Track market-moving stories before they get noisy

On July 6, Luxembourg’s financial regulator, the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier, upgraded Ripple’s preliminary Crypto-Asset Service Provider authorization into a full license under the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets framework. The approval means Ripple can passport regulated crypto services across all 30 countries of the European Economic Area, from Lisbon to Helsinki, under a single national authorization. Cassie Craddock, Ripple’s managing director for the UK and Europe, framed the moment plainly: the company enters the post-transitional MiCA era fully compliant and ready to scale.

Summary

Ripple secured a full MiCA license in Luxembourg, allowing it to offer regulated crypto services across the European Economic Area. While Europe has given Ripple regulatory certainty, XRP’s legal classification in the U.S. still depends on the CLARITY Act. The article explores whether Ripple’s expanding regulatory footprint can eventually translate into stronger XRP demand. Five days later, on the other side of the Atlantic, the legislation that would finally tell American regulators what XRP actually is remained stuck in the Senate. A merged draft of the CLARITY Act is expected the week of July 13, floor action is penciled in for the week of July 20, and the whole effort still needs roughly 7 Democratic votes it does not currently have. Galaxy Research has cut its odds of passage in 2026 to a coin flip.

That is the strange position Ripple occupies in the summer of 2026. A company born in San Francisco, hardened by a 4-year fight with the Securities and Exchange Commission, and lobbying harder than almost anyone for American crypto legislation, is now more comprehensively regulated in Europe than it has ever been at home. The Luxembourg license is not just a compliance milestone. It is a measuring stick for how far apart the two largest Western markets have drifted, and a live experiment in whether regulatory certainty actually converts into business, and eventually into token demand.

What Ripple actually won in Luxembourg The July 6 approval was the second half of a two-part regulatory build that Ripple has been assembling in the Grand Duchy for most of a year. The first half arrived on February 2, when the CSSF granted Ripple full approval as an Electronic Money Institution. The EMI license lets the company issue electronic money and run regulated fiat payment services across the European Union. It followed a preliminary EMI approval a month earlier and came shortly after Ripple picked up an EMI license and a cryptoasset registration from the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority, extending the same regulated posture to Britain.

The CASP license completes the picture on the crypto side. Under MiCA, a Crypto-Asset Service Provider authorization covers custody, exchange, transfer, and related services for cryptoassets. Ripple received preliminary CASP approval from the CSSF on June 23, then satisfied the remaining conditions in under 2 weeks, converting the in-principle nod into a full license just after MiCA’s transition period closed on July 1. As crypto.news reported, the timing put Ripple inside the licensed perimeter at the exact moment the perimeter became a hard wall.

The combination matters more than either license alone. With the EMI approval, European banks, fintechs, and corporates can move regulated fiat and e-money through Ripple. With the CASP approval, the same clients can move cryptoassets and stablecoin flows through the same provider under the same rulebook. Ripple Payments, the company’s cross-border settlement product, has processed more than $100 billion across more than 60 markets globally. The Luxembourg stack gives that product a clean legal wrapper in a bloc of roughly 450 million people, with one regulator to answer to and 30 countries to sell into.

Ripple says its global license count now exceeds 75 authorizations, registrations, and approvals, a portfolio that spans Singapore, Dubai, New York’s BitLicense regime, and now the heart of the EU. Few crypto-native companies carry anything comparable. That was a deliberate strategy long before MiCA existed: sell to banks, and you must look like something a bank compliance department can approve.

The graveyard on the other side of the deadline The value of a MiCA license is easiest to see in what happened to the companies that do not have one. The regulation’s transition period ended on July 1, 2026. From that date, any firm offering covered crypto services in the EEA without CASP authorization must limit or stop those services. The European Securities and Markets Authority added 57 newly approved firms to its register right after the deadline, bringing the total to around 300 authorized providers. Set that against the more than 1,200 firms that operated in Europe under the old patchwork of national regimes, and the scale of the cull becomes clear. By some counts, only around 210 of those incumbent companies completed the licensing process in time.

The casualty list includes names that would have seemed untouchable 2 years ago. Binance, the largest exchange in the world by volume, failed to secure authorization in time through its Greek application and has told customers in several European markets that services are suspended while it seeks approval elsewhere. Tether chose not to apply at all, citing objections to MiCA’s stablecoin requirements, and USDT has been delisted from European venues as a result. Hundreds of smaller firms now face a choice between merging with licensed competitors, shrinking to non-covered activities, or exiting the region entirely.

The passporting mechanism is what makes a single national license so valuable. Under MiCA, a firm authorized in one member state can offer covered crypto services throughout the EU and the wider EEA without seeking separate national approvals, the same single-market logic that has governed European banking and investment services for decades.

Before MiCA, a crypto company wanting continental coverage needed a patchwork of national registrations, each with its own rules, timelines, and supervisory quirks, and each revocable on its own schedule. After MiCA, the choice of home regulator became a strategic decision, because one supervisor now stands behind a firm’s entire European footprint. That concentration cuts both ways.

A company with a Luxembourg license answers to a regulator with a long institutional finance pedigree and a reputation for rigor, which reassures bank counterparties. It also means a single supervisory dispute could, in theory, imperil access to 30 markets at once. Firms accepted that trade because the alternative, 30 separate relationships, was worse.

Luxembourg, meanwhile, has become one of the main gateways for the firms that made it through. Coinbase won its MiCA license from the CSSF in June 2025, opened a physical hub in the country, and migrated its EU operations into a dedicated Luxembourg entity.

Standard Chartered received its authorization through the same regulator. B2C2 took the Luxembourg route for its European trading business. Ripple now joins that group, which turns the Grand Duchy into something like the institutional crypto capital of the EU, a jurisdiction that courted the industry with dedicated blockchain legislation and a regulator willing to process serious applications quickly.

For Ripple specifically, the competitive math is straightforward. Every payments client it pitches in Europe now faces a shrunken menu of fully licensed providers. The company spent years and considerable money building a compliance posture that most rivals treated as optional. MiCA just made it mandatory, and Ripple crossed the line while much of the field did not.

The license lands on top of an institutional build-out The Luxembourg approval did not arrive in isolation. It caps 12 months in which Ripple assembled more institutional infrastructure than in the previous decade combined, which is what makes the token’s indifference so striking and the license so strategically loaded.

Start with the prime brokerage. Ripple closed its $1.25 billion acquisition of Hidden Road in October 2025, folding a multi-asset prime broker into the company and rebranding the operation as Ripple Prime. On March 2, 2026, Ripple Prime appeared in the participant directory of the National Securities Clearing Corporation, the DTCC subsidiary that clears the vast majority of American equity trades.

The Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation processes transactions measured in the quadrillions of dollars annually and safeguards roughly $100 trillion in assets. Having XRP-linked infrastructure inside that machine is the kind of positioning that takes years to arrange and cannot be improvised later. DTCC has since named Ripple Prime to the industry working group of more than 50 firms shaping its tokenization service for Russell 1000 stocks, major ETFs, and US Treasuries, scheduled to launch in October 2026.

Then the ledger itself. Tokenized real-world assets on the XRP Ledger grew from $991 million at the start of 2026 to roughly $3.5 billion by midsummer. In early May, JPMorgan, Mastercard, Ondo Finance, and Ripple completed the first cross-border tokenized US Treasury redemption on XRPL, clearing in under 5 seconds.

Daily transactions on the ledger hit 3 million on March 15, roughly triple the averages of mid-2025. RLUSD, the stablecoin at the center of Ripple’s settlement strategy, reached a market capitalization of $1.72 billion in under a year, with more than $18 billion in transfer volume in the first quarter of 2026 alone. And in July, Ripple joined Open USD, the consortium dollar stablecoin backed by Visa, Mastercard, Stripe, BlackRock, and more than 140 other companies, hedging its own stablecoin bet with a seat at the industry table.

Every item on that list is the kind of development that, in a friendlier market, would have carried its own rally. Instead, each landed on a chart grinding lower, which is a useful reminder of how much of crypto pricing in 2026 is macro beta and how little is project-specific fundamentals. The relevance to the Luxembourg story is this: the license is not a standalone trophy. It is the regulatory layer of a stack that now includes clearing access, tokenization rails, a stablecoin, and a prime broker. Europe is where that full stack can operate legally today.

Meanwhile in Washington: a bill, a deadline, and seven missing votes The contrast with the United States is not subtle. The CLARITY Act, the market structure bill that would sort digital assets into commodity and security buckets and hand spot market oversight of digital commodities to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, has traveled further than any crypto legislation in American history. The House passed it 294 to 134 in July 2025. The Senate Banking Committee advanced its version 15 to 9 on May 14, 2026, with Democrats Ruben Gallego and Angela Alsobrooks crossing over. The bill sits on the Senate Legislative Calendar, eligible for a floor vote whenever leadership schedules one.

And there it sits. A unified draft merging the Banking and Agriculture Committee texts, reportedly more than 70 pages longer than the earlier versions and heavier on consumer protections, is expected as soon as the week of July 13, with floor action targeted for the week of July 20. The Senate breaks for recess on August 7.

Senator Cynthia Lummis has warned that failure in this window likely means no market structure law before 2030. Galaxy Research has lowered its passage odds for 2026 to 50%, down from 75% right after the committee vote, and Stifel’s Washington strategist has written that the bill’s prospects deteriorate materially if it misses the recess deadline.

The blockage is not primarily about crypto. It is about ethics. Senate Democrats have demanded language barring senior government officials, including the president, from holding business interests in the crypto industry, a demand aimed squarely at the Trump family’s estimated $2.3 billion in crypto exposure across memecoins, World Liberty Financial, and mining ventures.

The White House has said it will accept rules that apply across the board but not language that singles out one officeholder. A tentative compromise involving state attorney general enforcement fell apart. Even Gallego and Alsobrooks have said their floor votes depend on the ethics fix. As crypto.news covered, disputes over vacant SEC and CFTC commissioner seats have layered a second standoff on top of the first.

Two more fault lines complicate the count. Senator Amy Klobuchar has proposed an amendment that would block new CFTC rules from taking effect until at least four commissioners are confirmed, effectively turning the agency staffing dispute into a statutory switch on the entire regulatory framework the bill would create. CFTC Chair Selig has pushed back, arguing on July 9 that the bill is being derailed by matters extraneous to its substance and that the agency does not need a quorum to write rules.

And law enforcement groups have raised objections to Section 604, the developer protection language drawn from the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act, worried it could complicate illicit finance cases. Senator Ron Wyden countered on July 8 with a letter to Senate leadership urging that the BRCA provisions be preserved, giving the DeFi industry its one clear win of the month. Lummis, for her part, has answered the illicit finance critique by pointing to more than 16 safeguards in the text and $150 million in dedicated enforcement funding.

Add it together, and the arithmetic is unforgiving. Three working weeks remain in July, a defense spending bill competes for floor time, and every unresolved dispute needs to close simultaneously for 7 Democrats to move. The committee vote on May 14 offered a preview of what passage would be worth: within an hour of the 15-9 result, Bitcoin jumped to $81,449, and XRP gained 4.5% on the day. Citi has a $143,000 Bitcoin target and Standard Chartered a $150,000 target contingent on the bill becoming law. Markets have, in other words, priced regulatory clarity as a real asset. The Senate simply has not delivered it.

So the American question that matters most to Ripple, whether XRP is a digital commodity under CFTC oversight or something the SEC can still reach, remains formally unanswered. The 2023 court ruling in the SEC’s case against Ripple found that programmatic sales of XRP on exchanges were not securities transactions, and the SEC case itself ended in a settlement in 2025. But a court ruling in one district and a dropped enforcement action are not a statute. They are precedents that a future administration, a future commission, or a future judge could narrow. That is precisely the uncertainty the CLARITY Act exists to remove, and precisely the uncertainty Europe has already removed for Ripple’s payments business.

