomerát drží 27,19 mil. akcií v hodnotě 9,61 mld. USD, což představuje 3,21% podíl v portfoliu.

Akcií Alphabetu třídy A přikoupil Berkshire Hathaway 24,54 mil. Počet držených akcií této třídy tak navýšil o 45,2 % na 78,79 mil. Celková hodnota akcií třídy A v portfoliu činila 28,16 mld. USD, což představuje 9,41% podíl v portfoliu.

Berkshire rovněž v uplynulém kvartálu pokračoval v nákupech akcií Macy's, Delta Air Lines, Lennar Corp. a The New York Times. Nově konglomerát nakoupil akcie rezidenční developerské společnosti D.R. Horton.

Naopak Berkshire prodal celou svou pozici ve společnosti Constellation Brands. Významně redukoval své pozice v Capital One Financial, Nucor a Kroger. Prodával rovněž akcie Ally Financial, Bank of America a DaVita.

Pershing Square Capital Hedgeový fond Pershing Square Capital Management, který vede Bill Ackman, nakupoval v průběhu 2Q akcie Howard Hughes Holdings, přičemž počet držených akcií této společnosti navýšil o 47,7 %. Hodnota celkové pozice činila na konci kvartálu 1,99 mld. USD.

Ackman v průběhu 2Q navýšil také pozici v Uberu, když přikoupil 4,37 mil. akcií. Uber se tak stal největší akciovou pozicí v portfoliu Pershing Square.

Pershing Square navyšoval rovněž své pozice ve společnostech Meta Platforms, Restaurant Brands International a Microsoft. Nově vstoupil do společností Visa, Mastercard, S&P Global a Netflix, do kterého se fond po dřívějším odprodeji své pozice vrátil.

Naopak Pershing Square prodal celé své pozice v Alphabetu, a to jak v akciích třídy A, tak třídy C. Fond rovněž redukoval své pozice ve společnostech Amazon, Brookfield a Hertz.

Zdroj: Dataroma

Jakub Němec, Fio banka, a.s.

David Tepper‘s latest portfolio update suggests the billionaire hedge fund manager is expanding his AI playbook beyond the industry’s familiar names.

While Appaloosa Management increased stakes in Nvidia Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA), Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Ltd. (NYSE:TSM), Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) and Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) (NASDAQ:GOOG) during the second quarter, its newest AI-related position was cloud infrastructure provider CoreWeave, Inc. (NASDAQ:CRWV), underscoring a growing focus on the companies powering artificial intelligence rather than just building it.

David Tepper Adds CoreWeave to Growing AI PortfolioAccording to Appaloosa Management’s latest Form 13F, Tepper initiated a new position in CoreWeave worth about $107.3 million during the second quarter. The fund also established a new stake in Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ:AVGO), another key supplier to AI infrastructure, while increasing existing holdings in Nvidia, TSMC, Amazon, Alphabet and Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META).

The filing shows Tepper’s AI exposure extends well beyond chip designers. CoreWeave, one of the largest providers of GPU cloud infrastructure for AI workloads, joins a portfolio that already includes semiconductor leaders, hyperscale cloud beneficiaries and companies supporting the computing backbone behind generative AI.

It’s worth noting that 13F filings are a snapshot of holdings as of June 30, 2026, and don’t reflect any portfolio changes Appaloosa may have made after the quarter ended.

Read Next

Tepper Rebalanced Within AI as He Trimmed Other Tech HoldingsThe new CoreWeave investment came alongside several notable portfolio adjustments. Appaloosa reduced its stakes in Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMD) and Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU), while exiting positions in Corning Inc (NYSE:GLW), Sandisk Corp (NASDAQ:SNDK) and Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) altogether.

The filing doesn’t explain Tepper’s investment rationale, and 13Fs don’t reveal when trades were made during the quarter or whether some positions serve as hedges. However, the disclosed holdings show capital moving toward a concentrated group of AI infrastructure leaders while several legacy technology positions were reduced or eliminated.

Outside technology, Tepper also initiated new positions in Boeing Co (NYSE:BA), American Airlines Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:AAL) and The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company (NASDAQ:GT), while exiting holdings including Lyft, Inc. (NASDAQ:LYFT), JD.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:JD), PDD Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PDD), RTX Corp (NYSE:RTX), UnitedHealth Group Inc (NYSE:UNH) and Ball Corp (NYSE:BALL).

The number of disclosed holdings fell from 31 to 27 even as the reported portfolio value increased to approximately $7.7 billion from $5.9 billion, reflecting a more concentrated portfolio.

What Investors Should Watch NextCoreWeave’s addition is notable not because it is Appaloosa’s largest new position, but because it broadens Tepper’s exposure to a critical layer of the AI ecosystem. Investors should watch whether future filings show Appaloosa building on that position or whether the fund continues consolidating capital around companies tied to AI computing infrastructure as enterprise demand for AI capacity grows.

Read Next

Photo: PJ McDonnell / Shutterstock

© 2026 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.

PagSeguro Digital NYSE: PAGS reported second-quarter results marked by continued growth in banking engagement, credit balances and deposits, while management said it maintained its full-year targets despite a more challenging macroeconomic environment and elevated interest rates in Brazil.

Total payment volume reached BRL 133 billion, up 3% from a year earlier, which Principal Executive Officer Ricardo Dutra said reinforced a gradual reacceleration trend. Net revenue and income excluding interchange fees totaled BRL 3.4 billion, up 2% year over year and 1% sequentially. Recurring non-GAAP net income rose 2% to BRL 576 million, while diluted non-GAAP earnings per share increased 10% to BRL 2.06.

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“We continued to increase client engagement while expanding our multi-product ecosystem across payments, banking and credit,” Dutra said, adding that the company’s profitability remained resilient despite a difficult macroeconomic backdrop.

Banking engagement and product adoption increase Chief Executive Officer Carlos Mauad said PagBank continued to deepen its relationship with active customers through payments, banking and credit offerings. Cash-in volumes excluding acquiring-related inflows rose 23% year over year and 19% from the first quarter to nearly BRL 100 billion.

Cash-active banking clients reached 5.7 million, an increase of 27% from the prior-year period. Bill payments and Pix transactions increased 12% year over year. Investment penetration among active clients increased to 28% from 23%, while insurance penetration rose to 16% from 11%.

Credit-product penetration, excluding payroll clients, increased from 4% to 6%. Mauad said the broader adoption of financial products supports engagement, monetization and customer lifetime value.

The company also highlighted product launches and planned rollouts, including Minizinha Voz, a payment terminal with an AI-powered sales assistant; cashback on international credit card transactions; private payroll loans; Pix Finance, an installment-payment solution; zero-fee investments; pension plans; collections-management tools; and insurance products.

Credit expansion continues with asset quality below market average PagBank’s total credit portfolio reached BRL 5.1 billion, up 31% year over year. The company said growth was driven primarily by working-capital loans and credit cards. Working-capital balances grew 204% to BRL 600 million, while credit-card balances rose 35% to BRL 1.1 billion. Payroll loans and other credit products totaled BRL 3.4 billion, up 18%.

Including financial operations linked to merchant prepayments, PagBank’s expanded credit portfolio was BRL 52.4 billion, up 9% year over year and 3% sequentially.

Nonperforming loans more than 90 days past due stood at 3.4%, below the 6.2% Brazilian market average cited by management. Mauad said the company remains confident in its long-term credit strategy, even as macroeconomic conditions have become tougher than anticipated earlier in the year.

Management said working-capital origination slowed during the second quarter because PagBank deployed a new credit model and waited to assess its initial loan cohorts. July production subsequently reached about BRL 80 million, above the second-quarter average and prior-quarter averages. The company said it had also begun originating private payroll loans outside its economic group, starting with higher-credit-quality borrowers.

PagBank said it was not seeing deterioration across its credit products and did not identify a major impact from Brazil’s second Desenrola debt-renegotiation program.

Funding costs decline as capital returns continue Total deposits reached nearly BRL 43 billion, up 15% from a year earlier, while total funding rose 10% to BRL 47 billion. More than 90% of deposits were generated on the company’s platform, according to management.

Chief Financial Officer Gustavo Sechin said PagBank recorded its ninth consecutive quarter of funding-cost reductions as a percentage of CDI. Financial costs declined 5% from the first quarter, despite still-elevated Selic rates. He said the company expects more favorable comparisons in financial expenses during the second half, although its prior assumption for year-end Selic of about 12.5% is now closer to a range of 13.75% to 14%.

Gross profit was approximately BRL 2 billion, up 3% year over year and 6% sequentially. Total losses increased 9% year over year, reflecting the expansion and changing mix of the credit portfolio. Operating expenses represented 25.9% of revenue and income excluding interchange fees.

Management said it is pursuing additional efficiency through process redesign, automation, AI applications in customer service and back-office functions, and improved management of point-of-sale terminals. Sechin said the company aims to grow expenses below revenue growth, or at least below inflation, rather than forecasting an absolute expense reduction.

PagBank’s annualized non-GAAP return on equity was 15.6%, up 30 basis points year over year. Its adjusted Basel ratio declined to 22.5% from 24.1% in the first quarter, moving closer to its long-term target range of 18% to 22%.

Over the past 12 months, the company returned about BRL 2 billion to shareholders through dividends and buybacks. PagBank completed its third repurchase program during the first half, repurchasing more than BRL 307 million of shares. A third dividend tranche of $0.28 per common share is scheduled for payment on Sept. 30 to shareholders of record on Sept. 16.

Sechin said the company currently favors dividends as a more predictable capital-return tool, while noting that buybacks could still be used in the future. Management said its 2026 EPS outlook does not assume additional repurchases this year.

