Zero Rss

58% Against, Both Parties Scrambling: Data-Center Revolt Hits The Midterms

A "booming backlash" against AI data centers is shaping the midterm election - candidates cutting ads touting their anti-data-center credentials, protesters showing up at campaign events, industry players taking note - which will come as genuinely useful news to anyone who has spent the past year getting their information exclusively from NBC News.

The network's framing is that last year's elections in a handful of states revealed the hyperscale buildout as a major tension point up and down the ballot, and that the fight has now intensified into a full midterm issue - with demonstrators displaying "Stop Data Centers" signs at President Trump's Michigan appearance on Sunday - the protest movement having now reached the point where it greets the president of the United States at his own events.

The anti-data center protest during President Trump’s speech in Michigan: pic.twitter.com/EjsuS7yn7g

— Craig Mauger (@CraigDMauger) July 27, 2026

According to the report, Republicans, Trump included, have shifted toward ensuring data centers do not drive up voters' power bills, which is what happens when the polling gets loud enough to be heard over the donor calls.

A June Yale Program on Climate Communication poll cited by CNBC found 58% of registered voters oppose data-center construction in their own area - including 53% of conservative Republicans, which is not a demographic famous for agreeing with the 74% of liberal Democrats who feel the same way. More than 300 cities, towns and counties have enacted bans or moratoriums on hyperscale construction, per a count by The Information, and Data Center Watch tallied 75 major projects worth more than $130 billion delayed or canceled in the first quarter of 2026 alone - roughly matching the damage from all twelve months of 2025. New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed the nation's first statewide moratorium this month, voters in Monterey Park, California passed a permanent ban at the ballot box, and in April an unknown attacker fired 13 shots into the home of an Indianapolis councilman who had voted for an AI facility, leaving a note reading "No Data Centers," per The Week - the point at which a land-use dispute stops being a land-use dispute.

This is what it sounds like living next to a data center. The video below was recorded at midnight, and the data center is situated next to 100s of residential homes. pic.twitter.com/BHGqt3vKfb

— Merissa Hansen (@merissahansen17) May 10, 2026

The issue is bipartisan in the most literal sense: nobody knows which party owns the issue. In Wisconsin, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Francesca Hong is campaigning on a pledge to "tax the rich, fund our schools and stop AI data centers," per AP, while Pennsylvania's Josh Shapiro takes fire from his own rural base for welcoming the buildout onto prime farmland. In deep-red west Texas - which JLL projects will overtake northern Virginia as the world's largest data-center market by 2030 - protest groups led by Republicans are springing up in Lubbock, some of whose founders say they may not vote for Governor Abbott at all, and Abbott has responded by ordering regulators to make sure Texans are not paying higher electricity bills for the privilege of hosting Google. When the same issue is simultaneously a Democratic socialist's headline pledge and a Republican rancher's reason to stay home, the consultants have a problem no ad buy fixes.

None Of This Will Surprise Regular Readers

We've been tracking this revolt since it was a smattering of county fights. Earlier this month - in one day, there were 142 coordinated protests across 42 states under Tea Party veteran Amy Kremer, who declared that America is not for sale and predicted data centers on the ballot in November and again in 2028.

Today was incredible!

142 protests. 42 states. One message: ONE NATION UNITED AGAINST DATA CENTERS!

Communities across America showed up today for a National Day of Protest Against AI Data Centers to say that We The People deserve a voice before massive data centers are… pic.twitter.com/TwE7oRjR6V

— Kylie Jane Kremer (@KylieJaneKremer) July 18, 2026

The prediction is aging well - and now the mainstream media is catching up, four months before midterms. Meanwhile the enforcement arm of the buildout keeps generating its own coverage - this week's example being the Kansas physics teacher jailed for clapping at a data-center hearing while the commission passed the zoning anyway.

A high school teacher in Kansas was arrested for clapping in opposition to a proposed data center during a city council meeting. pic.twitter.com/yWRy5P0NHP

— FactPost (@factpostnews) July 28, 2026

Needless to say, the pitchforks are out...

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 15:45

The Facts Behind China's "Gold Reset"

Authored by Peter Reagan,

The internet loves a reset.

A “reset” takes an impossibly complicated subject and boils it down to a date, a decision and one big red button.

China’s recent gold market announcements launched a veritable cottage industry of dire warnings and hysterical predictions.

Over the past few weeks, my feeds have been absolutely flooded with claims that China’s brought back the gold standard. And that Beijing built a machine designed to “collapse the dollar.” Some warned that July 24 would mark “the end of gold trading” – somehow eliminating manipulation and revealing gold’s “real” price.

(One popular video managed to make nearly all those claims at once!)

Listen: I understand why people are getting worked up.