Does a license move a token? Here is where the bull case and the bear case split, and both deserve a fair hearing.

The bear case is blunt: the Luxembourg license is a company milestone, not a token catalyst. Ripple’s own announcement barely mentions XRP. The approval covers Ripple’s regulated payments services, not its tokens, and MiCA runs a separate authorization track for stablecoins that RLUSD has not yet cleared. Until that happens, Ripple’s own dollar token cannot be offered to the European public, a gap rivals like Circle’s USDC do not have.

Most Ripple Payments volume today settles in RLUSD or fiat, not XRP, and where XRP does route payments across the XRP Ledger, the fees burned per transaction amount to fractions of a cent. When the preliminary CASP approval landed in June, XRP fell about 3% that week alongside the broader market. The market looked at the news and, quite rationally, did not treat it as a buy signal.

The token’s price action through 2026 supports that reading. XRP peaked near $3.65 in July 2025, closed last year around $1.90, and has spent this summer defending the $1 level, trading recently in the $1.05 to $1.13 range. None of Ripple’s regulatory wins arrested the slide, because the slide was never about Ripple. It tracked a market-wide drawdown that pulled Bitcoin below $60,000 and cut altcoins far deeper.

The bull case asks for a longer clock. Regulatory moats compound slowly. Ripple can now sell regulated crypto payments to European banks and corporates at a moment when much of its competition legally cannot, and enterprise procurement cycles that begin in 2026 produce volume in 2027 and 2028. If that volume increasingly touches the XRP Ledger, whether through On-Demand Liquidity corridors, RLUSD flows that settle on XRPL, or tokenized asset activity, the token accrues usage that exists independently of speculative sentiment.

Institutional demand channels are also open in a way they were not a year ago: spot XRP ETFs have logged roughly $1.49 billion in cumulative net inflows since launching in November 2025, and as crypto.news noted, that streak recently stretched to 8 consecutive weeks even as the price languished. Standard Chartered and JPMorgan have both projected $4 to $8.4 billion in first-year ETF inflows if the CLARITY Act passes and unlocks allocators who cannot touch unclassified assets.

The honest synthesis is that the license changes Ripple’s revenue trajectory with high confidence and XRP’s demand trajectory with low confidence. The link between the two runs through actual ledger usage, and that is a metric to watch, not a headline to trade.

The deeper pattern: Two systems, two bets Step back from Ripple and the transatlantic gap looks like two different theories of how to regulate an industry.

Europe chose comprehensiveness first. MiCA is a single rulebook, written once, applied across 30 countries, with a hard deadline and real exclusion for non-compliance. Its critics have a point: the regime’s stablecoin rules, including a blanket ban on interest and heavy bank-deposit reserve requirements, pushed the largest stablecoin issuer on earth out of the market, and the European Commission has already opened a consultation on whether parts of the framework need repair. A rulebook that excludes Tether and stalls RLUSD is not obviously optimized for growth. But it exists, it is enforceable, and a company that clears it knows exactly where it stands.

The United States chose litigation first and legislation later, maybe. The SEC’s enforcement campaign defined the rules by lawsuit, Ripple’s case being the canonical example, and the current Congress is attempting to replace that regime with statute under intense time pressure and presidential conflict-of-interest baggage that no other financial bill has ever carried. The fallback if CLARITY fails is the SEC’s administrative framework known as Regulation Crypto, which Chair Paul Atkins has described as a bridge to legislation. A bridge built by one commission can be dismantled by the next, which is exactly the problem statutes exist to solve. Similar dynamics played out in the stablecoin fight that preceded this one, where, as crypto.news reported, even a bill that eventually passed spent months hostage to fights over state versus federal authority.

For a company like Ripple, which sells to the most conservative buyers in finance, the European bet pays off immediately, and the American bet pays off only if Congress acts. Cross-border payments are also a business where network effects follow regulatory access. Japan already shows what deep institutional integration looks like, with SBI running XRP-based remittance corridors that have no real American equivalent, a story crypto.news has examined in depth. Europe is now the second major bloc where Ripple can attempt that playbook with full regulatory cover. The United States, the company’s home market, is the one place where it still cannot.

There is one more wrinkle worth naming. If the CLARITY Act does pass before the August recess, the transatlantic gap closes fast, and it closes in a way that favors assets with existing institutional plumbing. XRP would enter CFTC jurisdiction as a digital commodity with ETFs already trading, a prime brokerage arm already inside the DTCC’s clearing ecosystem, and a European license portfolio already generating regulated volume. The pieces would connect. If the bill dies, the gap becomes the story for another year at minimum, and Ripple’s center of commercial gravity keeps shifting toward jurisdictions that gave it an answer.

What to watch from here Three markers will tell the story faster than any press release.

First, RLUSD’s European stablecoin authorization. The EMI license gives Ripple the corporate foundation to seek approval for its stablecoin under MiCA’s separate e-money token rules. Until that clears, the most natural settlement asset in Ripple’s European stack stays off the shelf for public offering, and the license story remains half finished.

Second, disclosed European client wins. Licenses are permission, not demand. The proof that regulatory certainty converts into business will arrive as named banks, payment providers, and corporates routing volume through Ripple Payments in the EEA. Watch for whether those announcements specify XRPL settlement or quietly settle in fiat and RLUSD, because that distinction is the entire XRP investment case in miniature.

Third, the Senate floor in the last 2 weeks of July. The merged CLARITY draft, the ethics compromise or its absence, and the 7-Democrat math will determine whether the United States joins Europe in giving Ripple a rulebook or hands the company another year of asymmetry. Either outcome is informative. One of them is also tradable.

The Luxembourg license will not move XRP this week, and anyone claiming otherwise is selling something. What it does is quietly settle an older argument. For years, skeptics said Ripple’s compliance-heavy strategy was expensive theater in an industry that rewarded speed over permission.

In Europe, in July 2026, permission became the product. The companies that skipped the theater are locked out of a market of 450 million people, and the company that endured 4 years of litigation from its own government is, for the moment, more welcome in Brussels than in Washington. That inversion says less about Ripple than it does about the two systems that produced it, and the next month will reveal whether the American half of the story finally catches up.

BNB Chain reported that its Binance Smart Chain (BSC) network has achieved a benchmark throughput of approximately 5,200 transactions per second (TPS) by June 2026, almost doubling its TPS from 2,800 at the beginning of the year. BNB Chain is a leading blockchain platform recognized for prioritizing scalability and speed across its ecosystem.

BSC performance improves in 2026The network reduced its block interval from 750 milliseconds to 450 milliseconds in the first half of 2026, decreasing the time users wait for new blocks to be added and resulting in faster transaction confirmations for developers and applications. BNB Chain also reported that its memory finality improved from 1,125 milliseconds to 650 milliseconds, further reducing the time required to consider transactions as finalized.

BNB Chain highlighted a significant year-to-date rise: “Block intervals: 750 ms to 450 ms, memory finality: 1,125 ms to 650 ms, benchmark throughput: 2,800 to 5,200 TPS. H2 goes further, targeting another 2x throughput increase.”

In parallel, network throughput reached the 5,200 TPS milestone, allowing the BSC to process far more transactions per second than at the start of 2026. This growth serves BNB Chain’s growing user and developer base, which requires higher performance for both decentralized applications and token transfers.

Mini dictionary: Block interval refers to the time between the creation of two consecutive blocks in a blockchain, impacting how quickly new transactions can be processed. Memory finality is the time it takes for a transaction to be confirmed as irreversible on the network.

MetricJanuary 2026June 2026Block Interval750 ms450 msMemory Finality1,125 ms650 msBenchmark TPS2,8005,200Key engineering upgrades fuel gainsBNB Chain attributed its recent performance improvements to a series of technical upgrades. Key enhancements included the Block-Level Access List (BAL), which enables transaction data to be prepared before execution, increasing efficiency and laying the groundwork for parallel processing in future updates.

Another key upgrade, Incremental Snapshot, allows new or delayed nodes—computers responsible for helping operate the blockchain—to synchronize more quickly with the active chain. Enhancements to the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), known as EVM SuperInstruction, seek to reduce unnecessary repeat executions, boosting overall throughput. The introduction of Extended Voting Rules is designed to maintain transaction finality even under challenging network conditions.

Mini dictionary: BSC, or Binance Smart Chain, is a blockchain network built for running smart contract-based applications with high throughput and lower transaction fees, operating alongside Binance Chain.

H2 roadmap aims for further scalingFor the second half of 2026, BNB Chain is targeting another twofold increase in throughput on BSC’s mainnet, forming part of a broader multi-year strategy to achieve a tenfold performance boost. The roadmap outlines plans to implement BEP-675 upgrades and additional fine-tuning of the BAL to further raise network capacity.

Additional roadmap goals include more robust congestion control measures to ensure stable network performance during periods of high demand. The decision to introduce dedicated lanes aims to limit interference between different applications operating on the blockchain.

BNB Chain is also preparing new gas fee models designed for specific business segments, aiming to optimize transaction cost structures for various user groups. The team is developing a new Layer 1 chain architecture with the ambition of reaching over 100,000 TPS and achieving sub-50 millisecond transaction preconfirmation times.

Mini dictionary: BEP-675 is a proposed protocol enhancement for the BSC, aiming to optimize transaction execution and throughput by enabling improved parallel processing and resource management.

Disclaimer: The information contained in this article does not constitute investment advice. Investors should be aware that cryptocurrencies carry high volatility and therefore risk, and should conduct their own research.

Circle, the company behind the USDC stablecoin, paid Coinbase $908 million in distribution costs and revenue sharing during 2024. That figure represents roughly 54% of Circle’s total revenue for the year, making Coinbase less of a distribution partner and more of a landlord collecting majority rent.

The arrangement, formalized through a Collaboration Agreement that took effect on August 18, 2023, is approaching its first major renewal window in August 2026.

The economics of a lopsided partnership Coinbase earns 100% of the reserve interest generated on USDC held directly on its platform. For USDC held anywhere else in the world, Coinbase still collects 50% of that interest income.

Advertisement

For Coinbase, stablecoin-related revenue is projected to reach approximately $1.35 billion in 2025. USDC-related activities accounted for roughly 13.8% of Coinbase’s total revenue in 2024, a figure large enough that any disruption to the partnership would show up clearly in quarterly earnings.

How we got here The current arrangement replaced a previous structure called the Centre Consortium, a joint venture that both companies operated together. When they restructured in August 2023, Circle took sole governance and issuance control of USDC.

As part of that restructuring, Coinbase also took an equity stake in Circle. The Collaboration Agreement runs on an initial three-year term through August 2026, with automatic three-year renewals that depend on performance metrics.

Coinbase’s wandering eye In June 2026, Coinbase endorsed Open USD, a rival stablecoin project. The market reaction was swift: Circle’s stock price dropped more than 17%.

What this means for investors The August 2026 renewal window is the most important date on the calendar for anyone with exposure to either company or to USDC itself. A renegotiation that shifts more revenue toward Circle would hurt Coinbase’s stablecoin income, while a deal that maintains the current structure keeps Circle’s margins under pressure.

For Coinbase investors, the $1.35 billion in projected stablecoin revenue for 2025 represents a substantial revenue stream. Stablecoin demand tends to persist even during bear markets, since traders use stablecoins to park capital, making this revenue line more resilient than Coinbase’s trading fee income.

If Coinbase actively promotes rival stablecoins on its platform, the 50% revenue share on off-platform USDC becomes less valuable as total USDC circulation potentially shrinks. Circle would then face the worst of both worlds: paying high distribution costs on a shrinking asset base.

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

Avalanche Stablecoin Supply Jumps 46% in Seven DaysAvalanche's stablecoin supply has posted one of its sharpest weekly gains on record. According to data shared by @BSCNews, the total stablecoin supply on @Avax surged 46% in just seven days, pushing the figure above $1.8 billion at time of writing. The move has lifted $AVAX into 11th place among all stablecoin networks globally, overtaking both @Plasma and @ripple's $XRP Ledger in the process.