PagBank also announced the appointment of Enrique Fragata as chief operating officer. Mauad said Fragata’s experience in financial services would support the company’s focus on execution, efficiency and operational excellence.

About PagSeguro Digital (NYSE:PAGS)PagSeguro Digital Ltd. is a Brazil-based financial technology company that specializes in digital payment solutions for merchants and consumers. Through its online platform and a suite of physical point-of-sale devices, the company enables businesses of all sizes to accept credit and debit cards, process e-commerce transactions, and manage payments via QR codes and digital wallets. In addition to payment acceptance, PagSeguro offers prepaid accounts, funds transfers, and working-capital credit lines designed to support small and medium-sized enterprises.

The company's product portfolio includes portable card readers, countertop terminals, and mobile point-of-sale devices that connect via Bluetooth or cellular networks.

This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to [email protected].

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Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - August 17, 2026) - Kuya Silver Corporation (CSE: KUYA) (OTCQB: KUYAF) (FSE: 6MR1) (the "Company" or "Kuya Silver") is pleased to announce financial and operating results for the six months ending June 30, 2026.

The Company maintained a strong cash position of $25.5 million as at June 30, 2026, providing a solid financial foundation to support its exploration program, mine development initiatives including the construction of the new ramp required to support Bethania's Phase 1 ramp-up to 350 tonnes per day.

The Company's revenue increased significantly to $2.7 million during the first six months ended June 30, 2026, compared to $1.3 million in the comparable period of 2025, reflecting increased silver production from the Bethania operation in addition to the positive effect higher silver prices. Revenue for the quarter was $1.25 million.

Exploration and evaluation expenditures were $1.0 million during the first six months of 2026, compared to $1.3 million in the comparable period of 2025. Expenditures at Bethania remained broadly consistent year over year, while expenditures at Silver Kings decreased as the Company continues to evaluate low-cost opportunities to unlock the project's potential. Exploration and evaluation expenditures are expected to increase during the second half of 2026 as the expanded drilling program commences and Bethania advances critical infrastructure development and ramp-up activities.

The Company recorded a net loss of $2.8 million for the six months ended June 30, 2026, compared to $1.35 million in the same period of 2025. The larger net loss primarily reflects expenses related to significantly greater activity levels at Bethania associated with the ramp-up, together with increased administrative expenses as the Company continues to build the organizational structure and capabilities required to support its growing operations. The increase was partially offset by higher revenue from Bethania and lower exploration and evaluation expenditures.

Camila Plant Acquisition Update

The Company continues to the Company continues to evaluate the proposed acquisition and expects to provide a further update in due course.

Outlook

Kuya Silver continues the process to onboard contractors at the Bethania mine to augment its workforce, which is expected to accelerate both mine development and underground drilling productivity in Q3 2026, continuing for the remainder of the year and into 2027. In the near term, the mine team has initiated a focused development program, allocating additional resources to unlock mineralized material for mining later this year and into 2027.

Upcoming Conference Call Webinar

Kuya Silver will host a conference call webinar taking place on Monday, August 17th at 9:00 am ET / 6:00 am PT. During the event, Kuya management will provide an in-depth overview of Q2 2026 financial results, cover recent news on the Silver Kings project and provide a market update on operations at the Bethania Project. A live Q&A will follow the presentation.

Register: https://6ix.com/event/kuya-silver-reports-q2-2026-financial-results-advances-bethania-and-drilling

A replay of the webinar will be made available later that day through the same link.

National Instrument 43-101 Disclosure

The technical content of this news release has been reviewed and approved by Osbaldo Zamora, PhD., P.Geo., Vice President Exploration with Kuya Silver, Qualified Persons as defined by National Instrument 43-101.

About Kuya Silver Corporation

Kuya Silver is a Canadian‐based, growth-oriented mining company with a focus on silver. Kuya Silver operates the Bethania silver mine in Peru, while developing district-scale silver projects in mining-friendly jurisdictions including Peru and Canada.

Reader Advisory

This news release contains statements that constitute "forward-looking information," including statements regarding the plans, intentions, beliefs, and current expectations of the Company, its directors, or its officers with respect to the future business activities of the Company. The words "may," "would," "could," "will," "intend," "plan," "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "expect," "must," "next," "propose," "new," "potential," "prospective," "target," "future," "verge," "favorable," "implications," and "ongoing," and similar expressions, as they relate to the Company or its management, are intended to identify such forward-looking information. Investors are cautioned that statements including forward-looking information are not guarantees of future business activities and involve risks and uncertainties, and that the Company's future business activities may differ materially from those described in the forward-looking information as a result of various factors, including but not limited to fluctuations in market prices, successes of the operations of the Company, continued availability of capital and financing, and general economic, market, and business conditions. There can be no assurances that such forward-looking information will prove accurate, and therefore, readers are advised to rely on their own evaluation of the risks and uncertainties. The Company does not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking information except as required under the applicable securities laws.

Neither the Canadian Securities Exchange nor the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/309739

Source: Kuya Silver Corporation

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Key Takeaways Astera Labs posted 104% revenue growth as PCIe 6 products surpassed half of total revenue.Arista Networks surpassed 100 AI fabric customers as Ethernet-based AI infrastructure expands.Both companies expect strong 2026 growth, with ALAB and ANET seeing improving earnings estimates. The rapid expansion of AI infrastructure has created a strong opportunity for companies that supply computing and networking systems required to develop AI models. Moreover, AI infrastructure is moving toward faster links, larger accelerator clusters and more complex rack-scale topologies, significantly expanding connectivity content opportunity.

Here, we recommend two stocks — Astera Labs Inc. (ALAB - Free Report) and Arista Networks Inc. (ANET - Free Report) — from these spaces for investment in 2026. The stocks currently sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) each. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

The chart below shows the price performance of our two picks year to date.

Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

Astera Labs Inc.Astera Labs develops semiconductor-based connectivity solutions tailored for cloud and AI infrastructure. ALAB is benefiting from surging demand for PCIe (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express) solutions, particularly as AI infrastructure investments accelerate globally.  

In the second quarter of 2026, ALAB reported record revenues of $392.4 million, up 104% year over year, with PCIe 6 products representing more than 50% of total revenues compared with 33% in the first quarter. This growth is driven by the adoption of its Scorpio AI Fabric Switches and Aries Retimers, which are critical for high-speed, low-latency connectivity in hyperscale data centers and AI clusters.

Diversified Product PortfolioIn the last quarter, Aries signal conditioning products reached record quarterly revenue, while Taurus grew across AI and general-purpose platforms. Management expects the transition to continue as PCIe 6 adoption broadens and 800-gig Ethernet deployments expand along with next-generation 200-gig per lane solutions.

High-radix Scorpio X-Series is entering volume production with an initial customer, while additional X-Series customers are expected to begin revenue shipments by year-end. Scorpio P-Series is also expanding across hyperscalers and AI infrastructure providers, with several programs expected to ramp more materially in 2027. 

ALAB  expects future Scorpio X-Series content to exceed $1,000 per XPU as next-generation systems adopt more complex switching topologies, larger clusters and higher bandwidth. Hypercast and In-Network Compute also deepen COSMOS integration within customers’ AI fabrics.

Astera Labs’ COSMOS software platform, which enables dynamic traffic shaping and real-time performance management, adds a layer of differentiation by making its hardware solutions more integrated and stickier for customers. 

The company is also investing in optical interconnects, with plans to deliver near-packaged optics and co-packaged optics solutions in 2027 and beyond, unlocking new multi-billion-dollar market opportunities.

Strong OutlookFor the third quarter of 2026, revenues are expected to be between $540 million and $560 million. The midpoint implies sequential growth of approximately 40%. Management projects non-GAAP earnings between $1.16 and $1.21 per share. Non-GAAP gross margin and operating margin are projected to be approximately 72% and 43%.

Solid Estimate RevisionsAstera Labs has an expected revenue and earnings growth rate of more than 100%, each, for the current year. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the current year’s earnings has improved 33.7% over the last 30 days. 

ALAB has an expected revenue and earnings growth rate of 60.9% and 56.9%, respectively, for the next year. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for next year’s earnings has improved 53.6% over the last 30 days. 

Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

Robust Price Upside PotentialThe short-term average price target of brokerage firms represents an increase of 32.1% from the last closing price of $321.61. The brokerage target price is currently in the range of $310-$500. This indicates a maximum upside of 55.5% and a downside of mere 3.6%.

Arista Networks Inc.Arista Networks provides cloud networking solutions for data centers and cloud computing environments. The company offers 10/25/40/50/100 Gigabit Ethernet switches and routers optimized for next-generation data center networks.

ANET strengthens its position in AI networking as enterprises and hyperscale customers expand Ethernet-based AI infrastructure. During the second quarter of 2026, the company exceeded 100 cumulative AI fabric customers using Etherlink switches, compared with only a handful of early adopters in 2024.

The new 7060XE7 family introduces 1.6-terabit platforms with liquid-cooled options, while Smart System Upgrade, Multipath Reliable Connection and SRv6 enhance AI cluster efficiency and utilization. These developments reinforce ANET’s long-term competitive position as AI networking architectures become increasingly Ethernet-centric.

Broad Product PortfolioArista Networks broaden its networking portfolio to address evolving AI, cloud and enterprise infrastructure requirements. ANET now offers switching platforms spanning traditional Ethernet deployments through emerging 1.6-terabit AI fabrics while expanding liquid-cooled networking solutions for next-generation data centers.

ANET expand its software platform beyond cloud data centers through automation, campus networking, routing and AI networking capabilities. The company's unified EOS architecture enables programmable networking across client, campus, cloud and AI environments while supporting advanced routing, observability and operational automation.

