It wasn’t just tech stocks that rallied this week. Gold, silver and base metals all came roaring back. Gold gained more than 7% for the week and climbed back above $4,300. Silver surged nearly 10% toward $63, while copper returned above $14,000 per ton. To me, the key change is simple: The market is starting to price in the idea that U.S. rates may have already peaked. Payrolls Removed the Biggest Headwind U.S. nonfarm payrolls fell by 23,000 in July, versus expectations for an increase of around 80,000. After the data, expectations for further tightening dropped sharply, while the dollar weakened and Treasury yields moved lower. That matters a lot for gold. The biggest pressure on gold over the past few months was not a lack of safe-haven demand. It was high oil prices, sticky inflation a

$SanDisk Corp.(SNDK)$and $Western Digital(WDC)$ both reported strong results. SanDisk posted revenue of $8.97 billion and adjusted EPS of $39.25. Western Digital reported revenue of $3.75 billion and adjusted EPS of $3.56. Both beat expectations. Yet the market reaction remained weak. The key takeaway is simple: memory fundamentals are still strong, but investors no longer reward past results. They only care about how much guidance can beat expectations. 🔥 1. SanDisk’s Profit Surge Still Depends on Pricing SanDisk’s revenue rose 51% quarter over quarter. Roughly two-thirds of the increase came from higher prices, while only one-third came from shipment growth. This confirms

AMD fell as much as 7% after hours, while SpaceX dropped about 6%. The earnings reports were not bad. The problem was that neither stock had been priced for a normal beat. AMD came into earnings with expectations set too high. SpaceX is simply spending money too fast. AMD: The Surprise Had Already Been Priced In AMD reported second-quarter revenue of $11.54 billion, up 50% year over year, with adjusted EPS of $1.66. The company also guided for roughly $13 billion in third-quarter revenue. Data center revenue reached $6.72 billion, up 107%, as both EPYC CPUs and Instinct accelerators continued to ramp. Put these numbers on almost any other semiconductor company, and investors would have very little to complain about. AMD still got hit after hours. The first reason was simple: the stock had

The most important signal today was not the Nasdaq rising roughly 2%. It was money moving back into the entire AI supply chain. With $苹果(AAPL)$ as the only exception, the Magnificent Seven rallied almost across the board. $Meta Platforms, Inc.(META)$gained roughly 6%, $微软(MSFT)$ and $谷歌(GOOG)$nearly 5%, Amazon 4.6%, Tesla 3.5%, and Nvidia around 3%. Amazon’s market capitalization also crossed $3 trillion for the first time. The rally then spread upstream. $Applied Optoelectronics Inc.(AAOI)$surged ro

These four earnings reports did not prove that the storage cycle is ending. If anything, they confirmed the opposite: AI data-center orders remain strong, storage prices are still rising, and supply remains tight. What has changed is the market’s scoring system. Previously, revenue growth and record profits were enough to push a stock higher. Now, even the strongest results in a company’s history can trigger a selloff if they fail to beat already-extreme consensus expectations. That is also how I view the upcoming earnings report from $SanDisk Corp.(SNDK)$ The results will probably be very strong. The problem is that “very strong” may no longer be enough. CompanyActual ResultsVersus ExpectationsMy View

Storage stocks finally stopped falling. $闪迪(SNDK)$surged approximately 26%, $美光科技(MU)$gained 18.4%, $西部数据(WDC)$ rose 15.4%, and $希捷科技(STX)$ climbed 11.4%. Microsoft’s earnings and Amazon’s accelerating AWS growth restored confidence in the AI infrastructure trade. Oversold conditions and short covering then transformed that confidence into an explosive rally. It was an incredible session. But one giant green candle is not enough to confirm a reversal. Samsung Proved the Memory Boom Is Still Real Samsung delivered one of the strongest memory earnings reports of t

This earnings season made one thing very clear: Wall Street is not turning bearish on AI. It is simply becoming much more selective about who deserves to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on it. Microsoft surged nearly 16%. Meta fell roughly 8%. Amazon delivered an enormous earnings beat, but the quality of that beat was more complicated than the headline suggested. All three companies are spending aggressively on AI. The difference is how quickly that spending is turning into revenue and cash flow. Microsoft Proved AI Can Generate Cash $Microsoft(MSFT)$ delivered the cleanest answer. Quarterly revenue reached $90 billion, Azure grew 43%, and management expects cloud growth to accelerate to approximately 45% next quarter. The c

Today was a macro-driven selloff, not the end of the AI trade. The Dow fell 2.2%, the S&P 500 lost 1.5%, and the Nasdaq dropped 1.7%. Oil surged back toward $90, the Fed delivered a hawkish hold, and crowded semiconductor positions faced another round of forced selling. But after the close, Microsoft and Meta confirmed something far more important: the AI investment cycle is not slowing down. If anything, it is still accelerating. The Fed Held Rates, but the Message Was Hawkish The Federal Reserve kept rates unchanged at 3.50%–3.75%, but the vote was 9–3, with three policymakers calling for an immediate 25-basis-point hike. That was not a normal pause. The Fed is still worried about inflation, while the market has started pricing in a real possibility of another hike. At the same time,

Today, global memory stocks finally staged a meaningful rebound. It felt like weeks of pent-up pressure were finally released. South Korea’s KOSPI rose roughly 3.6%, while Japan’s Nikkei gained about 3.3%. Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, and Kioxia $KIOXIA HLDGS CORP(KXIAY)$ all rallied. Japan was closed yesterday, and Kioxia came back today with a 17% surge—nearly brought me to tears.[Cool][Smart][Sly] In U.S. premarket trading, SNDK, MU, WDC, and STX were also all higher. Asia-Pacific market performance There was also a fundamental catalyst today: South Korea’s exports during the first 20 days of July rose 52.3% year over year, with semiconductor exports surging 180.6%. At the very least, this confirms that memory shipments have

Why AAOI Plunged After Announcing a Capacity Expansion: One Piece of Good News Exposed the Market’s Biggest Concern The optical communications sector also suffered a sharp sell-off today. As of around 2:45 p.m. Eastern Time, $Applied Optoelectronics(AAOI)$ was down approximately 12.2%, $Lumentum(LITE)$ had fallen around 7.7%, and $Coherent(COHR)$was down roughly 5.3%. AAOI’s decline was significantly steeper than those of other major optical communications companies. The most obvious explanation was the company’s newly released announcement regarding the expansion of its Pearland facilities. AAOI announced that it h

To be honest, back between April and June, so many people wanted to say one thing: "Buffett, you're getting old! This new era belongs to the youth, to tech, and to AI! Your investment style is outdated!!" But now that it's July, everyone is finally realizing that Buffett is still the true Oracle. I guess people are finally understanding what he meant by "the most important thing is to stay alive." There is a saying that I think hits the nail on the head: "Buy when there is panic; sell when there is hysteria." I hope everyone can reflect on this and take it to heart.