The milestone is notable not just for its speed but for the broader trajectory it reflects. According to Token Terminal data, the combined market cap of stablecoins and tokenized funds on Avalanche climbed from roughly $1.2 billion in January 2024 to just above $2 billion in January 2026, representing a roughly 70% increase over two years. The latest weekly spike suggests that pace is now accelerating.

Institutional Momentum and Network Growth Behind the MoveThe stablecoin surge does not exist in isolation. Avalanche has been building institutional momentum across several fronts in 2026. Avalanche formally launched the Avalanche Payments Collective, an alliance of 28 major organisations including Franklin Templeton, VanEck, and Paxos, aimed at unifying stablecoin settlement, treasury infrastructure, and foreign exchange into a single blockchain-based framework spanning more than 150 countries.

Major financial institutions such as J.P. Morgan, Apollo, and Citi are also using Avalanche for real-world asset tokenization and backend infrastructure. That institutional engagement has helped attract deeper stablecoin liquidity to the network, providing a structural foundation beneath the latest supply figures.

On the technical side, Avalanche's C-Chain can process roughly 88% more transaction throughput than Ethereum while pricing transactions at approximately one-fiftieth of the cost, and it can rapidly increase block size during periods of high demand. Those performance characteristics make it a practical choice for stablecoin issuers and settlement-focused applications looking for speed and low cost.

The credit for building the infrastructure that underpins these results sits largely with the @AvaLabs team, whose continued development work has positioned Avalanche as a credible institutional-grade settlement layer heading into the second half of 2026.

Sources:
Yahoo Finance: Avalanche posts 70% surge in stablecoin and tokenized fund market cap in 2 years
VanEck: Avalanche 201, The Institutional Platform
DefiLlama: Avalanche Stablecoin Market Cap and Supply

James Kihara, Principal Accounting Officer of Acadia Pharmaceuticals (ACAD 0.72%), disclosed the sale of 11,421 shares of common stock in an open-market transaction on June 26, 2026, according to the SEC Form 4 filing.

Transaction summaryMetricValueShares sold (direct)11,421Transaction value~$298,000Post-transaction shares (direct)13,088Post-transaction value (direct ownership)~$331,000Transaction value based on SEC Form 4 weighted average price ($26.08); post-transaction value based on June 26, 2026 market close price.

Key questionsHow does this transaction compare to prior open-market sales by James Kihara?
This 11,421-share sale is Kihara's largest single open-market sale on record, exceeding his previous sale on May 26, 2026 (5,401 shares), and surpassing the five-trade average of approximately 4,964 shares per sale.What proportion of Kihara's available direct shareholding was involved in this sale?
The transaction represented 46.60% of his direct holdings prior to the sale, a significant reduction that left only 13,088 shares directly held post-transaction.Were any derivative or indirect holdings involved in this disposition?
No derivative securities or indirect entities were involved; all shares sold were directly owned common stock, and no options or trust-held shares were reported in this filing.Does the cadence or scale of this sale reflect a change in disposition strategy?
Recent filings indicate an acceleration in selling as Kihara’s holdings have declined, with increasing sale sizes explained by the drawdown in available capacity rather than a discretionary slow-down or escalation.Company overviewMetricValueEmployees653Revenue (TTM)$1.10 billionNet income (TTM)$375.65 million1-year price change23.96%*1-year price change calculated as of June 26, 2026.

Company snapshotCore product: NUPLAZID (pimavanserin) for Parkinson's disease psychosis; pipeline includes late-stage candidates for Alzheimer's disease psychosis, Rett syndrome, and pain management.Revenue is primarily generated through the commercialization of proprietary therapeutics for central nervous system (CNS) disorders, with additional growth potential from clinical-stage assets.Target customers include neurologists, psychiatrists, and healthcare providers treating CNS disorders, with a focus on patients experiencing unmet medical needs.Acadia Pharmaceuticals is a biopharmaceutical company specializing in the discovery, development, and commercialization of innovative treatments for central nervous system disorders.

The company leverages its expertise in neuroscience to address significant gaps in the treatment landscape, with a marketed product and several late-stage pipeline candidates. Acadia’s strategic focus on high-need indications and a robust clinical pipeline position it as a differentiated player within the biotechnology sector.

What this transaction means for investorsThe June 26 sale of Acadia Pharmaceuticals stock by Principal Accounting Officer James Kihara is noteworthy for investors because it represented a substantial disposition of 46.6% of his holdings. The transaction came at a time when Acadia shares were soaring on the news that the European Medicines Agency recommended the company’s Daybue drug be allowed for sale in the European Union.

Kihara’s trade was at a weighted average price of $26.08 per share, close to the 52-week high of $28.35. While it seems he was capitalizing on the rising price, his sale was a non-discretionary transaction executed as part of a pre-established Rule 10b5-1 plan, adopted in December of 2025. Such plans enable insiders to sell shares at predetermined times to avoid concerns of trading on non-public information.

Even so, the fact that he disposed of nearly half his direct holdings is concerning, especially since the sale was about double his average transaction size. However, Acadia’s business is doing well. It kicked off 2026 with $268.1 million in first-quarter revenue, up from the prior year’s $244.3 million.

Robert Izquierdo has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

The exchange recorded $207 million in net withdrawals over seven days following a high-profile user theft claim that spread rapidly across crypto social media. The outflows came after a verified Gate.io user, posting under the handle @jheioff on X, alleged that $1.7 million had been drained from their account despite having every security layer the platform offers turned on.

What actually happened The user claimed their account was compromised through unauthorized changes to their security settings, even though real-name verification, two-factor authentication, and email notifications were all active. Gate.io’s initial response made things worse, not better. The exchange pushed back, saying the actions on the account appeared to be user-initiated and that no systemic breach had occurred. Gate.io CEO Dr. Han stated publicly that the situation was fully disclosed and that customer assets faced no systemic risk.

Widespread criticism followed across X and other platforms, with users questioning whether the exchange’s security architecture was sound and, more pointedly, whether Gate.io would take any financial responsibility for the alleged loss. The backlash was loud enough that Gate.io eventually reversed course, issued an apology, and committed to a full investigation.

Advertisement

The apology came. The $1.7 million, as far as public reporting shows, did not.

Why users started pulling funds The $207 million in net outflows over seven days is a direct expression of that calculus. This pattern is not new for Gate. In 2023, the exchange experienced withdrawal spikes ranging from $148 million to $176 million, triggered not by a confirmed exploit but by rumors circulating online. The 2026 incident follows a similar script, except this time there is an actual user with an actual claim attached to an actual dollar figure.

Gate.io’s history adds texture to the current anxiety. The exchange has faced scrutiny over a purported 2018 incident that some analysts have connected to roughly $230 million in losses that were never publicly disclosed by the platform. Gate.io has not confirmed that characterization, but the historical narrative exists and resurfaces every time the exchange finds itself in a security headline.

What this means for the broader market For Gate.io specifically, the sustained nature of the outflows, seven days of net withdrawals rather than a single-day panic, suggests this is not pure noise. A one-day spike can be dismissed as overreaction. A week of consistent net outflows is a platform bleeding trust in slow motion.

For traders still holding funds on Gate.io, the investigation timeline is the key variable to watch. If the exchange produces a transparent account of what happened and offers some form of restitution to the affected user, it has a path back to stability. If the inquiry goes quiet, the $207 million in outflows is unlikely to be the final number.

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

PASCAGOULA, Miss., July 11, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- HII (NYSE: HII) christened the future USS George M. Neal (DDG 131), the fourth Flight III Arleigh Burke-class destroyer to be built at the company’s Ingalls Shipbuilding division.

The ship is named for Aviation Machinist’s Mate Third Class George M. Neal, a Korean War veteran and Navy Cross recipient. In 1951, Neal’s helicopter crashed during a rescue attempt in the North Korean mountains. He evaded enemy forces for nine days before being captured and held as a prisoner of war for two and a half years. He was released and returned to the United States in 1952 along with more than 320 fellow prisoners of war.

Performing the duties of the under secretary of the Navy, William Toti delivered the keynote address. “The future USS George M. Neal honors a legacy of extraordinary courage and sacrifice,” Toti said. “As we christen this ship, we mark another step toward building the Navy our nation needs. Flight III destroyers are critical to our nation’s security, and we are proud to accept each one built by the skilled workforce at Ingalls."

Photos accompanying this release are available at: http://hii.com/news/hii-christens-guided-missile-destroyer-george-m-neal-ddg-131/.

Toti’s remarks highlighted the deep connection between the Navy’s mission and the dedicated Americans who design and build the ships that carry it forward. Building on that message, HII President and CEO Chris Kastner underscored the unique skill and commitment of the Ingalls Shipbuilding team.

“As a company, HII does a lot of amazing things, but only people — human beings — build ships. They build ships with their hands, their minds and toughness. The people of Ingalls Shipbuilding are among the finest craftsmen and craftswomen on the face of the Earth,” Kastner said. “When she is delivered, DDG 131 will be the most powerful surface combatant in the world. She will be ready. She’ll be ready because the United States of America makes a conscious choice, generation after generation for now 250 years, to invest in U.S. Navy ships, built by Americans, in America.”

The ship’s sponsor and daughter of the namesake, Kelley Neal Gray, performed the traditional bottle-breaking ceremony against the bow to formally christen DDG 131. In her remarks, she honored her father’s legacy and expressed gratitude to those who built the ship.

“On behalf of my family, I express my deepest gratitude to the United States Navy, to the incredible honor, for this magnificent destroyer after my father, George Milton Neal,” Gray said. “We are forever grateful that his life of service, sacrifice and courage will be remembered through a ship that will one day defend our nation and carry his legacy throughout the world.”

U.S. Rep. Mike Ezell, representing Mississippi’s 4th District, also addressed ceremony attendees.

“Today’s christening of the future USS George M. Neal is a proud moment for Mississippi and our nation,” Ezell said. “George M. Neal’s courage, sacrifice, and service represent the very best of America, and it is fitting that this warship will carry his legacy for generations to come. I’m grateful to the hardworking men and women of Ingalls Shipbuilding whose craftsmanship strengthens our Navy, supports our Gulf Coast economy, and helps keep our nation safe.”

To date, Ingalls has delivered 36 Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, including the first Flight III, USS Jack H. Lucas (DDG 125), and Ted Stevens (DDG 128). Flight III destroyers currently under construction include Jeremiah Denton (DDG 129), George M. Neal (DDG 131), Sam Nunn (DDG 133), Thad Cochran (DDG 135), and John F. Lehman (DDG 137). Ships in pre-planning include Telesforo Trinidad (DDG 139), Ernest E. Evans (DDG 141), Charles French (DDG 142), Richard J. Danzig (DDG 143), Intrepid (DDG 145), Robert Kerrey (DDG 146), and Ray Mabus (DDG 147).

Flight III Arleigh Burke-class destroyers represent the next generation of surface combatants and incorporate a number of design modifications that collectively provide significantly enhanced capability. Upgrades include the AN/SPY-6(V)1 Air and Missile Defense Radar (AMDR) and the Aegis Baseline 10 Combat System required to keep pace with the threats well into the 21st century.

Video of the ceremony, along with additional information on DDG 131 and the Arleigh Burke-class program, is available at www.hii.com/events/DDG131.

About HII

HII is America’s largest shipbuilder, delivering the world’s most powerful ships and all-domain mission technologies, including unmanned systems, to U.S. and allied defense customers. HII is the largest producer of unmanned underwater vehicles for the U.S. Navy and the world.