Strong OutlookFor the third quarter of 2026, management expects revenues to be approximately $3.3 billion, driven by healthy growth momentum and solid demand trends. Non-GAAP operating margin is expected to be 48-49%, and non-GAAP earnings per share are expected to be between $1.06 and $1.08. Management also expects AI revenue to reach at least $3.6 billion in 2026, supported by scale-up, scale-out and scale-across deployments.

Solid Estimate RevisionsArista Networks has an expected revenue and earnings growth rate of 37.7% 35.6%, respectively, for the current year. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the current year’s earnings has improved 11.3% over the last 30 days. 

ANET has an expected revenue and earnings growth rate of 25.4% and 23.4%, respectively, for the next year. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for next year’s earnings has improved 13.7% over the last 30 days. 

Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

Impressive Price Upside PotentialThe short-term average price target of brokerage firms represents an increase of 20.7% from the last closing price of $198.82. The brokerage target price is currently in the range of $179.15-$289. This indicates a maximum upside of 45.3% and a downside of mere 9.9%.

Apple has received a bullish upgrade from Rothschild & Co Redburn, with analysts pointing to the company’s planned entry into the foldable smartphone market and a potential shift in its artificial intelligence strategy.

Redburn upgraded Apple to Buy from Neutral and raised its price target to $400 from $260.

The new target implies a 31% upside from Apple’s Friday closing price of $305.93.

Analysts led by Timm Schulze-Melander expect Apple to launch a foldable iPhone in September and forecast sales of 14 million iPhone Ultra units in fiscal 2027.

Of those, only around 4 million are expected to represent sales cannibalised from existing iPhone models.

The broker estimates the device will be priced at $2,199, representing an 83% premium to the iPhone 17 Pro Max.

Redburn believes Apple has a history of reshaping markets when it enters new product categories.

AirPods and the Apple Watch, for example, captured an estimated 65%-75% of incremental unit growth in their respective markets following their launches.

The analysts expect the foldable iPhone to lift Apple’s iPhone average selling price by 11% by June 2027.

Apple’s artificial intelligence efforts remain a concern, however, with Redburn describing its Apple Intelligence strategy as disappointing so far.

The company is relying on a customised version of Google’s Gemini model for some AI features, including the revamped Siri.

Apple reportedly pays Google around $1 billion annually for access to the model, while Google pays Apple about $27.5 billion a year for search placement across its devices.

Redburn believes Apple could reduce its dependence on Google by adopting open-source AI models, potentially in collaboration with Nvidia. The analysts described the potential approach as “Fast Follower 2.0”.

Nvidia’s Nemotron models could offer performance comparable to leading closed models, according to the analysts, although they acknowledged that relations between Apple and Nvidia have historically been strained.

An open-source approach could give Apple greater flexibility while reducing the costs and risks associated with developing frontier AI models internally.

Risks remain for the bullish caseRedburn forecasts Apple’s iPhone revenue to be 3%-14% above consensus estimates between fiscal 2026 and 2030.

Its overall earnings forecasts are 8%-18% above consensus by fiscal 2030.

However, delays to the foldable iPhone, problems with display crease visibility, and questions over hinge durability could undermine the investment case.

Consumer demand is another uncertainty.

A 2023 CNET survey found that 64% of respondents did not want a foldable handset, although a more recent Forbes survey found 61% said Apple’s entry would immediately increase their confidence in the category.

IDC analysts expect global foldable smartphone sales to rise 19% if Apple launches its foldable iPhone in 2026, with the company potentially capturing about 24% of the global market.

Uber is investing in, and partnering with, drone delivery company Zipline with the goal of making one million deliveries per day using the startup’s drones by the end of 2029.

Zipline drones will make the first deliveries on the Uber Eats platform by the end of this year, the companies said on Monday. These deliveries will start in Zipline’s existing markets, and the companies want to expand into “dozens of U.S. cities.”

The companies didn’t disclose the investment amount.

Uber has been taking on multiple drone delivery partners as it looks for ways to keep growing Uber Eats. The ride-hail giant is replicating the early business model it’s adopted for robotaxis and other services built around autonomous vehicles, which is to essentially bring as many companies on to its platform as possible.

This approach has helped Uber stay at the forefront of these new technologies despite selling off its own programs like the aerial ride-sharing service, Uber Elevate, and Uber Autonomous Technologies Group, which was working on autonomous vehicles. Investments have been a huge part of the strategy, with Uber committing more than $10 billion to dozens of autonomous vehicle providers.

The strategy is not a panacea, though. Uber recently clashed with one of its highest-profile partners so far, Waymo, and the companies are now expected to walk away from each other when their contracts expire in 2028. Uber and Waymo are also on different sides of a growing fight over autonomous vehicle regulation.

The ride-hail giant had tested the waters of drone delivery when it still had its Elevate division. The company dipped back into the idea late last year when it announced a partnership with Israeli startup Flytrex, which also came with a minor investment.

Uber thinks Zipline’s drones can fulfill orders on Uber Eats within five to ten minutes. “Truly quick commerce is proving to be an even bigger market than the original food market was,” Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi told the Wall Street Journal in an interview. “We think this can be an enormous tailwind for the next leg of growth for Eats.”

Zipline, based in San Francisco, recently closed an extended Series H funding round of $800 million, pushing its valuation to $7.6 billion.

“Every great transportation revolution has changed where people live, how businesses operate, and how economies grow,” Zipline co-founder Keller Cliffton said in a statement. “Together with Uber, we’re taking the next step toward building a world where getting what you need is as fast and effortless as sending a text, no matter where you are.”

When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence.

Sean O’Kane is a reporter who has spent a decade covering the rapidly-evolving business and technology of the transportation industry, including Tesla and the many startups chasing Elon Musk. Most recently, he was a reporter at Bloomberg News where he helped break stories about some of the most notorious EV SPAC flops. He previously worked at The Verge, where he also covered consumer technology, hosted many short- and long-form videos, performed product and editorial photography, and once nearly passed out in a Red Bull Air Race plane.

You can contact or verify outreach from Sean by emailing [email protected] or via encrypted message at okane.01 on Signal.

Key Takeaways Microsoft surpassed 30 million paid Copilot seats, with additions more than doubling sequentially.E7 adoption supports seat expansion and higher average revenue per user.Microsoft 365 Commercial seats grew 6% year over year, supporting cloud revenue growth. Microsoft (MSFT - Free Report) continues to strengthen its enterprise productivity franchise as adoption of Microsoft 365 Copilot expands across its commercial customer base. The opportunity is shifting beyond initial deployments. Broader seat adoption and deeper integration across enterprise workflows could support longer-term growth. It could also increase the stickiness of Microsoft 365 within organizations.

Premium SKU adoption is adding another growth avenue. Microsoft’s E7 offering combines Copilot, E5, Entra and Agent 365. Early adoption suggests growing interest in integrated AI and security capabilities. Hundreds of enterprise customers had purchased millions of E7 seats within two months of its launch. This supports both seat expansion and higher average revenue per user as customers move toward premium offerings.

Paid Microsoft 365 Copilot seats exceeded 30 million in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2026, while net paid seat additions more than doubled sequentially. Paid Microsoft 365 Commercial seats grew 6% year over year, indicating continued expansion of the installed base. Premium offerings, including Copilot, E5 and E7, also supported average revenue per user growth

However, lower average revenue per user from new frontline and small and medium-sized business seats could temper the near-term benefit from higher seat volumes. Still, continued Copilot adoption and premium SKU expansion could support Microsoft 365 Commercial cloud growth, with revenue growth expected to accelerate through fiscal 2027.

How MSFT Is Placed Against PeersMicrosoft faces competition from Alphabet (GOOGL - Free Report) and Salesforce (CRM - Free Report) in the enterprise AI productivity space. Alphabet continues to push Gemini integration across Google Workspace, targeting similar seat-based monetization among business customers. Salesforce has positioned Agentforce as its core enterprise AI agent offering, competing for budget allocated toward AI-driven workflow tools. While Alphabet benefits from broad Workspace penetration and Salesforce brings deep CRM integration, Microsoft's advantage lies in bundling Copilot across its existing Office and Windows installed base. This scale advantage, alongside E7 adoption, could help Microsoft sustain seat growth even as Alphabet and Salesforce intensify competitive positioning in enterprise AI tools.

MSFT’s Share Price Performance, Valuation & EstimatesMSFT shares have appreciated 2.5% in the year-to-date (YTD) period against the Zacks Computer – Software industry’s decline of 4.2%. The Zacks Computer and Technology sector has appreciated 19% in the same time frame.

MSFT’s YTD Price Performance
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

From a valuation standpoint, MSFT stock appears overvalued, trading at a forward 12-month price/earnings ratio of 24.68X, higher than the industry’s 23.13X. MSFT has a Value Score of D.

MSFT’s Valuation
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research

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McDonald’s (NYSE:MCD | MCD Price Prediction) currently trades at $272.83, well below the Wall Street consensus price target of $316.06. That gap works out to roughly 15.85% implied upside.

The world’s largest quick-service restaurant operator runs a 46,028-unit global system through a highly franchised model that produces operating margins near 46.5% and strong free cash flow. The stock is a Dow blue chip that dividend investors treat as defensive, so a slide of this size gets Wall Street’s attention.

One outlier has gone further. Tigress Financial’s Ivan Feinseth carries a $390 target, the highest active call on the Street, implying nearly 43% upside from here.

A Sharp U.S. Execution Miss Broke the Uptrend The catalyst was a rough Q2 26 earnings report. Global comparable sales decelerated to 1.3% from 3.8% a year earlier, U.S. comparable guest counts turned negative, and comps in China and France went red. Revenue of $7.10 billion missed the $7.13 billion consensus, and while EPS of $3.38 beat by 1.77%, SG&A surged 17%.