China is the world’s top gold-mining nation. In 2023, China surpassed India to become the world’s #1 gold-buying nation (and its consumption substantially exceeds domestic mining). Its central bank, the People’s Bank of China or PBoC has been steadily adding to its official gold reserves for the last 20 consecutive months.

Now China and Hong Kong are building new vaults, clearing systems and delivery connections around the precious metal.

That sounds significant because it is significant.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

This isn’t a gold standard. It is not a ban on paper gold.

And there is no evidence that China flipped a switch that will suddenly “reset” gold’s global price.

As is often the case in real life, the real story is more complicated.

I think it’s important though, because I expect it will have a much bigger impact over the long run…

China is building more than a bigger vault

Let’s begin with what actually happened.

On July 7, Hong Kong began trial operations of a new central clearing and settlement system for gold.

Clearing and settlement are two of those phrases that make most people’s eyes glaze over. In plain English, the new system is designed to help institutions complete gold transactions more efficiently – matching buyers and sellers, transferring payments and confirming who owns what.

Hong Kong also launched the first phase of a new “Delivery Connect” program with the Shanghai Gold Exchange. This is intended to make it easier to settle cross-border gold transactions and move physical metal between the two markets.

Meanwhile, Hong Kong wants to expand its gold storage capacity to more than 2,000 metric tons within three years. That would be roughly 10 times its current reported capacity.

Officials describe the goal as building a complete gold ecosystem incorporating trading, clearing, storage, delivery, insurance and logistics.

Think of it this way:

Owning a large pile of gold is one thing.

Building the roads, warehouses, scales, security systems and payment networks required to move that gold is something else entirely.

China has already accumulated substantial quantities of physical gold. Now it is developing more of the infrastructure needed to make that gold useful across institutions and borders.

That does not make the yuan a gold-backed currency.

But it could make gold easier to hold, trade and deliver within a financial system centered more closely on China and the yuan.

China’s banks are closing one retail door

The second development is what gave rise to the July 24 “China reset” story.

Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, or ICBC, announced that it would stop acting as an intermediary for individual customers trading precious-metals contracts through the Shanghai Gold Exchange after end-of-day settlement on Friday, July 24.

ICBC’s notice covered several kinds of contracts.

Some represented spot gold products eligible for physical delivery. Others were deferred-delivery contracts that allowed customers to use leverage – controlling a larger gold position with a smaller amount of money.

ICBC advised customers with existing positions to sell, close their trades or arrange physical delivery before the service was shut down. Other major Chinese banks have announced similar withdrawals from individual Shanghai Gold Exchange trading, although not all of them used the same deadline.

For example, China Construction Bank announced a similar July 24 closure and warned that remaining inventories or positions could subsequently be sold or forcibly closed. (They’d already raised collateral requirements on precious metals contracts to 120%.)

The banks’ stated reason was risk management.

That makes sense in light of gold’s extraordinary volatility this year. Gold climbed to an intraday high near $5,600 in January before briefly retreating below $4,000 in June. Chinese banks responded by tightening trading requirements, with some collateral requirements reportedly reaching as high as 140%.

In other words, a customer had to deposit more collateral than the value of the position itself! At the same time, CME Group’s COMEX requires a 40% margin for gold futures.

At that point, the appeal of offering the service presumably became rather difficult for the banks to justify.

This was not a nationwide prohibition on gold ownership. Chinese citizens can still own physical gold, buy bars and coins and use other non-leveraged gold products.

Nor did China shut down the Shanghai Gold Exchange.

A more accurate description would be:

China is not closing the gold vault. Its largest banks are closing part of the speculative trading counter attached to the vault.

That is noteworthy. But it is not a monetary reset.

Here’s what China did not do

China did not restore the gold standard.

Under a traditional gold standard, a nation defines its currency in terms of a specific quantity of gold and promises conversion between the two. China made no such promise.

The yuan is not redeemable for a fixed weight of gold. Beijing has not announced that every yuan will be backed by gold reserves. Nor has it limited its ability to create more currency according to the amount of gold in its vaults.

China also did not ban futures or derivatives trading.

In fact, Hong Kong is doing nearly the opposite.

As part of its effort to become a larger gold-trading hub, Hong Kong has revived gold futures denominated in both U.S. dollars and “offshore yuan,” with physical delivery services available through participating institutions. The goal of all these changes? To strengthen Hong Kong as an offshore yuan center and a regional gold-trading, clearing and reserve hub – not to make the yuan convertible into gold.

China isn’t systematically eliminating paper gold. It looks more like they’re reducing access to certain volatile, bank-operated retail products – meanwhile, expanding institutional gold trading, clearing, delivery and storage.

Those two policies are not necessarily contradictory.