With a more than 140-year history of advancing U.S. national security, HII builds and integrates defense capabilities extending from the core fleet to C6ISR, AI/ML, EW and synthetic training. Headquartered in Virginia, HII’s workforce is 44,000 strong. For more information, visit:

HII on the web: https://www.HII.com/HII on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TeamHIIHII on X: https://www.twitter.com/WeAreHIIHII on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/WeAreHIIHII on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wearehii
Contact:

Kimberly K. Aguillard
[email protected]
228-355-5663

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/173938d8-a6b0-484d-b1b9-dcf22b5e76f5

Warren Buffett served as the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway (BRKA 0.17%)(BRKB 0.33%) from 1965 to 2025, growing it into a $1 trillion conglomerate with numerous wholly owned subsidiaries and a portfolio of stocks and securities that is today worth about $347 billion. Buffett continues to serve as Berkshire's chairman, but his chosen successor, Greg Abel, took over as CEO at the beginning of 2026.

Berkshire Hathaway stock delivered compound annual growth of 19.7% during Buffett's 60-year tenure, which would have been enough to turn a $500 investment made in 1965 into a staggering $24 million as of the end of 2025. Therefore, Abel has very big shoes to fill, and it appears he's already swinging for the fences.

Berkshire purchased shares of Google parent Alphabet (GOOG 0.29%)(GOOGL 0.50%) last year, but it has quadrupled its position since Abel took the helm. The stake is now worth over $30 billion and accounts for almost 9% of the conglomerate's equity portfolio. Alphabet is scheduled to report its operating results for the second quarter on July 22, and that earnings release will be a key test of Berkshire's biggest bet under Abel so far.

Image source: Alphabet.

Berkshire will be looking for more AI-driven momentum at Google Search AI was initially expected to be a massive disruption to Alphabet because chatbots like OpenAI's ChatGPT can be a more convenient way for people to find information online compared to traditional search engines like Google Search. But Alphabet has invested heavily in new AI-powered features like AI Overviews and AI Mode to create a hybrid user experience, and it's paying off.

AI Overviews combine text, images, and links to third-party sources to give users fast responses to their Google Search queries. These answers appear above the traditional search results, so users don't have to sift through web pages to find the information they need. AI Mode, on the other hand, opens a chatbot-style interface where users can expand on their initial queries by asking follow-up questions.

Alphabet said AI Overviews fueled growth in overall Google Search usage during the first quarter of 2026, and it also said a growing number of users globally are tapping into AI Mode. This is critical because when Google Search receives more traffic, it can serve more ads and generate more revenue.

The benefits are already showing up in Alphabet's financial results. Google Search generated a record $60.4 billion in revenue during the first quarter, which was a 19% increase from the year-ago period. It was also the fourth consecutive quarter of accelerating growth, and shareholders like Berkshire will be looking for evidence of further momentum in Alphabet's second-quarter report.

Google Cloud likely had another record quarter While Google Search consistently accounts for more than half of Alphabet's total revenue, Google Cloud is the company's fastest-growing segment. Its revenue soared 63% year over year in the first quarter to $20 billion. Most of that growth can be attributed to Google Cloud's expanding portfolio of AI tools and services.

The cloud computing infrastructure provider operates data centers all over the world that are fitted with advanced chips and components specifically designed for processing AI workloads. Some of those chips come from suppliers like Nvidia, but Alphabet has also designed its own AI chips in partnership with Broadcom. They are called Tensor Processing Units (TPUs), and the latest versions -- the eighth generation of the chips -- are the most powerful yet.

Today's Change

(

-0.50

%) $

-1.81

Current Price

$

357.08

Google Cloud rents computing capacity from its data centers to other businesses, many of which use it to develop and power AI software. Clients can also access a series of ready-made large language models (LLMs) through the cloud platform, including Alphabet's own Gemini family, which they can use to accelerate their software development goals.

All eyes will be on Google Cloud's second-quarter revenue growth on July 22, but there's another key number investors would be well advised to watch. The platform's order backlog nearly doubled sequentially to $462 billion during the first quarter, driven by customers who were waiting for more data center capacity to come online. If that figure continued to soar in Q2, Wall Street might have to start pricing in even faster future cloud revenue growth, which would be positive for Alphabet stock.

Alphabet stock looks cheap  Berkshire owned 17.8 million Alphabet shares at the end of 2025. Under Abel's leadership, the conglomerate has more than quadrupled its position to around 86.4 million shares. Alphabet is now the fifth-largest position in Berkshire's portfolio, just behind Bank of America.

Alphabet stock has set multiple new all-time highs this year, so Berkshire has been buying on the way up. That might surprise people who followed Buffett's career, because he is a value investor who preferred to buy stocks when they were beaten down, or at least trading below what he considered to be a fair price.

However, despite the recent gains in Alphabet stock, it isn't necessarily expensive. It's currently trading at a price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of 27.3, so it's still cheaper than the Nasdaq-100 technology index, which has a P/E ratio of 35.2. Plus, based on Wall Street's earnings estimate for 2027, Alphabet's 1-year forward P/E is just 24.6.

GOOGL PE Ratio data by YCharts.

One quarterly report is unlikely to derail Alphabet's positive momentum, but there is no denying that the company's financial performance will likely depend on the success of its AI initiatives. As a result, investors might be watching its second-quarter results more closely than usual, given how high the stakes are for this early-stage technology.

July 22 could be an important day for Abel as Berkshire's shareholders gauge the success of his first big swing. However, I expect each of Alphabet's quarterly reports going forward will be equally critical for the new CEO, given the size of this position.

Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU) has received another bullish endorsement from Wall Street, with TD Cowen reiterating its ‘Buy’ rating and maintaining a $1,600 price target on the memory-chip giant.

The target implies a 63% upside from Micron’s press-time value of $979. 

MU one-week stock price chart. Source: Finbold The firm’s analyst Krish Sankar reaffirmed confidence in the company’s long-term growth outlook, pointing to sustained demand for memory products and supply constraints that are expected to persist beyond 2027.

TD Cowen’s bullish stance follows investor meetings with Micron Chief Executive Officer Sanjay Mehrotra and Chief Financial Officer Mark Murphy. 

The firm highlighted strong industry fundamentals, noting that physical production constraints continue to limit supply while demand remains robust across key end markets.

A major component of the firm’s thesis centers on Supply Constrainment Agreements (SCAs), which provide customers with guaranteed access to memory products while giving Micron greater revenue visibility. 

TD Cowen estimates that nearly 50% of Micron’s total revenue could eventually be covered by such agreements, helping the company secure long-term pricing stability and improve profitability.

The analyst also pointed to continued tightness in the DRAM market, with recent industry checks indicating average selling prices could increase by more than 15% during the current quarter.

Demand for high-bandwidth memory (HBM), DRAM, and NAND products remains elevated as artificial intelligence infrastructure spending continues to accelerate.

Wall Street bullish on MU stock price  The broader analyst community remains overwhelmingly positive on the stock. According to consensus estimates from 30 Wall Street analysts over at TipRanks, Micron carries a ‘Strong Buy’ rating, with 29 buy recommendations, one hold rating, and no sell ratings.

 The average 12-month price target stands at approximately $1,564, while the highest target reaches $2,200 and the lowest sits at $1,100.

MU 12-month stock price prediction. Source: TipRanks Overall, Micron has emerged as one of the biggest beneficiaries of the AI-driven memory boom. The stock has delivered extraordinary gains over the past year, climbing from double-digit levels to trade near $1,000, although shares have experienced heightened volatility in recent weeks amid broader semiconductor sector pullbacks.

Micron stock fundamentals  The company’s latest financial results reinforced the bullish narrative. For the third quarter 2026, Micron reported revenue of $41.46 billion, representing a 346% year-over-year increase, while adjusted earnings per share came in at $25.11, comfortably ahead of analyst expectations. 

Management also issued fourth-quarter revenue guidance of approximately $50 billion, signaling continued momentum across its business.

Beyond near-term demand strength, Micron is also expanding its manufacturing footprint. The company recently increased its long-term U.S. investment commitment to $250 billion through 2035 as it seeks to expand domestic DRAM production capacity and capitalize on growing demand for AI-related memory solutions.

William J.G. Griffith, a Director at Netskope, Inc. (NTSK 0.80%), reported an indirect purchase of ~610,000 shares of Class A Common Stock for ~$7.2 million on July 8, 2026. SEC Form 4 filing.

Today's Change

(

-0.80

%) $

-0.10

Current Price

$

12.32

Company snapshotSector: TechnologyIndustry: Software - ServicesMarket Capitalization: $5.0 billionTTM Revenue: $752.9 millionTTM Net Income: -$716.6 millionNetskope is a leading cloud security provider, offering clients a comprehensive, unified platform known as Netskope One. This integrated solution is meticulously engineered to ensure robust data protection, facilitate secure access, and deliver extensive visibility across various applications, web activity, and cloud services.

Transaction summaryMetricValueTransaction value~$7.2 millionShares purchased~610,000Post-transaction shares (directly held)0Post-transaction shares (indirectly held)~66.9 millionPost-transaction value$797.18 millionTransaction value based on SEC Form 4 weighted average purchase price ($11.82); post-transaction value based on July 8 market close ($11.92).

Key questionsHow significant was this acquisition relative to the director's existing position?
The purchase of ~610,000 shares represents a 0.92% increase in William J.G. Griffith's total indirect position, bringing the aggregate holdings managed through various ICONIQ entities to ~66.9 million shares.At what price level did the insider deploy capital?
Shares were acquired at a weighted-average price of $11.82, reflecting a slight discount to the $11.92 market close on the transaction date of July 8, 2026.What is the director's total beneficial ownership following this transaction?
The director maintains total beneficial ownership of ~66.9 million shares, held entirely through indirect entities, while also holding 16,778 derivative securities directly.Which specific entities are involved in the director's indirect ownership?
The holdings are distributed across ICONIQ Strategic Partners VIII Holdings, L.P., ICONIQ Strategic Partners VI, L.P., ICONIQ Strategic Partners VI-B, L.P., ICONIQ Strategic Partners VI Co-Invest, L.P. (Series NS), ICONIQ Strategic Partners II, L.P., ICONIQ Strategic Partners II-B, L.P., and ICONIQ Strategic Partners II Co-Invest, L.P. (Series NS).Company OverviewMetricValueShare Price (as of market close 2026-07-09)$12.42Market Capitalization$5.0 billionRevenue (TTM)$752.9 millionNet Income (TTM)-$716.6 millionCompany SnapshotNetskope, Inc. develops and delivers Netskope One, a unified cloud security platform that provides comprehensive data protection, secure access, threat prevention, and networking capabilities across cloud applications and web services.The company operates a subscription-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) business model, generating recurring revenue from enterprise customers through platform licensing and support services.Netskope serves large enterprises and mid-market organizations that require integrated cloud security solutions to protect data and ensure secure access across modern cloud-native environments.Netskope is a leading cloud security provider with a market capitalization of $5.0 billion and TTM revenue of $752.9 million, serving a growing market of enterprises transitioning to cloud-first architectures. The company's Netskope One platform consolidates multiple security functions into a single, integrated solution, providing competitive differentiation through comprehensive visibility and protection across cloud services and web activity. As a pure-play cloud security vendor, Netskope is positioned to benefit from sustained enterprise investment in cloud infrastructure security and data protection initiatives.

What this transaction means for investorsThere are many reasons an insider may sell shares of a company, some of which have nothing to do with their opinion of the stock’s direction.

There is only one reason an insider buys stock: they believe the price will rise.

Based on that alone, Griffith’s purchase is bullish for Netskope stock, especially since studies show that insider purchases predict a share price gain in the next 30 days more often than not.

Netskope just went public in September 2025 at a share price of $19. That the shares are significantly lower nearly a year later is typical of stocks post-IPO: they often need time to find their legs in the market as long-term investors gain comfort with the business and come in to accumulate more shares. ICONIQ has backed Netskope for years, and the fact that Griffith is buying shows the firm continues to believe in the business’s long-term viability and its share price.

There’s reason to believe that: in its first-quarter fiscal 2027, reported at the start of June, Netskope sales rose 28% to $202 million, beating prior guidance from management. That tracks with expectations for a stronger year for Netskope.