CEO Chris Kempczinski owned the problem, telling investors, “We don’t have a strategy problem. We simply didn’t execute at the level we needed to in the second quarter.” He pinned roughly two-thirds of the U.S. traffic miss on a botched rollout of the 10 items for under $3 EDAP menu, saying “call it a third of the system that did not execute against what we were guiding around” on pricing.

Shares are off 14.54% from the February 2026 peak near $319 and sit below both the 50-day and 200-day moving averages.

Why Tigress Financial Still Sees $390 Feinseth raised his target to $390 from $385. His thesis leans on the “Accelerating the Arches” strategy: physical unit expansion paired with digital modernization, a capital-light franchise engine with gross margins near 57%, and 50 consecutive years of dividend increases underpinning the story.

The digital flywheel is the operative catalyst. Loyalty scale hit roughly 220 million 90-day active users, driving over $40 billion in trailing-twelve-month systemwide sales across 70 markets. That is the raw material for AI-driven personalization, drive-thru optimization, and higher-frequency repeat visits.

Fixes are in motion. Skye Anderson, promoted to President of McDonald’s USA, drove 30%+ comp growth across the West Zone in her prior role. The new beverage platform is running 50% above the average check in launch markets. On October 5th, management retrains 2 million+ restaurant crew on service standards.

The broader Street is more cautious. Ratings split 4 Strong Buy, 14 Buy, 15 Hold, 1 Sell, and recent updates have been reiterations rather than fresh upgrades. The 50,000-unit goal slipped from 2027 to 2028. Even the bulls need U.S. traffic to inflect.

Peers Held Up While McDonald’s Slid Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX) trades near $107.69 against a $112.23 average target, roughly 4.2% upside. The Back to Starbucks turnaround produced 7.9% comps last quarter.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) sits at $148.11 with a $173.38 target and about 17.1% upside. Taco Bell drove 7% Q2 comps and Pizza Hut is being divested.

Restaurant Brands International (NYSE:QSR) trades at $77.64 versus an $85.65 target, roughly 10.3% upside. Burger King’s Reclaim the Flame plan drove 8.5% U.S. comps.

The largest implied upside in the cluster sits with MCD, whether you take the 15.85% consensus or the 43% Tigress outlier. Peers are priced fairly. MCD is the dislocated name.

The Numbers Behind the Dislocation McDonald’s trades at $272.83 against a consensus target of $316.06 from 34 covering analysts, implying 15.85% upside. Tigress Financial’s $390 outlier implies roughly 43%. The stock is off 9.63% year to date and 9.55% over the trailing year, while the S&P 500 has gained 13.85% YTD.

Analyst ratings:

Strong Buy: 4 Buy: 14 Hold: 15 Sell: 1 MCD trades at a P/E of 23 with a 2.65% dividend yield and a free cash flow yield near 3.72%. Fundamentals are intact. Sentiment has done the moving.

My Take: Constructive, But Watch the U.S. Traffic Line The bull case holds if you believe Skye Anderson can restore U.S. execution within two or three quarters, the beverage platform scales as Germany suggests, and the October retraining tightens service enough to bring guest counts back. That is the path to the consensus target and, if traffic reaccelerates, toward Feinseth’s $390.

The bear case builds if you think the negative U.S. guest counts and stubborn China and France weakness are structural rather than execution-driven. Comps halving from 3.8% to 1.3% in one quarter is a red flag, and the slipped 50,000-unit target is a soft admission. If the QSR consumer is broken, loyalty scale alone will not rescue the multiple.

I lean cautiously constructive. Fundamentals justify the consensus target more than the current price, but Tigress’s $390 call requires clean U.S. execution snapback, and Q2 gave the market a real reason to doubt it.

Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.

Williams Puts a Price on ProofDominic Williams, founder of DFINITY and President and Chief Scientist of the DFINITY Foundation, has offered a bounty of 7,500 $ICP to anyone who can produce verified evidence that online critics of the Internet Computer token are being paid to post negative commentary. Williams framed the reward as intentionally generous, suggesting it would exceed whatever the alleged posters were paid to spread criticism in the first place.

The offer came in direct response to a widely circulated claim that a $10,000 investment in $ICP made five years ago would today be worth just $29. The implication was clear: the token's long-term price performance has been severe enough to attract sustained public backlash, and Williams appears determined to reframe at least some of that backlash as coordinated rather than organic.

A Token With a Long ShadowThe criticism Williams is pushing back against is rooted in numbers that are hard to dispute. According to CoinGecko, $ICP reached an all-time high of $700.65 and is now trading roughly 99.70% below that peak. The token briefly traded above $700 shortly after its 2021 launch before collapsing as early investors exited and liquidity thinned, setting the stage for a prolonged downtrend that has persisted across multiple market cycles.

Despite that backdrop, DFINITY has been pushing new initiatives aimed at reversing the token's fortunes. Dominic Williams published the Mission 70 white paper in January 2026, which proposes reducing $ICP inflation by at least 70% by the end of the year. The white paper estimates that proposed changes would cut annual token creation from 9.72% to 5.42%. The plan combines supply-side cuts to voting rewards and node provider incentives with demand-side growth driven by the Caffeine AI platform, which burns ICP tokens as users build applications on the network.

Whether the bounty itself changes the conversation around $ICP remains to be seen. For now, it signals that Williams is taking the reputational battle around his project seriously, even as the token continues to trade far below the levels that defined its early days.

Sources:
Internet Computer (ICP) Price and Market Data, CoinGecko
Mission 70 White Paper, DFINITY / Internet Computer

Plan balances reliability, diverse resources and costs while helping communities in the Carolinas continue to build robust economies Near-term actions serve our customers' rising energy needs while keeping customer benefits, value and future optionality central to resource planning , /PRNewswire/ -- South Carolina is one of the fastest-growing states in the nation, attracting new residents, major employers and billions of dollars in economic investment. Meeting the state's energy needs requires a reliable energy system that can support thriving communities while keeping costs as low as possible for customers.

Duke Energy's 2026 Carolinas Resource Plan – submitted Aug. 14 to the Public Service Commission of South Carolina (PSCSC) – reflects execution already underway and highlights new opportunities to power South Carolina's future.

The strategy is designed to maximize the value of existing assets while making prudent investments in additional diverse resources needed to serve the state's growing population and economy. Through an execution-informed planning approach, Duke Energy will continue adjusting to changing conditions while maintaining its focus on delivering safe, reliable and affordable energy for Palmetto State customers. Our view: "South Carolina's success depends on having the energy infrastructure in place to support new residents, new businesses and new or expanding industries," said Tim Pearson, Duke Energy's South Carolina president. "We've made significant progress executing the strategy outlined in previous resource plans, and this updated roadmap builds on that momentum and details the additional actions we need to take now to keep the Carolinas powered reliably and affordably as the region grows."

A plan for South Carolina: Consistent with previous resource plans and supportive of South Carolina energy policy goals under the 2025 Energy Security Act (Act 41), the latest plan advances new generation, new energy storage and renewables opportunities, evaluates future nuclear generation options, maximizes energy efficiency and maintains flexibility to adapt as customer needs, technology and market conditions evolve.

What's in the plan?

Key elements include:

Natural Gas: Natural gas is a major near-term reliability resource, with efficiency upgrades completed, multiple combined cycle (CC)/combustion turbine (CT) projects advancing, approval for a 1,400 megawatt (MW) new combined cycle facility in Anderson County secured, and turbine supply agreements executed with delivery beginning from GE Vernova in Greenville. Storage: The company is scaling battery storage execution, with storage projects in service, equipment secured, interconnection activity underway, and an RFP for 400 MW of standalone storage in South Carolina. Solar: Solar procurement and construction remain active, including completed facilities, projects under construction, and RFPs for solar and solar paired with storage. Nuclear: Existing nuclear assets continue to be maximized through license renewals, uprates, and fuel-cycle work, while the company evaluates potential new nuclear options and considers sites in Cherokee County, S.C., and Stokes County, N.C. Grid Edge: Grid Edge programs are treated as a core execution tool to reduce, shift, and shape demand through energy efficiency, demand-side management, load curtailment, customer programs, and storage demand response. To explore more details of the 2026 Carolinas Resource Plan, visit duke-energy.com/CarolinasResourcePlan.

Our view: "As South Carolina continues to grow, we're continuing our investment not only in new energy resources, but also in programs and technologies that help customers use energy more efficiently and save money," Pearson said. "From energy-efficiency programs to demand-response initiatives and our grid modernization strategy, this plan provides customers with more value while ensuring we have the reliable energy infrastructure needed to support the state's future."

Maximizing value for customers: Duke Energy continues to use every tool available to manage costs for our customers while delivering the high quality of service they expect.

Through its proposed resource mix, the company is maximizing the value that tax credits provide customers and finalizing the recently approved combination of Duke Energy Carolinas and Duke Energy Progress – efforts that together will deliver more than $5 billion in cost-saving benefits to the customers and communities the company serves. Duke Energy has also applied for loans from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) that represent potentially billions of dollars in customer savings as the company strengthens the electric grid. What's next: The PSCSC will hold a hearing on the resource plan in April 2027 and issue an order by June 2027. 

Duke Energy Carolinas
Duke Energy Carolinas, a subsidiary of Duke Energy, owns 20,800 megawatts of energy capacity, supplying electricity to 2.9 million residential, commercial and industrial customers across a 24,000-square-mile service area in North Carolina and South Carolina. 

Duke Energy Progress
Duke Energy Progress, a subsidiary of Duke Energy, owns 13,800 megawatts of energy capacity, supplying electricity to 1.8 million residential, commercial and industrial customers across a 28,000-square-mile service area in North Carolina and South Carolina.

Duke Energy
Duke Energy (NYSE: DUK), a Fortune 150 company headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., is one of America's largest energy holding companies. The company's electric utilities serve 8.7 million customers in North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, Indiana, Ohio and Kentucky, and collectively own 55,700 megawatts of energy capacity. Its natural gas utilities serve 1.6 million customers in North Carolina, South Carolina, Ohio and Kentucky.

Duke Energy is executing an energy modernization strategy, keeping customer value at the forefront as it invests in electric grid upgrades and efficient generation resources to strengthen the system and serve growing energy needs.

More information is available at duke-energy.com. Follow Duke Energy on X, LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok and Facebook for stories about the people and innovations powering its communities.

Media Contact: Ryan Mosier

24-Hour: 800.559.3853

SOURCE Duke Energy

11h35 ▪ 7 min read ▪ by Luc Jose A.

Summarize this article with:

Rarity could soon no longer be the exclusive domain of bitcoin. According to projections published by Grayscale, the annual growth of Ethereum and Solana supply could fall below gold’s 1.8% by 2031. Indeed, several reforms are currently being debated, including EIP-8361 on Ethereum and SIMD-0550 and SIMD-0553 on Solana. If adopted, ETH’s annual inflation could drop to 0.4%, compared to 1.1% for SOL. This development is likely to reshuffle the cards between rarity, staking yield, and valuation of these two cryptos.

In brief According to a Grayscale study, new technical proposals could reduce Ethereum’s annual inflation to 0.4% and Solana’s to 1.1%, making them rarer than physical gold. The EIP-8361 proposal plans to burn an increasing share of validator rewards as staking increases, bringing ETH issuance back to Bitcoin’s level. By doubling the emission reduction rate via the SIMD-0550 proposal, Solana considerably accelerates its path to a tightly capped supply. Although this tightening reduces direct returns paid to stakers and ETFs, the increased rarity could support token prices and transform these altcoins into leading stores of value. The overhaul of Ethereum’s emission model by EIP-8361 On August 4th, six researchers from the ecosystem, including Justin Drake of the Ethereum Foundation, formally submitted proposal EIP-8361, entitled “Tapered Issuance Burn”. This text aims to fix what the authors call artificial overissuance in the current economic model of the network. Today, validators can still claim a staking yield close to 1.5% per year, even in a scenario where almost all ETH tokens would be locked in the protocol.

According to the diagnosis made by the researchers, this ceiling maintains excessive monetary creation without this corresponding to a real need for operational security. EIP-8361 thus introduces a dynamic mechanism designed to burn an increasingly large share of rewards as the ratio of staked ETH increases, planning a transition over 18 months to burn all rewards once about 60.25 million ETH, or half of the total supply, will be staked.

According to the quantitative models integrated in the proposal and analyzed by Grayscale, Ethereum’s annual issuance would peak around 0.5% at a staking level of 20%, before starting a downward trajectory towards zero as the network approaches the 50% plateau. In its central scenario projected for 2031, the asset manager estimates that ETH’s annual inflation would fall to about 0.4%, thus matching the emission rate anticipated for bitcoin over the same period.

This structural change does not go unnoticed by the institutional financial sector. Grayscale also recalls that its own ETHE spot fund began earlier this year distributing staking yields to its shareholders, constituting the first crypto spot exchange-traded product (ETP) in the United States to implement such a mechanism.

Several fundamental numerical indicators summarize the technical and financial impact of this update for the Ethereum network :

60.25 million ETH : the staking threshold from which 100% of the emission dedicated to rewards will be burned after the 18-month transition ; 0.4% : the theoretical annual inflation rate of ETH supply projected by Grayscale by 2031, equaling that of bitcoin ; 0.5% : the peak that the annual issuance would barely exceed when the network’s staking rate is around 20%. Solana: accelerating supply reduction via SIMD-0550 and SIMD-0553 On its side, Solana follows a separate disinflationary trajectory, centered on improvement documents SIMD-0550 and SIMD-0553. Currently set at about 3.695% per year, this crypto’s inflation rate follows an initial schedule predicting a 15% reduction per year until reaching a long-term floor set at 1.5%. The SIMD-0550 project proposes to accelerate this process by doubling the annual reduction rate, compressing several years of gradual monetary adjustment into a much shorter time frame.

In parallel, the SIMD-0553 proposal modifies transaction fee management to increase the proportion of SOL permanently destroyed, preventing these cryptos from being re-injected to validators. However, Grayscale’s analysis shows that the additional amount of SOL burned via SIMD-0553 remains modest compared to the daily issuance volume under current network conditions, confirming that SIMD-0550 is the real driver of the projected drop to 1.1% by 2031.

This dual technical initiative does not enjoy a fully homogeneous consensus regarding its time feasibility. As Grayscale’s research note explicitly points out, these emission trajectories rely on strict assumptions of immediate implementation without alteration of other operational parameters, a condition considered unlikely to be realized exactly as such in reality.

The political and community dimension plays a key role here. In a recent intervention, Zach Pandl, Grayscale’s research director, qualified the comparative progress of the two networks. He then stated: “Solana’s plan enjoys broader community support and has better chances of being implemented than its Ethereum equivalent”. This divergence in the degree of buy-in from key players proves decisive for investors seeking to incorporate this future rarity in their valuation models.

The economic trade-offs of enhanced rarity The evolution of these emission models places community governance at the heart of the strategic choices of each crypto ecosystem. Although mathematical models anticipate a marked compression of token creation, moving from proposal to effective implementation requires the buy-in of the majority of validation actors.

The difference in support highlighted by Grayscale between Ethereum and Solana illustrates how political and economic considerations influence the adoption of technical updates. On the market side, establishing rarity greater than that of gold marks a stage in the structuring of major altcoins as mature financial assets, capable of competing with traditional safe havens against global inflationary pressures.

Economically, the shift toward algorithmic enhanced rarity imposes a complex trade-off between the unit value of the asset and the gross yield perceived by network participants. By reducing the pace of new token issuance, these reforms de facto decrease nominal income paid to validators and holders of staked crypto ETF shares.

Zach Pandl notes, however, that a smaller circulating supply could support token prices in the market, thus offsetting the mechanical decrease in staking yields. The final equation will depend on the ecosystems’ ability to maintain the security of their consensus while convincing staking actors to accept lower direct rewards in exchange for a theoretically rarer and more robust underlying asset against traditional monetary pressures.

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Luc Jose A.

Diplômé de Sciences Po Toulouse et titulaire d'une certification consultant blockchain délivrée par Alyra, j'ai rejoint l'aventure Cointribune en 2019. Convaincu du potentiel de la blockchain pour transformer de nombreux secteurs de l'économie, j'ai pris l'engagement de sensibiliser et d'informer le grand public sur cet écosystème en constante évolution. Mon objectif est de permettre à chacun de mieux comprendre la blockchain et de saisir les opportunités qu'elle offre. Je m'efforce chaque jour de fournir une analyse objective de l'actualité, de décrypter les tendances du marché, de relayer les dernières innovations technologiques et de mettre en perspective les enjeux économiques et sociétaux de cette révolution en marche.

DISCLAIMER

The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this article belong solely to the author, and should not be taken as investment advice. Do your own research before taking any investment decisions.

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I keep buying Broadcom. Every paycheck, every dip, every time the market hands me a chance under $400, my finger finds the buy button. This latest slide is doing it again.

Broadcom (NASDAQ:AVGO | AVGO Price Prediction) closed at $392.99 last Friday, down 8.13% in a week and 5.94% on the session. To me that reads as an invitation to add.

The Thesis in Plain English Broadcom sells two things every hyperscaler now needs: custom silicon (ASIC) co-designed with the customer alongside dominant high-speed switching silicon (Tomahawk and Jericho) that lashes those chips together into working clusters. When Google, Meta, OpenAI, or Anthropic decides to build proprietary AI hardware to escape GPU pricing, they still buy the networking from Broadcom. This dual-engine strategy captures AI capital expenditure from both sides, and enterprise lock-in here reads more like a utility than semiconductor cyclicality.

The Receipts Start with growth. Q2 FY2026 revenue hit $22.19 billion, up 47.9% YoY, with AI semiconductor revenue of $10.80 billion, up 143%. Management guides Q3 to $29.4 billion in total revenue and $16 billion in AI semi, over 200% YoY growth. Hock Tan expects full-year fiscal 2026 AI semi revenue of $56 billion, and he has reiterated the company is on track to exceed $100 billion in AI sales in 2027. AI bookings have passed $30 billion against $10.8 billion shipped, and visibility now runs to 2028.

Then the cash. Free cash flow was $10.26 billion in Q2, 46% of revenue. Adjusted EBITDA ran at 69% of revenue. Operating income grew 85.07% YoY. Broadcom generates returns today and hands them back.

Then the capital return. The dividend has climbed for 15 consecutive years, most recently a 10% hike to $0.65 per quarter. A $10 billion buyback runs through December 31, 2026, and $7.8 billion of that already went to work in Q1. That is a durable capital-return machine sitting on top of AI hypergrowth.

Why Not the Obvious Alternative The reflex AI-silicon trade is NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA). I own some. My money keeps landing here instead. Broadcom trades at a forward P/E of 21 against a trailing P/E of 65, with a PEG of 0.44 and an analyst target of $527.88. I am paying a growth-stock forward multiple for a dividend compounder with 46% FCF margins, $19.63 billion in cash, and total liabilities declining 3.76% YoY. Pure GPU exposure comes at a richer valuation without that dividend record.