Ark Invest CEO Cathie Wood has long been a crypto bull. In the company's 2025 Big Ideas report, Ark Invest said its 2030 base-case price target for Bitcoin (BTC +0.30%) is $700,000, with a bull case of $1.5 million.

Although Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have been crushed this year, Wood and Ark don't seem to be giving up yet, as they typically take a long view of what they believe are groundbreaking technologies.

Ahead of a big potential U.S. Senate vote on the Clarity Act, Ark has been buying cryptocurrency names such as Coinbase Global (COIN +0.40%) and Circle Internet Group. Here's the bet.

Image source: Getty Images.

How the Clarity Act would benefit crypto companies At the very end of June, disclosures from Ark Invest showed that its ARK Innovation ETF purchased 66,754 shares of Circle and 37,153 shares of Coinbase.

While we don't know the exact thinking of Wood and her team, there is a good chance they are buying Coinbase and Circle on the bet that the Senate will pass the Clarity Act, a broad regulation bill that crypto advocates see as a game changer. The bill seeks to create a framework for crypto regulation in the U.S. by doing three main things.

First, it provides a legal definition of a "mature blockchain" as "a blockchain system, together with its related digital commodity, that is not controlled by any person or group of persons under common control." The bill also provides a clear framework for dividing regulatory jurisdiction between the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).

The CFTC would have exclusive regulatory authority over spot markets and cryptocurrencies that are intrinsically connected to a blockchain. Cryptocurrencies classified as digital commodities trading on "mature blockchains" would not be securities and therefore would not need to be registered with the SEC. There are other provisions in the law that seek to protect investors and prevent pump-and-dump schemes.

Today's Change

(

0.40

%) $

0.63

Current Price

$

159.07

Finally, the Clarity Act contains provisions on stablecoins, digital assets pegged to a currency or commodity, that prevent idle stablecoins from earning yield, but do allow yield to be issued based on rewards for certain activities, such as transactions.

Passage of the Clarity Act would be good for Coinbase and Circle for a few reasons. For one, a clear regulatory framework would enable more of the traditional finance world to engage with crypto without fear of regulatory repercussions.

Clearer jurisdictional boundaries between the SEC and the CFTC would make it easier for exchanges to offer different cryptocurrencies on their platforms without worrying about whether they are skirting securities registration laws.

The stablecoin provision is also very important. It is not a complete win for Circle and Coinbase, which would have liked to offer yield on idle stablecoins. However, banks were concerned that doing this could have led to a run on traditional deposits.

Still, the language suggests that crypto platforms can incentivize people to use stablecoins for transactions, which could expand their ecosystems and usage.

Will the Clarity Act pass? The bill has been over a year in the making. The U.S. House of Representatives approved the legislation easily in mid-June last year, but it still hasn't cleared the Senate, which requires 60 votes to pass.

The Trump administration has been trying to get the law passed before the midterm elections. Congress is scheduled to be in recess from Aug. 10 to Sept. 11, adding more pressure to the timeline.

There are 53 Republicans in the Senate, so seven Democrats or independents are needed to make the law a reality. As of July 7, only two Democrats have publicly said they support the bill.

Furthermore, Sen. Mitch McConnell's (R-KY) status is currently unknown, as the longtime Republican senator has been hospitalized for the past several weeks with what is speculated to be a serious ailment.

As of this writing on July 9, Kalshi placed the odds of the Clarity Act receiving more than 60 votes from the Senate at just 25%, although these percentages change quickly.

Perhaps Wood and her team have studied the political landscape closely or simply believe that broad crypto legislation is only a matter of time.

PANews July 11 news, Galaxy research head Alex Thorn stated that the “abandoned Bitcoin” case surrounding “Noah Doe’s” attempt to obtain ownership of Satoshi Nakamoto’s Bitcoin through legal proceedings has seen a major development. The Bitcoin Policy Institute (BPI) has formally applied to intervene as a defendant in the case and seeks to have the court dismiss the entire lawsuit. It is learned that a defendant under the pseudonym “John Doe 33” had previously appeared in court as an individual, denying the plaintiff’s attempt to link him to an address holding 5,000 BTC. Additionally, The Digital Chamber has also submitted an amicus brief opposing the legal theories advanced by the plaintiff.

Alex Thorn said that BPI, represented by the law firm White & Case, has not only applied to intervene in the case but has also submitted a proposed answer, 15 affirmative defenses, and plans to file a motion to dismiss.

BPI argues that it has standing to intervene because the organization self-custodies a portion of its Bitcoin reserves intended to be held indefinitely, and the plaintiff’s theory that “long-term inactivity constitutes abandonment” could precisely sweep similar assets into future litigation. It contends that merely discovering a public address is like obtaining someone’s bank account number and does not confer ownership of the assets therein; the wallet itself does not exist on-chain; and holding coins for more than five years should not be deemed “abandonment,” but rather the “HODL” strategy long practiced by the Bitcoin community.

Alex Thorn stated that if the legal logic of the “Noah Doe” case is ultimately upheld by the court, it could become a precedent to deprive long-term self-custody users of asset ownership in the future. Therefore, this litigation concerns not only assets related to Satoshi Nakamoto, but also the legal foundation of the entire Bitcoin self-custody ecosystem.

Previous news, a plaintiff under the pseudonym “Noah Doe” filed a lawsuit in a New York court, seeking ownership of 39,069 dormant Bitcoin wallets, including addresses attributed to Satoshi Nakamoto. These wallets are estimated to hold approximately 3.7 million BTC, worth around $290 billion. The plaintiff, through two Wyoming shell companies ABC Company and XYZ Company, submitted a 901-page complaint on May 1, claiming these Bitcoins qualify as “abandoned property” under New York’s lost property law.

On-chain analytics platform CryptoQuant reported that spot liquidity in the XRP market is rapidly increasing, but the delegitimization process in derivatives trading, which has been ongoing since mid-June, has not yet ended.

According to CryptoQuant data, Binance experienced a significant increase in XRP spot trading activity between July 4th and 8th. Specifically, on July 7th, 64.9 million XRP were injected into the exchange, while 49.2 million XRP were withdrawn on the same day.

The analysis added that this volatility in the spot market was not the factor that triggered the closing of positions in derivative markets. It was noted that the size of open XRP positions on Binance decreased from over $500 million in mid-June to $431 million by July 4th, and further to $399 million by July 10th.

During the same period, long position liquidations increased by 94 percent on a weekly basis. While long position liquidations were reported to be 172 percent above the average of the last three months, short position liquidations decreased by 53 percent.

CryptoQuant stated that the high inflows and outflows in the spot market indicate investors repositioning their capital rather than anticipating a new and strong direction. The continued decline in open positions suggests that leveraged capital continues to exit the XRP derivatives market.

In contrast, a different trend was observed in funding rates. Binance XRP funding rate, which briefly turned negative at the end of June, increased by 266 percent on a weekly basis, rising to 0.007.

According to CryptoQuant, as open positions decline while funding rates rise and long position liquidations increase, it indicates that remaining or newly opened long positions in the market are paying increasingly higher premiums. This suggests that despite a decrease in the total derivatives market capitalization, a segment of investors still maintains a bullish outlook.

On-chain data, however, presents a more balanced picture compared to the derivatives market. The number of active addresses on the XRP network remains 11 percent below the average of the last three months, indicating that broad-based network participation has not yet fully recovered.

However, the number of transactions increased by approximately 3-4 percent on both a weekly and monthly basis. Nevertheless, the total number of transactions remains 21 percent below the three-month average.

During the same period, a decline in the NVT ratio, which measures the relationship between XRP’s network value and transaction volume, suggested that the previous decline in network usage may have slowed and usage may have begun to stabilize.

CryptoQuant stated that the market becomes more vulnerable to funding rate corrections during periods when long position liquidations continue, funding rates rise, and the derivatives market size shrinks.

If this trend continues, funding rates may fall again as overly optimistic leveraged positions are liquidated. However, strengthening spot demand and a continued recovery in network activity could limit the impact of any potential correction.

*This is not investment advice.

Follow our Telegram and Twitter account now for exclusive news, analytics and on-chain data!

Tom Lee has reaffirmed that Ethereum will play the central role as traditional finance and cryptocurrency converge into a single market.

Summary

Tom Lee says traditional finance and crypto will eventually merge into one market, with Ethereum at the center. His comments come as Bitmine’s Ethereum treasury has grown to 5.74 million ETH, equal to 4.8% of the total supply. Lee also links Ethereum’s outlook to the CLARITY Act and expanding layer-2 payment activity involving Visa and Shopify. According to a post published by Bitmine chairman Tom Lee on X, he believes the line separating traditional financial markets and digital assets will eventually disappear, with Ethereum positioned at the center of that transition.

— Thomas (Tom) Lee (not drummer) FundstratDirect.com (@fundstrat) July 10, 2026 Lee shared the view while responding to a post from Fundstrat Capital head of distribution Carrie Presley, who recalled telling him during an interview nearly six years ago that she was highly optimistic about Ethereum and blockchain technology. Lee acknowledged the exchange and reiterated that he remains bullish on Ethereum.

His latest comments arrive as Bitmine continues expanding one of the largest corporate Ethereum treasuries in the market. The company said last week that it held 5,742,237 ETH, equal to about 4.8% of Ethereum’s circulating supply of roughly 120.7 million ETH. Bitmine added that its combined crypto holdings, cash, marketable securities, and other investments were valued at about $11.1 billion.

Bitmine continues expanding its Ethereum treasury Recent disclosures show Bitmine has steadily increased its Ethereum holdings throughout the year. Crypto.news previously reported that the company added another 27,084 ETH in its latest weekly purchase, pushing its treasury above 5.7 million ETH before the newest holdings update confirmed the total at more than 5.74 million ETH.

Beyond Ethereum, Bitmine reported holding 206 Bitcoin alongside $527 million in cash and marketable securities. The company also disclosed equity investments in Beast Industries and Eightco Holdings as part of its balance sheet.

Lee has repeatedly linked Ethereum’s long-term outlook to changing U.S. crypto regulation. In earlier comments released by Bitmine, he said investors had become more optimistic about the chances of the CLARITY Act advancing through Congress, arguing that clearer rules could support smart contract platforms as digital assets become more integrated into payment systems and financial services.

Ethereum adoption continues to expand into financial services While discussing Ethereum’s role in financial infrastructure, Lee pointed to existing commercial activity already taking place on Ethereum layer-2 networks. According to his earlier remarks, companies including Shopify and Visa already process USDC-related activity through Ethereum scaling networks, demonstrating practical use beyond speculation.

Presley’s recent reminder of their conversation from nearly six years ago also highlighted how long Lee has maintained his positive view on Ethereum. Responding publicly on X, Lee confirmed that his conviction has remained unchanged, adding that he still expects Ethereum to become the foundation connecting traditional finance with the crypto economy as both markets continue moving closer together.

At press time, Ethereum (ETH) was trading at around $1,800, little changed over the past 24 hours and up 2.2% over the previous seven days.

16h05 ▪ 6 min read ▪ by Ghiles A.

Summarize this article with:

The Ethereum network continues to evolve, but its geographical distribution remains a subject of monitoring for researchers. A new study from the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance shows that a significant share of nodes operates in North America and Europe. This snapshot of the network highlights several technical and legal issues. It also reminds us that the location of infrastructures can influence the protocol’s resilience. The updated data finally sheds new light on the network’s energy consumption after the merge.

In brief 31% of Ethereum nodes are hosted in the United States, compared to 39% in the European Union excluding the United Kingdom. The network can stop finalizing its transactions if more than a third of validators become simultaneously inactive. The concentration of infrastructures and client software remains a major issue for Ethereum’s resilience and decentralization. Ethereum’s energy consumption has dropped by about 99.98% since the merge, according to the new Cambridge study. Ethereum’s Geographic Distribution Is Dominated by the United States and Europe The new study indicates that 31% of Ethereum activity is now hosted in the United States. The European Union, excluding the United Kingdom, concentrates about 39% of this activity. In a statement attributed to the daily show The Starting Block, Alexander Neumuller, head of research at the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance, estimates that the distribution remains heavily oriented towards Western countries. However, it does not indicate excessive concentration in a single state.