The Risk Worth Naming Customer concentration is real. A handful of hyperscalers drive the AI franchise, and if one shifts internal design work or dials capex, a quarter can look ugly fast. The Q2 earnings-day reaction was a 12.59% decline despite the beat, exactly that flavor of jitter.

My conviction holds because the customer roster keeps widening. Two additional customers arrive with $6 billion in purchase orders, Anthropic added 5 gigawatts of next-generation TPU compute beginning 2027, OpenAI has 1.3 gigawatts contractually committed for 2027, and Meta signed for 3 gigawatts through end of 2028. Concentration risk moderates as gigawatt commitments spread.

Why the Buy Button Stays Live I own a business printing 46% FCF margins into the biggest capex build in modern history, run by a CEO who under-promises and raises the dividend every year. At 21x forward earnings with $56 billion in AI revenue guided this year, that is a compounding machine on sale, and I am buying every share the market hands me under $400.

Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.

Snap Inc. (NYSE:SNAP) shares are trading lower Monday morning as Wall Street continues to digest a pivotal ruling from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals alongside heavy insider stock sales. Here’s what investors need to know.

Snap stock is among today’s weakest performers. Why is SNAP stock dropping? Section 230 Defense Rejected in Federal Appeals CourtThe federal appeals court last week rejected tech industry efforts to throw out over 3,000 consolidated lawsuits, ruling that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act acts as an affirmative defense rather than blanket immunity from being sued.

The decision allows thousands of claims alleging Snapchat’s core design features foster youth addiction to proceed directly toward trial.

Executive Insider Selling Amplifies Bearish SentimentCompounding the legal pressure, recent regulatory filings revealed significant executive stock disposals. Chief Technology Officer Robert Murphy sold 4 million Class A shares for approximately $21.6 million under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan.

Although 10b5-1 plans are scheduled in advance to avoid trading on non-public information, the large insider divestment following second-quarter earnings has heightened market caution and added short-term selling pressure.

Why These Dual Risks Matter to Wall StreetHistorically, Section 230 has served as legal armor, protecting social media platforms from liability associated with third-party user content.However, plaintiffs are targeting proprietary algorithms, notifications and engagement features, which courts increasingly view as product design rather than protected speech.

Without broad pretrial immunity, Snap faces immense financial and operational exposure. Defense costs and potential multi-billion-dollar settlement liabilities could severely impair free cash flow.

More critically, potential court-ordered product modifications could force Snap to alter its core engagement algorithms, directly threatening active user growth, screen time and advertising monetization.

Paired with negative insider selling optics, the prospect of years of protracted litigation creates a multi-faceted overhang that could suppress valuation multiples until greater clarity returns.

SNAP Shares Fall Monday MorningSNAP Price Action: Snap shares were down 3.52% at $5.22 during premarket trading on Monday, according to Benzinga Pro data.

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Binance has overtaken CME Group in Bitcoin futures open interest for the first time since late 2023, holding roughly 148,500 BTC against CME’s 102,840. The reversal unwinds two years of institutional dominance narrative and raises questions about whether traditional finance is retreating from crypto derivatives or simply relocating.

Summary

Binance has surpassed CME Group in Bitcoin futures open interest for the first time since late 2023, holding roughly 148,500 BTC ($9.6 billion) compared with CME’s 102,840 BTC ($6.7 billion). CME open interest has fallen to its lowest level since February 2024 after five consecutive months of decline, driven largely by the unwinding of the cash and carry basis trade. The annualized Bitcoin futures basis has compressed to roughly 3%, falling below the 3.8% yield on two year U.S. Treasuries, eliminating the arbitrage incentive that fueled institutional CME positioning. Market makers and hedge funds are migrating toward offshore perpetual contracts on Binance, Bybit, and OKX, while a parallel regulatory shift is bringing perpetual futures onshore through CFTC approved venues like Kalshi. The reversal raises fundamental questions about whether the “institutional adoption” narrative built on CME dominance was always more fragile than it appeared, and whether traditional finance is retreating or simply relocating. For two years, a single chart told the story of Bitcoin’s institutional coming of age. CME Group, the Chicago exchange where pension funds, sovereign wealth managers, and hedge funds trade everything from corn to crude oil, held more Bitcoin futures open interest than any venue on Earth. That lead over Binance, the offshore exchange synonymous with retail speculation, became the most cited proof point for the “institutions are here” thesis.

That chart has now flipped. Binance holds roughly 148,500 BTC in open interest, worth approximately $9.6 billion. CME has dropped to around 102,840 BTC, or $6.7 billion, its lowest reading since February 2024. The gap is not narrow. It is roughly 45,000 BTC wide and growing.

The shift did not arrive overnight. CME open interest has fallen for five consecutive months, accelerating through the second quarter of 2026 as the profitability of the basis trade collapsed and institutional appetites shifted. What looked like a permanent structural change in Bitcoin market microstructure may have been, at least in part, an arbitrage play dressed in institutional clothing.

Understanding what happened, why it matters, and where it leads requires following the money through a maze of basis spreads, regulatory upheaval, and the evolving definition of what “institutional” even means in crypto.

The basis trade machine and how it broke The centerpiece of CME’s rise to the top of the Bitcoin futures leaderboard was not directional conviction. It was the cash and carry basis trade, a delta neutral strategy older than most of the people trading it.

The mechanics are straightforward. Buy spot Bitcoin, or more commonly after January 2024, buy shares of a spot Bitcoin ETF like BlackRock’s IBIT. Simultaneously sell Bitcoin futures on CME at a premium to the spot price. The difference between the futures price and the spot price, the basis, represents annualized yield. When Bitcoin was rallying through 2024 and the first half of 2025, that basis regularly exceeded 15% to 20%, dwarfing anything available in traditional fixed income.

Hedge funds, proprietary trading desks, and institutional players rotated capital into this trade at scale. According to CFTC Commitments of Traders data, leveraged funds held persistent net short positions on CME Bitcoin futures throughout most of 2024 and 2025, the signature footprint of the basis trade. They were not bearish on Bitcoin. They were harvesting yield from the contango.

The problem is that the basis trade is self limiting. As more capital enters, competition compresses the spread. As Bitcoin’s price declined from its highs above $120,000 to the $60,000 to $80,000 range through the first half of 2026, futures premiums collapsed alongside it. By mid 2026, the annualized three month basis on CME had fallen to roughly 3%, below the 3.8% yield on two year U.S. Treasuries.

At that point, the math stopped working. Why lock up capital in a trade that earns less than risk free government debt, while carrying counterparty risk, margin requirements, and the operational complexity of rolling quarterly futures contracts? The answer, for most institutional desks, was to unwind.

The unwinding was not panic. It was arithmetic. The Block reported that CME Bitcoin futures activity slumped to a 14 month low in April 2026, with average daily open interest falling below $8 billion and daily trading volume dropping under $3 billion. Each month since has continued the decline.

The scale of the exodus is visible in the raw numbers. CME began 2026 with approximately 175,000 BTC in open interest. By April, that figure had dropped to roughly 120,000 BTC. By August, it sat near 103,000 BTC, a decline of more than 40% in eight months. For context, the open interest that CME lost over this period, roughly 72,000 BTC, represents more than $4.5 billion in notional value at current prices. That is not a rounding error. It is a structural repricing of where institutional derivatives capital lives.

Where the money went The capital that exited CME did not vanish from the Bitcoin derivatives market. Some returned to direct spot holdings, simplifying portfolios and removing the futures leg entirely. But a meaningful share migrated to offshore perpetual contracts, the instrument that dominates crypto derivatives trading and has for years.

Perpetual futures, which have no expiration date and use a funding rate mechanism to stay tethered to spot prices, account for roughly 90% of all crypto derivatives volume globally. Binance alone controls approximately 33% of the centralized perpetual futures market, followed by OKX and Bybit. In the first quarter of 2026, Binance tightened its grip even as overall crypto trading volume declined, capturing a 40% share of perpetual futures activity.

The appeal for institutional market makers is not mysterious. Perpetuals offer continuous liquidity without the friction of quarterly roll dates. Margin requirements on offshore exchanges are more flexible. And for desks that are genuinely market neutral, providing liquidity on both sides, the funding rate on perpetuals can generate yield similar to the old basis trade, often with better capital efficiency.

What has changed is not the existence of these benefits, which offshore venues have offered for years, but the willingness of institutional participants to act on them. As the basis trade on CME became unprofitable and the regulatory climate around perpetuals began to shift, the stigma of trading on offshore venues appears to have softened for a segment of the institutional market.

This does not mean Goldman Sachs is opening a Binance account. The migration is concentrated among crypto native market makers, quantitative trading firms, and smaller hedge funds that operate across jurisdictions. Many of these firms are registered in Singapore, Dubai, or the British Virgin Islands and face no regulatory barrier to trading on Binance or similar platforms. For them, the question was never whether they could trade offshore but whether the economics justified staying on CME. Once the basis spread vanished, the answer changed.

These participants were a significant share of CME’s open interest, and their departure has been measurable. CoinGecko data from the first quarter of 2026 shows that Binance and OKX together dominate the perpetual futures landscape, with decentralized perpetual exchanges also nearly quadrupling their share of open interest year over year, adding another layer of competition that CME cannot match.

CME’s countermove and why 24/7 was not enough CME did not sit idle while its Bitcoin futures franchise eroded. On May 29, 2026, the exchange launched 24/7 trading for cryptocurrency futures and options, eliminating the weekend gap that had been a persistent structural disadvantage against crypto native venues.

The inaugural weekend saw more than 7,200 contracts traded, roughly $50 million in notional value. Average daily volume across CME’s crypto complex reached 407,200 contracts, up 46% year over year. The exchange also introduced Bitcoin volatility futures on June 1, expanding the toolkit available to institutional traders.