Researchers also observe that nodes rely heavily on three major hosting providers: Hetzner, AWS, and OVH. Alexander Neumuller recalls that Hetzner’s terms of use previously prohibited operating blockchain services. However, he notes that this policy may have evolved. This concentration of infrastructures therefore deserves ongoing attention, even if the data do not show a unique national imbalance.

The study also emphasizes that the relationship between nodes and validators remains difficult to measure precisely. The same access point can indeed host several validators. Researchers explain that it is therefore impossible to know exactly the number of validators associated with each infrastructure.

The One-Third Threshold Remains a Key Concern for the Network The analysis conclusions remind us of an important characteristic of Ethereum’s operation. Contrary to some misconceptions, the network does not need to lose half of its validators to encounter a problem. As soon as more than a third of validators simultaneously cease their activity, checkpoint finalization may be interrupted.

This situation explains why the distribution of Ethereum nodes represents a strategic element for the network’s stability. An interruption affecting a widely used infrastructure could slow down overall operation. However, Alexander Neumuller specifies that the available data do not allow a direct link to be established between each node and the exact number of validators it hosts.

Concentration concerns not only physical infrastructures. According to the researcher, client software diversity also plays a crucial role. A technical defect affecting a dominant client could quickly spread to a large part of the network. The report thus presents detailed data on the distribution of consensus clients and execution clients to illustrate this other risk factor.

A New Energy Estimate and Ongoing Legal Challenges The location of nodes goes beyond the simple technical framework. In 2022, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) estimated that it could claim jurisdiction over Ethereum. The authority notably relied on the fact that a majority of the network’s infrastructure was then hosted on U.S. soil. This issue therefore continues to fuel reflections on the legal framework applicable to transactions.

Alexander Neumüller nonetheless presents the current geographical distribution as a balance he considers positive, while specifying that it is his personal assessment. According to him, better geographical distribution is an advantage for a decentralized network.

Geographical distribution is a real asset for the network’s resilience, even if the community must continue to monitor its evolution. At the same time, a strong concentration of client software could amplify the consequences of a bug affecting the most used client.

Alexander Neumuller, Head of Research at the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance, Source: The Block. He also believes that a strong concentration of client software risks quickly spreading the effects of a bug affecting the network’s main client. On this, the community must continue to closely follow this development.

The report also updates Ethereum’s energy estimates thanks to a new methodology. Researchers now use empirical data on node distribution between residential and commercial hosting, rather than theoretical assumptions. This approach takes into account software changes made after the merge, which can modify equipment consumption.

The new estimates assess the annual network consumption at about 7.9 gigawatt hours, equivalent to a continuous power of one megawatt. This corresponds to the consumption of about 2,000 British households. The study also estimates that this consumption remains about 99.98% lower than levels observed before the merge. Finally, the share of sustainable energy used by the network now exceeds 56%, compared to an estimated global average of 43%.

Researchers also estimate the theoretical cost of fully offsetting annual emissions through high-quality carbon credits. This would be between 25,000 and 55,000 pounds sterling, an amount Alexander Neumuller compares to the price of a car. He indicates that this estimate is the result that surprised him most. The Ethereum Foundation supported this study, while researchers specify that their analyses on decentralization reflect their own interpretation. Upcoming observations will measure whether this geographical distribution continues to evolve while preserving network resilience.

Maximize your Cointribune experience with our "Read to Earn" program! For every article you read, earn points and access exclusive rewards. Sign up now and start earning benefits.

Join the program

A

A

Lien copié

Ghiles A.

Journaliste et rédacteur web passionné par l’univers des cryptomonnaies et des technologies Web3. J’y traite les dernières tendances et actualités afin de proposer un contenu de haute qualité à un large public du secteur.

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.

Hedera’s native token HBAR has fallen more than 2% after blockchain security researchers reported that a suspected exploit had moved more than $5.8 million in assets from the Hedera network to Ethereum.

Summary

Suspected Hedera exploit moved more than $5.8 million in assets to Ethereum, according to blockchain security researchers. Specter and PeckShield said the attacker bridged funds through LayerZero before swapping WBTC for ETH. HBAR fell more than 2%, trading near $0.069 as the reported exploit unfolded. According to blockchain security researcher Specter, the suspected attacker had already bridged more than $3.7 million worth of assets from Hedera to Ethereum before continuing to move additional funds.

There appears to be an ongoing hack involving @hedera Network, with over $3.7M already bridged to Ethereum by the attacker.

The stolen funds are currently being swapped from WBTC for ETH after being bridged from the Hedera network via Layerzero.

Theft addresses:… pic.twitter.com/KSxd3K2vlu

— Specter (@SpecterAnalyst) July 11, 2026 Specter said the stolen assets were being swapped from Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) into Ether (ETH) after crossing chains through LayerZero. The researcher also published two wallet addresses believed to be linked to the incident.

At the time of writing, CryptoBull360 reported that the wallet’s estimated value had increased to roughly $5.8 million, indicating that more assets had reached Ethereum after the initial transfers. The shared wallet data showed holdings of about 3,203 ETH, representing nearly 80% of the portfolio, alongside roughly 20% in WBTC.

According to data from crypto.news, Hedera (HBAR) price traded around $0.069, down more than 2% following the reports of the suspected exploit.

Cross-chain transfers have continued after the initial breach As additional transactions appeared on-chain, blockchain security firm PeckShield said the suspected exploit had already transferred approximately $5.25 million from the Hedera mainnet to Ethereum. The firm added that the wallet held around 2,360 ETH, valued at roughly $4.25 million, and 15.58 WBTC, worth about $1 million, at the time of its analysis.

PeckShield also reported that the wallet had originally been funded with 1 ETH from Tornado Cash, citing on-chain transaction history. The observation identifies the source of the wallet’s initial funding but does not establish who controls the address or who carried out the alleged attack.

The wallet screenshots shared by both Specter and PeckShield showed a series of inbound transfers arriving within a short period before the assets were converted into ETH.

Investigation remains ongoing as official details are limited Neither Specter nor PeckShield identified the party responsible for the suspected exploit, and no official estimate of the total losses had been released at the time of writing. The reported value of the stolen assets continued to change as additional funds were observed moving through the wallet.

The incident is still developing, with blockchain security researchers continuing to monitor the addresses and publish updates as new transactions appear on-chain. Meanwhile, market participants are watching for an official statement from the Hedera team regarding the reported exploit and any measures taken to contain its impact.

The Hedera incident comes amid a series of security-related developments reported by crypto.news in recent weeks. Blockaid recently said it detected an active exploit targeting Summer.fi, estimating losses of about $6 million at the time of its alert.

Separately, Ctrl Wallet announced it will permanently shut down after a security exploit affecting some Cardano wallets, giving users until Aug. 3 to withdraw their assets. Meanwhile, crypto.news also reported that Secret Network has proposed migrating SCRT from Cosmos to Arbitrum, with the team citing security risks, weaker liquidity, and an aging codebase in its July 7 governance proposal.

Hedera-based lending protocol Bonzo Lend lost about $9 million after an attacker manipulated the price of SAUCE used as collateral, allowing the account to borrow assets far beyond the value deposited.

In a preliminary incident report published Saturday, Bonzo said the attacker deposited 250 SAUCE, worth only a few dollars, before submitting a price update that inflated the token’s value by roughly 12 orders of magnitude. The wallet then borrowed 6.63 million USDC and 34.5 million wrapped HBAR from the lending pool.

The case illustrates how oracle failures can turn low-value collateral into a tool for draining large amounts of liquidity from lending protocols, even when the application and underlying network continue operating as designed. 

Bonzo attributed the incident to a flaw in Supra’s on-chain oracle verifier, which accepted a manipulated SAUCE price carrying a zeroed signature. The protocol said Supra acknowledged the issue and deployed a fix, while stressing that the incident was not a vulnerability in Bonzo Lend’s contracts or Hedera’s core network.

Estimated economic impact of the incident. Source: Bonzo Finance

DeFi hacks continue to pressure the sector The incident adds to a growing number of exploits targeting decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols in 2026. 

The second quarter had become the most-hacked quarter on record by incident count, with 83 exploits and about $755 million stolen. Cross-chain bridge exploits accounted for $351 million, while compromised administrator attacks and fake token price manipulation represented 37% of quarterly losses. 

In 2026, DeFi’s total value locked (TVL) had fallen 39% to over $70 billion in June from about $115 billion in January. CryptoRank recorded 121 hacks and roughly $942 million in losses over the period, saying repeated security incidents likely weighed on user confidence and reinforced capital outflows.

The Bonzo incident also follows a similar collateral-pricing exploit on Stellar. In February, attackers drained roughly $10 million from a YieldBlox DAO-managed lending pool after manipulating the price path used to value USTRY collateral, allowing them to borrow assets beyond the token’s real worth. 

Magazine: Will the crypto lobby's $189M campaign get CLARITY over the line?

Cointelegraph is committed to independent, transparent journalism. This news article is produced in accordance with Cointelegraph’s Editorial Policy and aims to provide accurate and timely information. Readers are encouraged to verify information independently.

Uniswap just crossed $1 billion in cumulative trading volume on Robinhood Chain. It took nine days.

To put that in perspective, the chain’s public mainnet launched around July 1, and by July 10 the leading decentralized exchange had already processed a billion dollars in trades. Daily active traders surpassed 220,000 during the same stretch.

The numbers behind the surge The trajectory was steep from the start. Uniswap racked up roughly $250 million in trading volume during its first week on Robinhood Chain, then saw a single-day explosion to approximately $500 million on July 8. That one-day spike ranked the chain’s Uniswap activity second only to Ethereum mainnet.

Advertisement

Uniswap’s total value locked on Robinhood Chain topped $30 million by July 10. The broader chain’s TVL cleared $106 million during the same window.

All four of Uniswap’s protocol versions, v2, v3, v4, and UniswapX, were live from day one as the primary public automated market maker.

The trading activity wasn’t driven by a single catalyst. Two categories dominated: tokenized stocks and memecoins.

Why Robinhood Chain matters for DeFi Robinhood Chain is built on Arbitrum’s Layer 2 technology, giving it 100-millisecond block times.

The UNI governance token responded accordingly, climbing as much as 14% during the volume surge.

What this means for investors The tokenized stocks angle deserves particular attention. If traders on Robinhood Chain can seamlessly swap between memecoins and tokenized equities using the same DEX interface, that blurs the line between traditional brokerage services and DeFi in ways regulators will almost certainly want to examine.

The $106 million in total chain TVL is still modest compared to established L2s like Arbitrum One or Base, which hold billions.

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

Cover image via U.Today Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by our writers are their own and do not represent the views of U.Today. The financial and market information provided on U.Today is intended for informational purposes only. U.Today is not liable for any financial losses incurred while trading cryptocurrencies. Conduct your own research by contacting financial experts before making any investment decisions. We believe that all content is accurate as of the date of publication, but certain offers mentioned may no longer be available.

Shiba Inu community veteran Mazrael highlighted Japan's latest crypto push, which stands to benefit Shiba Inu.

According to Mazrael, Japan just took another major step toward becoming one of the world's most crypto-friendly economies.

🇯🇵 Japan just took another major step toward becoming one of the world's most crypto-friendly economies.

• Crypto is being recognized as regulated financial products.
• The government is moving toward legalizing crypto ETFs.
• SHIB is already on Japan's JVCEA Green List,… https://t.co/A05BOgkjdc pic.twitter.com/Gkxqam60kJ

— Mazrael.Shib (@Mazrael_shib) July 11, 2026 This comes as cryptocurrencies are recognized as regulated financial products in the country. Last month, Japan's House of Representatives passed a bill that moves crypto regulation from the Payment Services Act to the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act.