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— crypto.news (@cryptodotnews) April 27, 2026 These moves addressed genuine pain points. Corporate treasury desks, asset managers, and hedge funds running Bitcoin positions had long struggled with the inability to adjust hedges during weekends when spot markets kept moving. The CME gap, a visible discontinuity in Monday’s opening price relative to Friday’s close, was a real source of basis risk.

But 24/7 trading arrived too late to reverse the basis trade exodus. The open interest decline continued through June, July, and August, suggesting that the forces driving capital away from CME were more fundamental than trading hours. The basis trade collapse was a yield problem, not an access problem, and extending trading hours does not restore the contango.

The perpetual futures revolution comes onshore While CME was losing open interest to offshore venues, a parallel regulatory development was reshaping the competitive landscape from the other direction. On May 29, 2026, the same day CME went 24/7, the CFTC approved Kalshi’s BTCPERP contract, the first Bitcoin perpetual futures product listed on a regulated U.S. exchange.

The approval represented a watershed moment for American crypto derivatives trading. Perpetual futures had existed exclusively offshore for nearly a decade, generating trillions of dollars in annual volume on exchanges beyond the reach of U.S. regulators. The CFTC’s decision to allow them onshore, initially through Kalshi and with additional applications from Coinbase and others in the pipeline, opened a new front in the competition for institutional flow.

CME’s response was to sue. The exchange filed a federal lawsuit against the CFTC and its chairman, arguing that the agency had overstepped its authority and that perpetual futures should be classified as swaps, not futures, which would subject them to different regulatory treatment and potentially restrict their availability. The legal argument centers on whether a contract that never expires and settles through continuous funding rate payments meets the statutory definition of a futures contract or whether it more closely resembles a swap, which carries heavier compliance obligations including mandatory clearing and reporting. The case remains pending, and its outcome could reshape the regulatory framework for crypto derivatives in the United States for years to come.

Kalshi’s early traction has been notable. Within weeks of launch, the platform generated more than $5.5 billion in cumulative perpetual futures volume. It subsequently added Ethereum, Solana, and XRP perpetuals, broadening its product lineup beyond Bitcoin.

The implications for CME are significant. If regulated perpetual futures gain a foothold in the United States, they could siphon volume not only from offshore venues but from CME’s own quarterly futures contracts. The instrument that CME is fighting in court may ultimately become the instrument that defines the next phase of institutional crypto derivatives trading.

Was institutional adoption ever what it seemed? The Binance CME flip forces a reexamination of the “institutional adoption” narrative that has underpinned much of the bullish thesis for Bitcoin since 2024. That narrative rested on several pillars: the approval of spot Bitcoin ETFs, the growth of CME open interest, the expansion of custody solutions from banks like Citi, and the entry of traditional brokerages like Charles Schwab into crypto trading.

Each of those pillars remains standing. Spot Bitcoin ETFs control more than $100 billion in assets, even as the institutional rotation into other products accelerates. Schwab launched Bitcoin and Ethereum trading on its $13 trillion platform in May 2026. Citi is building $30 trillion custody rails scheduled for deployment later this year.

But the CME open interest decline reveals that a meaningful portion of what was counted as “institutional demand” was actually basis arbitrage, mechanically long spot and short futures, with no directional view on Bitcoin’s price. When the basis compressed, the demand disappeared.

This distinction matters for how markets interpret institutional flow. A pension fund buying IBIT because its investment committee believes in Bitcoin as a long term asset is fundamentally different from a prop trading desk buying IBIT and shorting CME futures to harvest a 15% annualized spread. Both show up as ETF inflows. Both contribute to CME open interest. But only one represents genuine conviction in Bitcoin’s value proposition.

The first half of 2026 exposed this ambiguity. U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded $5.4 billion in net outflows, the first negative half year since the products launched in January 2024. A significant portion of those outflows traced directly to basis trade unwinding, as desks closed the spot leg alongside the futures leg. The headline, that institutions were dumping Bitcoin, obscured the more nuanced reality that arbitrageurs were simply closing a trade that no longer paid.

The opposing case: why this reversal may be temporary Not everyone reads the Binance CME flip as a structural shift. Several factors could reverse the trend and restore CME to the top of the open interest rankings within months.

First, the basis trade is cyclical. When Bitcoin enters its next sustained rally and futures premiums expand back into double digit contango, the cash and carry trade will become profitable again. Institutional capital will return to CME for the same reason it arrived: risk adjusted yield. A move above $100,000 in spot Bitcoin, combined with renewed ETF inflows, could compress the timeline for this reversal to weeks rather than months.

Second, CME’s 24/7 trading is still new. The exchange needs time to build liquidity around the clock, particularly on weekends when crypto markets are often most volatile. As that liquidity deepens, the structural advantages of trading on a CFTC regulated exchange, counterparty clearing through CME Clearing, standardized margin, and regulatory certainty, may draw institutional flow back.

Third, the regulatory crackdown on offshore exchanges could intensify. Binance has operated under scrutiny from U.S., European, and Asian regulators for years. Any enforcement action, licensing restriction, or counterparty event affecting Binance could rapidly shift open interest back toward regulated venues.

The invalidation criteria for the structural shift thesis are clear: if Bitcoin’s three month annualized basis on CME returns above 8% for a sustained period, if CME regains the open interest lead from Binance, or if U.S. spot ETF flows turn decisively positive again, the reversal narrative loses its foundation.

What the hedge fund positioning data reveals One of the most telling signals in the CME data is not the decline in overall open interest but the shift in how hedge funds are positioned. For most of 2024 and 2025, leveraged funds on CME held persistent net short positions, the signature of the basis trade. In recent weeks, CFTC Commitments of Traders data shows that hedge funds have flipped to a net long position, a rare and significant shift.

This flip suggests that the remaining institutional participants on CME are no longer running delta neutral arbitrage. They are taking directional bets on Bitcoin’s price. The nature of institutional demand on CME is changing from yield extraction to conviction, which is arguably a healthier and more durable form of institutional participation.

The flip also means that the next phase of CME open interest growth, when it comes, may be driven by genuine directional flow rather than arbitrage. This could produce a CME open interest profile that is smaller in absolute terms but more meaningful as a signal of institutional sentiment.

Whether this transition is complete or merely in its early stages remains unclear. The net long positioning could reverse if Bitcoin’s price declines further, triggering stop losses and margin calls among the remaining directional traders. But for now, the data suggests a qualitative change in the type of institution that trades Bitcoin futures on CME.

There is a parallel signal worth noting. JPMorgan analysts have observed that institutional participation in perpetual futures skews heavily toward speculative trading instead of hedging, a dynamic that differs from traditional commodity futures markets where commercial hedgers anchor open interest. If CME’s remaining participants are increasingly directional while perpetual venues remain speculative, the two markets may be evolving toward different functions entirely: CME as a venue for macro conviction bets, and perpetuals as the infrastructure for short term trading and market making.

What to watch The Binance CME flip is not the end of institutional Bitcoin adoption. It is, however, the end of a specific chapter in which CME open interest served as the primary scoreboard for measuring it.

Several developments will determine whether this shift is temporary or permanent. The Bitcoin futures basis is the single most important variable: if annualized yields return above 8% to 10%, expect the basis trade and the CME open interest it generates to come back quickly. The trajectory of U.S. spot ETF flows will signal whether institutional appetite for Bitcoin exposure, independent of arbitrage, is growing or contracting.

The onshore perpetual futures market deserves close attention. Kalshi’s volume trajectory, CME’s lawsuit against the CFTC, and whether additional regulated venues launch competing perpetual products will shape the competitive landscape. If perpetuals win regulatory acceptance in the United States, the quarterly futures contract that made CME the center of institutional crypto trading may become an increasingly niche product.

Binance’s regulatory status is equally critical. The exchange is operating under a monitored compliance agreement with U.S. authorities and faces ongoing scrutiny in multiple jurisdictions. Any deterioration in Binance’s regulatory position could rapidly redistribute open interest toward CME and other regulated venues.

Finally, watch the CFTC Commitments of Traders data for shifts in hedge fund positioning. The recent flip from net short to net long is a meaningful signal, but it needs confirmation over multiple reporting periods to constitute a trend.

The market structure that emerges from this transition will look different from what came before. A world in which CME, Kalshi, Binance, and decentralized perpetual protocols each serve distinct segments of the institutional and retail spectrum is more fragmented but potentially more resilient than one in which a single venue dominates. The risk is that fragmentation reduces transparency, making it harder for regulators and market participants alike to gauge total leverage in the system.

The story of Bitcoin’s institutional market is not the story of one exchange winning and another losing. It is the story of capital finding the most efficient venue for each strategy at each moment. Right now, that search is pulling capital away from CME and toward offshore perpetuals, onshore innovations, and direct spot holdings. Where it goes next depends on basis spreads, regulation, and whether the next Bitcoin rally reignites the machine that made CME dominant in the first place.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or trading advice. Cryptocurrency markets carry significant risk, and past performance does not guarantee future results. Always conduct your own research before making investment decisions. Published August 16, 2026.

Engine selected as a second-source propulsion system for the Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM), advancing the program to deliver small, low-cost, high-performance engines for missiles and uncrewed platforms  | Source: Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc.

SAN DIEGO, Aug. 17, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc. (NASDAQ: KTOS), a Technology Company in the Defense, National Security and Global Markets, and GE Aerospace (NYSE: GE) today announced that the GEK800 engine, which received the U.S. Military Engine Type Designation F143-ZZ-100, has been awarded a contract with the United States Air Force for the Engineering, Manufacturing and Development (EMD) of the turbofan as a second-source propulsion system for the Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM).

The designation and contract mark advancement of the program designed to provide small, low-cost, high-performance engines for use in cruise missiles, collaborative combat-type aircraft, and other uncrewed aerial vehicles.

“The F143-ZZ-100 designation and EMD award are a testament to the strong performance and capability of the GEK800 engine and the strength of our partnership with Kratos. This reflects years of disciplined engineering to deliver propulsion systems that meet the evolving, mission-critical requirements of our military customers,” said Amy Gowder, President and CEO of GE Aerospace Defense & Systems.

“Kratos has been working with our outstanding partner GE Aerospace and the United States Air Force to support the Department of War in reindustrializing U.S. manufacturing capacity and capability in the area of low cost, rapidly manufacturable, in large quantities, jet engines for drones, cruise missiles and other systems. Kratos and GE Aerospace are making significant investments with our government partners, to support U.S. National Security priorities,” said Eric DeMarco, President and CEO of Kratos.

The GEK800, now designated the F143, is an 800-lb thrust turbofan engine designed to power long-range missiles and other uncrewed applications. With a combination of internal investment plus support and funding from the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), Kratos and GE Aerospace began working together in 2023 to complete a Technology Maturation and Risk Reduction (TMRR) phase including testing of the engine. The joint team has completed more than 50 engine starts in ground testing at Kratos and GE Aerospace testing facilities, and in 2025 successfully completed altitude testing at Purdue University’s Maurice J. Zucrow Laboratories.

About Kratos Defense & Security Solutions
Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc. (NASDAQ: KTOS) is a technology, products, system and software company addressing the defense, national security, and commercial markets. Kratos makes true internally funded research, development, capital and other investments, to rapidly develop, produce and field solutions that address our customers’ mission critical needs and requirements. At Kratos, affordability is a technology, and we seek to utilize proven, leading-edge approaches and technology, not unproven bleeding edge approaches or technology, with Kratos’ approach designed to reduce cost, schedule and risk, enabling us to be first to market with cost effective solutions. We believe that Kratos is known as an innovative disruptive change agent in the industry, a company that is an expert in designing products and systems up front for successful rapid, large quantity, low-cost future manufacturing which is a value-add competitive differentiator for our large traditional prime system integrator partners and also to our government and commercial customers. Kratos intends to pursue program and contract opportunities as the prime or lead contractor when we believe that our probability of win (PWin) is high and any investment required by Kratos is within our capital resource comfort level. We intend to partner and team with a large, traditional system integrator when our assessment of PWin is greater or required investment is beyond Kratos’ comfort level. Kratos’ primary business areas include virtualized ground systems for satellites and space vehicles including software for C2 and telemetry, tracking and control (TT&C), jet powered unmanned aerial drone systems, hypersonic vehicles and rocket systems, propulsion systems for drones, missiles, loitering munitions, supersonic systems, space craft and launch systems, C5ISR and microwave electronic products for missile, radar, missile defense, space, satellite, counter UAS, directed energy, communication and other systems, and virtual & augmented reality training systems for the warfighter. For more information, visit www.KratosDefense.com and follow Kratos on LinkedIn and X.

About GE Aerospace
GE Aerospace is a global aerospace propulsion, services, and systems leader with an installed base of approximately 49,000 commercial and 29,000 military aircraft engines. With a global team of approximately 53,000 employees building on more than a century of innovation and learning, GE Aerospace is committed to inventing the future of flight, lifting people up, and bringing them home safely. Learn more about how GE Aerospace and its partners are defining flight for today, tomorrow, and the future at www.geaerospace.com.

Notice Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements in this press release may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements are made on the basis of the current beliefs, expectations and assumptions of the management of Kratos and are subject to significant risks and uncertainty. Investors are cautioned not to place undue reliance on any such forward-looking statements. All such forward-looking statements speak only as of the date they are made, and Kratos undertakes no obligation to update or revise these statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Although Kratos believes that the expectations reflected in these forward-looking statements are reasonable, these statements involve many risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from what may be expressed or implied in these forward-looking statements. For a further discussion of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ from those expressed in these forward-looking statements, as well as risks relating to the business of Kratos in general, see the risk disclosures in the Annual Report on Form 10-K of Kratos for the year ended December 28, 2025, and in subsequent reports on Forms 10-Q and 8-K and other filings made with the SEC by Kratos.

Kratos Press Contact:
Claire Cantrell
[email protected]

Kratos Investor Information:
877-934-4687
[email protected]

GE Aerospace Press Contact:
Deb Case
[email protected]

Posted by Defense World Staff on Aug 17th, 2026

Focus Partners Advisor Solutions LLC acquired a new stake in shares of McKesson Corporation (NYSE:MCK – Free Report) in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund acquired 1,702 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,286,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of MCK. University of Texas Texas AM Investment Management Co. purchased a new position in McKesson during the fourth quarter valued at $25,000. Swiss RE Ltd. purchased a new stake in McKesson in the fourth quarter worth about $26,000. State of Wyoming purchased a new stake in McKesson in the second quarter worth about $29,000. Kingdom Financial Group LLC. bought a new position in shares of McKesson in the fourth quarter worth about $33,000. Finally, Birchwood Financial Partners Inc. bought a new position in shares of McKesson in the fourth quarter worth about $33,000. 85.07% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes A number of research analysts recently issued reports on the company. Weiss Ratings downgraded McKesson from a “buy (b)” rating to a “buy (b-)” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 7th. Morgan Stanley restated an “overweight” rating on shares of McKesson in a research note on Friday, August 7th. William Blair started coverage on shares of McKesson in a report on Tuesday, April 28th. They set an “outperform” rating on the stock. TD Cowen increased their price objective on shares of McKesson from $989.00 to $1,006.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 6th. Finally, Citigroup increased their price objective on shares of McKesson from $945.00 to $1,000.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, July 24th. Fourteen research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, McKesson presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $977.00.

Read Our Latest Report on McKesson

McKesson Trading Down 0.0% Shares of MCK opened at $868.72 on Monday. The business’s 50 day moving average is $813.45 and its 200 day moving average is $842.94. The company has a market capitalization of $101.28 billion, a PE ratio of 23.25, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.71 and a beta of 0.30. McKesson Corporation has a 12-month low of $667.50 and a 12-month high of $999.00.

McKesson (NYSE:MCK – Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 5th. The company reported $9.93 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $9.56 by $0.37. McKesson had a negative return on equity of 253.21% and a net margin of 1.12%.The company had revenue of $105.38 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $103.88 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $8.26 EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 7.7% compared to the same quarter last year. McKesson has set its FY 2027 guidance at 44.200-45.000 EPS. Equities research analysts predict that McKesson Corporation will post 44.65 earnings per share for the current year.

McKesson Increases Dividend The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, October 1st. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, September 1st will be issued a $0.94 dividend. This represents a $3.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.4%. This is a boost from McKesson’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.82. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, September 1st. McKesson’s payout ratio is presently 8.78%.

Insider Activity In related news, EVP Michele Lau sold 3,550 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, May 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $761.09, for a total transaction of $2,701,869.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president owned 3,247 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,471,259.23. This represents a 52.23% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, Director Bradley E. Lerman sold 301 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, August 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $892.33, for a total transaction of $268,591.33. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders have sold 29,049 shares of company stock valued at $22,530,626 in the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.06% of the company’s stock.

McKesson Profile (Free Report)

McKesson Corporation (NYSE: MCK) is a global healthcare services and distribution company that supplies pharmaceuticals, medical-surgical products and health care technology solutions. Founded in 1833 and headquartered in Irving, Texas, McKesson operates across the drug distribution and healthcare services value chain, connecting manufacturers, pharmacies, hospitals and health systems to help manage the movement of medicines and clinical supplies.

The company’s core activities include pharmaceutical wholesale distribution and logistics, specialty pharmacy services, and the provision of medical-surgical supplies to acute and non-acute care providers.

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XDC Network processed 27.7 million transactions in July 2026, a new monthly record for the enterprise-focused blockchain. That figure represents a 50% jump over the previous six months, and it pushes the network’s lifetime transaction count past 1 billion since its mainnet launch in June 2019.

XDC is not a chain most retail traders think about. Its design targets enterprise workflows: trade finance settlement, real-world asset tokenization, and ISO 20022 compliance for interoperability with traditional banking infrastructure.

The network’s throughput capacity sits at up to 2,000 transactions per second, with an average finality time of around six seconds. In July 2026, the chain was processing up to 18.7 TPS on average, meaning the current load is a fraction of theoretical capacity.

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Stablecoin settlements have become a meaningful part of the activity mix. The network has processed over $1.3 billion in USDC transactions on-chain, establishing it as a viable settlement rail for institutions that want blockchain efficiency without token price exposure on their books.

Trade finance is the other pillar. XDC has been running pilots using vLEI technology, a verifiable legal entity identifier framework that allows companies to cryptographically prove their corporate identity on-chain.

XDC added Animoca Brands, NTT DOCOMO GLOBAL, and Republic to its validator set in 2026. These organizations’ participation suggests the network is being evaluated as infrastructure rather than as a speculative investment.

XDC operates as a hybrid blockchain, combining a public chain with private sub-networks called subnetworks. That architecture lets enterprises keep sensitive transaction data off the public ledger while still anchoring to a shared settlement layer.

The partnership with Stripe and its Bridge infrastructure around stablecoin settlement is another data point worth noting.

XDC traded near $0.030 as of May 2026, well below its all-time high of approximately $0.19 set in 2021.

The network crossed 801 million total transactions by June 2025, meaning it added roughly 200 million more in the months that followed.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.