You Might Also Like

HOT Stories

The new rules, due to come into force next year, would treat crypto assets as financial instruments, subjecting them to lower taxes and stricter trading rules. They also open the door to new products such as exchange-traded funds (ETFs).

Mazrael also highlighted Japan's push toward legalizing crypto ETFs. Japan is getting closer to bringing cryptocurrency further into its mainstream financial system after indicating support for crypto exchange-traded funds. Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama stated the government is working on a legal framework to allow these investment products in the domestic market.

Big win for SHIB?Japan has over 14 million open cryptocurrency accounts, with low- to middle-income retail customers driving the growth.

You Might Also Like

Shiba Inu is positioned to benefit from this growing market as it is already on Japan's JVCEA Green List, which makes it easier for regulated platforms in the country to list. JVCEA said it had added Shiba Inu to the Green List last November. This is significant as being on the list is like getting a fast pass for Japanese exchanges.

SHIB is also available through Mercoin, a Tokyo-based subsidiary of Japan's massive e-commerce and marketplace app Mercari, thus expanding access across Japan.

Japan opened a major door for SHIB in April with its listing on Rakuten Wallet, a cryptocurrency trading platform owned by Japan's Rakuten Group. Shiba Inu is now utilized in the ecosystem, which includes Rakuten Pay with 44 million users, allowing SHIB to reach people who have never even thought about crypto.

HomeStock IdeasLong IdeasTech 

SummaryKyber delay concerns remain unconfirmed, while Nvidia maintains its roadmap and $91 billion quarterly revenue outlook.Nvidia's second AI wave expands beyond hyperscalers into enterprise, sovereign AI, and agentic applications globally.AI Cloud, Industrial, and Enterprise revenue grew 31% sequentially, while AI Cloud revenue tripled year-over-year.Nvidia's ecosystem, software moat, and AI factory strategy support growth beyond traditional GPU demand cycles. PonyWang/iStock via Getty Images

Introduction The industry is still thinking about Nvidia (NVDA) in the context of the first wave of AI, where demand was largely limited to a select group of hyperscalers looking to train ever-more complex foundation

687 Followers

Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have a beneficial long position in the shares of NVDA either through stock ownership, options, or other derivatives. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.

Seeking Alpha's Disclosure: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. Any views or opinions expressed above may not reflect those of Seeking Alpha as a whole. Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker or US investment adviser or investment bank. Our analysts are third party authors that include both professional investors and individual investors who may not be licensed or certified by any institute or regulatory body.

American Express (AXP +1.11%) stock has been sliding this year as the market continues to worry about interest rates, inflation, oil prices, and how they're going to impact the economy. The Warren Buffett favorite, though, continues to demonstrate growth and momentum. Are the worries unfounded?

Here's why card-fee growth matters more than spending growth right now, and what to expect when the company reports second-quarter earnings on July 24.

Image source: American Express.

The inflation-proof model American Express isn't the largest credit card network in the world, but it targets the affluent, who tend to spend more. It has a fee-based model for most of its cards that attracts a higher-income population, and even though it only has 155.9 million cards in force, its revenue is actually much higher than that of Visa (V +0.27%), which services about 5 billion cards worldwide.

Data by YCharts.

This model works well and provides resilience in challenging economic environments because it has a recurring revenue stream that flows directly to the bottom line. Whether members shop more or less, they still pay the annual fee. There have been times when even its higher spenders have been under pressure, and the fee-based model has provided protection during those periods.

So far, business has been robust despite the challenging macroeconomy. In the 2026 first quarter, revenue increased 11% year over year, while card fees, which accounted for 14.5% of the total, increased 18%. Billed business was up 10%. Earnings per share (EPS) were up 18% as well to $4.28, and Wall Street is looking for $4.40 in EPS for the second quarter, a 7.8% increase year over year.

The future growth engine Another feature that plays into this is its successful pivot targeting younger shoppers, who are buying into the long-term model. Millennials accounted for 30% of the total in the first quarter but increased 13%, while Gen-Z cardmembers accounted for 6% of the total but grew 38%. That's in contrast with Gen-X members, who accounted for 36% and grew 8%. These shoppers should provide years of growth as they engage with the platform, pay annual fees, and spend.

Today's Change

(

1.11

%) $

3.86

Current Price

$

350.58

American Express, which is looking a lot more like a subscription business than a volume play, can navigate challenges more smoothly than a company like Visa, which simply takes a small cut of every swipe. In Visa's case, fewer swipes mean less revenue. In Amex's case, more swipes sweeten the deal, but it's still coming out ahead.

It's also a lot cheaper than Visa, trading at 21 times trailing-12-month sales vs. 31 for Visa. That likely figures into why Buffett likes it so much more, and it could be undervalued as a subscription-based model at this price.

(This is the Warren Buffett Watch newsletter, news and analysis on all things Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway. You can sign up here to receive it every Friday evening in your inbox.)

Berkshire gains ground but still trails S&P as '26 enters second halfWith 2026 a bit more than half over, Berkshire Hathaway's B shares are down 1.8% year-to-date and 12.4 percentage points behind the S&P 500's 10.7% gain. (Including dividends, the S&P is up 11.4% giving it a 13.1 percentage point lead).

A strong June for Berkshire erased almost a third of its 17.5 percentage point deficit as of June 1, its biggest losing margin of the year so far.

Even with that June bump, however, it's been a tough Q2 (+ 10 days) for Berkshire with a gain of a bit more than 3% versus the benchmark's strong tech-driven 16% advance, totally erasing what was a slim 1.8 percentage point Berkshire lead at the end of March.

Last year, Berkshire underperformed the S&P by 5.5 percentage points excluding dividends. The deficit was 7.0 percentage points with dividends included.

Berkshire execs spotted at exclusive Sun Valley conferenceBerkshire Hathaway CEO Greg Abel and portfolio manager Ted Weschler aren't featured in the Forbes article on "Sun Valley's Billionaire Summer Camp" now underway in Idaho.

But they are on the magazine's list of attendees and photos from CNBC's David Grogan and Brendan McDermid of Reuters provide visual evidence they are present at the annual Allen & Co. invitation-only gathering of moguls, along with names like Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Sam Altman.

Warren Buffett went to Sun Valley for decades but has not attended the last few years.

In 1999, at the height of the dotcom craze, he gave a notable speech at the conference warning that while the internet would be transformative, investors were expecting too much and were bound to be disappointed.

BUFFETT & BERKSHIRE AROUND THE INTERNETHIGHLIGHTS FROM CNBC'S BUFFETT ARCHIVEAI could make financial scams a 'growth industry' (2024)Warren Buffett describes seeing a convincing AI-generated video of himself that has him worried the technology will make financial scams much more effective.

watch now

AUDIENCE MEMBER: How do you think about the role of technological advances, especially generative AI, on more traditional industries? Thank you...

WARREN BUFFETT:  I don't know anything about AI. But I do — I do have — I don't — that doesn't mean I deny its existence or importance or anything of the sort.

And last year I said, you know, that we let the genie out of the bottle when we developed nuclear weapons, and that genie has been doing some terrible things lately.

And the power of that genie is what, you know, scares the hell out of me. And on, the other hand, I don't know any way to get the genie back in the bottle.

And AI is somewhat similar. It's out — it's part-way out of the bottle. And it's enormously important, and it's going to be done by somebody...

Now AI, I had one experience that does make me a little nervous. And I'll just explain it.

Very recently — fairly recently — I saw an image in front of my eyes on the screen, and it was me, and it was my voice and wearing the kind of clothes I wear. And my wife or my daughter wouldn't have been able to detect any difference. And it was delivering a message that no way came from me.

So — it — when you think of the potential for scamming people, if you can reproduce images that I can't even tell, that say, I need money, you know, it's your daughter, I've just had a car crash. I need fifty thousand dollars wired.

I mean, scamming has always been part of the American scene. But this would make me, if I was interested in investing in scamming, it's going to be the growth industry of all time.

And it's enabled in a way — you know, obviously AI has potential for good things, too, but I don't know how you — based on the one I saw recently, I practically would send money to myself over in some crazy country. (Laughter)

So I don't have any advice on how the world handles it because I don't think we know how to handle what we did with the nuclear genie.

But I do think, as someone who doesn't understand a damn thing about it, that it is — it has enormous potential for good and enormous potential for harm, and I just don't know how that plays out.

BERKSHIRE STOCK WATCHFour weeks

Twelve months

BRK.A stock price: $739,750.00

BRK.B stock price: $493.71

BRK.B P/E (TTM): 14.70

Berkshire market capitalization: $1,064,452,706,579

Berkshire Cash as of March 31: $397.4 billion (Up 6.5% from Dec. 31)

Excluding Rail Cash and Subtracting T-Bills Payable: $380.2 billion (Up 3.0% from Dec. 31)

Berkshire repurchased $234 million of its shares in Q1 2026.

BERKSHIRE'S TOP EQUITY HOLDINGS - Jul. 10, 2026Berkshire's top holdings of disclosed publicly traded stocks in the U.S. and Japan, by market value, based on the latest closing prices.

Holdings are as of March 31, 2026, as reported in Berkshire Hathaway's 13F filing on May 15, 2026, except for:

Alphabet, which includes the $10 billion in shares that Berkshire agreed to buy directly from the company, as announced on June 1, 2026. Berkshire has not yet formally disclosed whether the transaction has been completed. The entry is a combination of Class A and Class C Alphabet shares. The market price is a weighted average of the prices of the two classes.Mitsubishi, which is as of April 30, 2026The full list of holdings and current market values is available from CNBC.com's Berkshire Hathaway Portfolio Tracker.

QUESTIONS OR COMMENTSPlease send any questions or comments about the newsletter to me at [email protected]. (Sorry, but we don't forward questions or comments to Buffett himself.)

If you aren't already subscribed to this newsletter, you can sign up here.

Also, Buffett's annual letters to shareholders are highly recommended reading. There are collected here on Berkshire's website.

-- Alex Crippen, Editor, Warren Buffett Watch

This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

Applied Materials (NASDAQ:AMAT | AMAT Price Prediction) just told the Street its semiconductor equipment business will grow more than 30% in calendar 2026, an upward revision from a prior bar of 20%. That is the sound of an AI fab CapEx supercycle shifting from thesis to invoice, and the picks-and-shovel names selling into every foundry, HBM stack and gate-all-around node are the ones cashing the checks. Five stocks sit directly under that spending fire hose. Here is where the money is moving, in order.

1. Onto Innovation: The Advanced-Packaging Sleeper Onto Innovation (NYSE:ONTO) is the name most retail investors still cannot spell, but it sits at the exact chokepoint AI needs: inspection and metrology for HBM stacks, 2.5D logic and gate-all-around devices. When TSMC and SK hynix bolt an accelerator together, Onto’s Dragonfly and Atlas tools decide whether the die passes or scraps. That is process control leverage on the fastest-growing corner of the fab, well beyond commoditized deposition.

The Q1 FY26 earnings report did the talking. Revenue hit a record $291.95 million, up 9.5% year over year, with the advanced nodes business tracking roughly 25% full-year growth. Onto also locked a volume purchase agreement worth more than $240 million with a leading HBM manufacturer running through 2027. CEO Mike Plisinski flagged “the accelerating adoption of our Atlas G6 OCD system for next-generation logic and memory devices” as the tell.

The stock action agrees. ONTO closed at $321.44 on July 10 after ripping nearly 94% higher year to date and more than 212% over the past year. The analyst target sits at $369.60 with seven of seven analysts at a Buy or Strong Buy rating. The bigger surprise is what a $479 billion incumbent is telling investors about 2026.

2. Applied Materials: The Heavyweight Raising Its Own Bar Applied Materials is the broadest AI-fab exposure in the group. Deposition, ion implant, CMP, epitaxy, advanced packaging: If a wafer moves, Applied touches it. Gate-all-around transistor transitions and HBM DRAM stacking both pull disproportionate dollars per wafer, and Applied’s Precision Selective Nitride PECVD and Trillium ALD tools were built for exactly that geometry.

Q2 FY26 delivered a fourth straight beat: non-GAAP EPS of $2.86 versus $2.66 expected, revenue of $7.91 billion, up 11.4% year over year, and non-GAAP operating margin expanding to 32.1% from 30.7%. CEO Gary Dickerson bluntly raised the ceiling: “we now expect our semiconductor equipment business to grow more than 30% in calendar 2026.”

Shares reflect the move: AMAT closed at $602.50 on July 10, up 124.09% year to date. Forward P/E of 36 is not cheap, but with 28 Buy ratings against a single Strong Sell, the Street is not blinking. The next name goes narrower and hits harder on memory.

3. Lam Research: Etch, Deposition, and the HBM Stack Lam Research (NASDAQ:LRCX) owns the etch and deposition tools required to build 3D NAND and stack HBM DRAM dies without wrecking yield. Every incremental HBM3E and HBM4 layer means more Lam content per wafer. That is why the memory recovery narrative and the AI CapEx narrative converge on this ticker.

Q3 FY26 was a record quarter across the board: EPS of $1.47 beat by 7.83%, revenue hit $5.84 billion, up 23.76% year over year, and operating margin expanded to 35.0% from 33.9%. Q4 guidance calls for revenue of roughly $6.60 billion. CEO Tim Archer framed it plainly: “Lam delivered record revenue and EPS in the March quarter as AI-driven demand reshapes the semiconductor industry.”

_________________________________

What's Your Number...?Here's a question most people 5y from retirement can't answer: at your current savings rate, how much do you need, and how long will it actually last? A good advisor can put a date on that in a single meeting. SmartAsset's free quiz matches you with up to three fiduciary advisors serving your area, so you can get YOUR retirement number now (sponsor)

__________________________________________

The stock closed at $350.33 on July 10, up 89.31% year to date and 246.66% over the last year. Analyst target is $357.77 with 29 of 35 analysts at a Buy or Strong Buy rating. Etch and deposition are the volume game. The next stock is the quality game, and it has monopoly economics.

4. KLA: The Process-Control Moat Nobody Can Bypass KLA Corporation (NASDAQ:KLAC) does one thing better than anyone: tell foundries where the defects are before a wafer becomes a $30,000 doorstop. There is no advanced node, no HBM stack and no CoWoS package being built at scale in 2026 without KLA inspection and metrology on the floor. That is the moat, and it prints margins that look like software.

Q3 FY26 revenue was $3.42 billion, up 11.5% year over year, with the Semi Process Control segment doing $3.08 billion. The kicker is profitability: TTM operating margin of 41.2% and return on equity of 95%. Capital return matched the confidence: a 17th consecutive dividend increase to $2.30 per share and a new $7 billion buyback authorization. CEO Rick Wallace called KLA “a key enabler of the AI ecosystem” across foundry/logic, memory, advanced packaging, and services.

KLAC closed at $231.52 on July 10, up nearly 82% year to date. Solid, though the real punchline is a $56 billion test company whose AI exposure just detonated.

5. Teradyne: The AI Test Kingpin Teradyne (NASDAQ:TER) tests the chips after everyone else builds them. Every accelerator, every HBM die, every networking ASIC gets validated on Teradyne automatic test equipment before it ships to a hyperscaler. Approximately 70% of Q1 revenue is tied to AI-related demand. There is no other name on this list with that level of direct AI concentration.

Q1 FY26 obliterated estimates. Revenue: $1.28 billion, up 87.04% year over year. Non-GAAP EPS: $2.56 versus $2.11 expected, a 21.15% beat. Non-GAAP operating margin expanded to 37.5% from 20.5% a year prior, and net income surged 303.36% to $398.9 million. CEO Greg Smith made the thesis explicit: “our results reflect the strength of our wafer to AI data center strategy.”

Shares closed at $359.60 on July 10, up 73.25% year to date and 264.63% over the past year. Analyst target is $423.41. Retail has noticed too: Reddit engagement spiked in mid-June with 263 upvotes and 73 comments in a single peak window on r/wallstreetbets. Robotics remains free optionality on top of the test franchise.

The Bottom Line Applied Materials raised its 2026 growth bar past 30%, KLA green-lit a $7 billion buyback, Lam printed a record quarter, Onto locked HBM into 2027, and Teradyne grew revenue 87%. That is a coordinated capex flood, well beyond a simple rotation, and the equipment vendors are the toll booths. China export controls and tariffs remain the tail risk on all five names, but with hyperscaler capex still climbing and every advanced node needing more process control per wafer, the window for reasonable entry is narrowing quarter by quarter.

If You’ve Been Thinking About Retirement, Pay Attention (sponsor) Retirement planning doesn’t have to feel overwhelming. The key is finding expert guidance, and SmartAsset’s simple quiz makes it easier than ever for you to connect with a vetted financial advisor. Here’s how:

Answer a Few Simple Questions. 

Get Matched with Vetted Advisors 

Choose Your  Fit 

Why wait? Start building the retirement you’ve always dreamed of. Get started today! (sponsor)  

Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.

Morgan Stanley has increased its Bitcoin holdings by nearly 1,000 BTC over the past two weeks, lifting its tracked balance above 5,700 BTC, according to on-chain data.

Summary

Morgan Stanley added nearly 1,000 BTC over the past two weeks, pushing its tracked holdings to 5,761 BTC. Arkham data shows the accumulation came through multiple large transfers from Coinbase Prime rather than a single purchase. The latest buying follows Morgan Stanley’s June crypto expansion with Galaxy Digital, allowing eligible clients to convert crypto into spot investment products. According to blockchain intelligence platform Arkham, the investment bank continued adding Bitcoin through its spot Bitcoin investment product during the recent market pullback. Arkham’s latest portfolio data shows Morgan Stanley now holds 5,761 BTC worth roughly $369.9 million, making it one of the larger institutional Bitcoin holders tracked on the platform.

Source: Arkham The latest increase follows a series of transfers recorded over the past two weeks instead of a single purchase. Arkham’s transaction history shows several large inflows from Coinbase Prime wallets, including transfers of 495.8 BTC, 171.9 BTC, 166.2 BTC, 154.8 BTC, 143.3 BTC, 126.1 BTC, 120.4 BTC, and another 34.4 BTC within the last 14 hours. The activity also includes minor operational transfers and a 1 BTC movement back to Coinbase Prime, leaving the firm’s net increase at roughly 1,000 BTC.

Source: Arkham Latest purchases have come through multiple large transfers Recent Arkham data indicates Morgan Stanley accumulated Bitcoin in stages rather than executing a single large transaction. Most of the recorded inflows originated from Coinbase Prime custody and deposit addresses, suggesting institutional settlement activity linked to its Bitcoin investment product.

At current market prices shown on Arkham, the firm’s Bitcoin holdings are valued at nearly $370 million. Arkham also classifies the entity as a fund, an exchange-traded product, and a Bitcoin whale, while linking the portfolio to 11 tracked wallet addresses.

The latest buying extends a pattern of adding exposure during price weakness. Although Arkham describes the activity as another instance of Morgan Stanley “buying the dip,” the platform does not disclose whether the transactions represent direct purchases, client subscriptions, or other operational inflows into the investment vehicle.

Crypto investment services have expanded for wealthy clients The recent accumulation follows Morgan Stanley Wealth Management’s June announcement that it had expanded its digital asset offering through a referral arrangement with Galaxy Digital.

Under the program, eligible high-net-worth clients can lend cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin, Ether, and Solana to Galaxy Digital and receive shares in spot crypto investment products, including the Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Trust. According to the companies, the structure allows investors to move crypto exposure into regulated investment vehicles without first selling their digital assets.

Morgan Stanley and Galaxy Digital also said the arrangement can reduce in-kind crypto-to-exchange-traded product onboarding times by as much as 75%, making transfers into regulated investment products faster than conventional processes.

The expanded client offering and the latest on-chain accumulation come as institutional participation in spot Bitcoin investment products continues to grow. While Arkham’s wallet data tracks assets associated with Morgan Stanley’s Bitcoin product, the platform does not identify the underlying investors or distinguish between firm-owned holdings and assets managed on behalf of clients.

In a year when the artificial intelligence (AI) trade minted fortunes across chipmakers and power suppliers, one of the companies best positioned to profit from AI at scale has been left behind. Amazon (AMZN 0.73%) has been one of the megacap laggards of 2026, up only modestly while the AI names raced higher around it.

What makes that odd is that Amazon's business is arguably in its best shape in years. The stock even drew fresh attention recently when a well-known hedge fund manager was reported to have trimmed his position, adding to a sense that the market has cooled on it.

So, with the stock sitting about 12% below its 52-week high, is Amazon a bargain hiding in plain sight? Or is the market right to hesitate?

Image source: Getty Images.

The business is quietly setting records The place to look first is the cloud. Amazon Web Services, the company's most important profit engine, just reaccelerated. AWS revenue rose 28% year over year to $37.6 billion in the first quarter of 2026. That was its fastest growth in 15 quarters, and it puts the business at about a $150 billion annual pace.

A good chunk of that reacceleration is AI itself. Companies increasingly train and run their models where their data already sits, and for many of them that means AWS.

The growth is also enormously profitable. AWS generated $14.2 billion in operating income at a 37.7% margin, which is why it drives most of Amazon's profits even though it is a fraction of total revenue.

The rest of the company pulled its weight, too. Total revenue rose 17% to $181.5 billion, and operating income jumped to $23.9 billion. That worked out to an operating margin of 13.1%, a record for Amazon and a sign that years of cost discipline in retail are finally showing up.

By segment, North America revenue rose 12% to $104 billion, and the international business grew 19%, both turning a solid profit. Advertising, a high-margin business tucked inside retail, keeps growing at a double-digit clip and quietly pads those margins.

Amazon is even building a substantial AI chip business. Its custom silicon now runs at more than a $20 billion annual revenue pace and is growing at triple-digit rates, as customers hunt for cheaper alternatives to the priciest graphics processing units (GPUs).

Today's Change

(

-0.73

%) $

-1.81

Current Price

$

245.23

What's holding the stock back So why hasn't the stock followed? The short answer is spending. Amazon poured $44.2 billion into capital projects in the first quarter alone, most of it for AI infrastructure, up from $25 billion a year earlier.

That surge has all but erased the company's free cash flow, which fell to about $1.2 billion over the trailing 12 months, down from nearly $26 billion.

That is the figure that worries investors. A company famous for generating cash is suddenly generating almost none. The bet is that today's spending builds the data centers that power tomorrow's AWS growth. But that payoff takes years, and the timing is never guaranteed.

Still, I think the trade-off looks reasonable. The spending is a choice, not a symptom of a struggling business. AWS is reaccelerating, retail margins are improving, and the chip business gives Amazon a second way to profit from AI.

Amazon has made this kind of bet before, too. It spent heavily to build AWS and its logistics network years ago, and both turned into enormous profit engines once the investment cycle passed.

And the price is fair. At about $244 as of this writing, Amazon trades at roughly 29 times earnings. That isn't the bargain-bin multiple its underperformance might suggest, but it's a reasonable price for a business growing profits at this rate, and a discount to where the stock has often traded in the past.

So is Amazon a bargain? Not a screaming one. But I think it's good value here, and the setup is appealing: a market-leading business performing well on several fronts, temporarily out of favor because it is investing heavily for the future.

Personally, I'd be comfortable buying on this weakness. I'd just go in knowing that the heavy spending, and the pressure it puts on free cash flow, is likely to continue for a while. For patient investors, the laggard may turn out to be the opportunity.