Beijing may want gold to play a larger strategic role without encouraging ordinary households to make highly leveraged short-term bets on its price.

That is a far more plausible explanation than the idea that China secretly scheduled the destruction of the global monetary system for a Friday afternoon in July.

Why people are paying attention anyway

The hype may be overblown, but it did not appear out of thin air.

China occupies a unique position in the gold market.

It is the world’s largest gold producer, accounting for roughly 10% of global mine output in recent years. It is also the largest consumer – which means the nation uses more gold than it produces and must import substantial quantities to meet domestic demand.

Chinese gold demand is also changing.

In 2025, purchases of bars and coins rose more than 35% to approximately 504 metric tons. For the first time, Chinese demand for investment bars and coins exceeded demand for gold jewelry. Domestic mine production reached approximately 381 metric tons.

Then there is China’s central bank.

The People’s Bank of China reported adding approximately 15 metric tons of gold in June, its largest monthly increase since October 2023. That extended its reported purchasing streak to 20 consecutive months and brought official holdings to approximately 2,346 metric tons.

Put the pieces together:

• China mines lots of gold.

• Chinese households and institutions buy gold.

• China imports additional gold.

• The PBoC accumulates gold.

• Hong Kong is expanding gold storage.

• New systems are being built to clear, settle and deliver gold across borders.

That is not a gold standard. But neither is it meaningless.

China is building a financial neighborhood in which physical gold is easier to store, trade and use – while reducing reliance on institutions and payment systems outside its control.

We have discussed before why central banks increasingly regard physical gold as a vital reserve asset in a world of rising government debt, geopolitical friction and currency uncertainty.

China’s latest moves fit that broader pattern.

Could China reshape gold’s global price?

This is where we have to be especially careful.

Gold does not have one market or one price-making machine.

Its global price emerges from a complicated network of physical bars, wholesale spot transactions, futures contracts, currency movements, central-bank activity and buying by households and institutions around the world.

London and New York remain enormously influential. Shanghai has become increasingly important. Prices move between these markets through arbitrage – traders responding whenever gold becomes meaningfully cheaper in one location than another.

A popular argument says futures trading creates an artificial gold price because vastly more contracts trade than physical bars change hands.

There is a grain of truth here.

Leverage allows traders to control large positions without paying the full value upfront. During extreme market moves, margin calls and forced liquidations can amplify price swings. Recent metals volatility has offered plenty of examples of speculative activity accelerating both rallies and selloffs.

But it would be a mistake to conclude that all futures trading is fake or that eliminating it would automatically reveal gold’s “true” price.

Futures also provide liquidity and help buyers and sellers discover prices. Research on China’s own gold market has found that futures trading has historically played a significant role in price discovery. The World Gold Council likewise notes that futures concentrate trading activity, add liquidity and contribute to the process by which new information becomes reflected in prices.

Less leverage may reduce forced selling and speculative excess. In fact, the Bank of International Settlements claims that leverage and margin-triggered liquidations amplified the abrupt reversal in gold’s price back in January.

It can also mean fewer buyers and sellers, thinner trading and greater volatility.

So I would not claim that China’s bank closures will automatically produce a more honest gold price – especially because those closures affect only certain retail trading channels, while Hong Kong is simultaneously expanding other forms of futures trading.

The potentially more important development is the growth of physical infrastructure.

If more gold is stored in Hong Kong…

And if more trades result in physical delivery…

And if Delivery Connect attracts substantial cross-border activity…

And if Asian institutions increasingly use those systems rather than merely referencing prices established elsewhere…

…then physical demand from China and the rest of Asia could exert more direct influence over gold’s global price.

That would not happen on one deadline.

It would happen gradually, transaction by transaction. Gold bar by gold bar.

What to watch next

The best way to judge China’s gold ambitions is not to watch social media predictions or stare at gold’s price on the morning after July 24.

Watch what China actually builds.

Does Hong Kong’s storage capacity begin moving toward its 2,000-ton goal?

How much gold passes through the new clearing system?

Do international banks, central banks and large commercial buyers use Delivery Connect?

Do Hong Kong’s new gold contracts attract enough trading to become meaningful?

Does more gold move into allocated storage and physical settlement rather than remaining merely a contractual promise?

Those numbers will tell us whether China has created a genuine alternative gold center – or merely another ambitious financial project that never attracts sufficient use.

Infrastructure matters. But infrastructure must be used.

An empty highway does not reshape trade simply because someone poured the concrete.

Only physical gold is gold itself

Although China did not launch a gold-backed currency, ban derivatives or reset the global price of gold, its recent decisions illustrate something I discuss frequently:

Physical gold and a financial claim tied to gold are not the same thing.

A futures contract is an agreement.

It has rules, expiration dates, collateral requirements and counterparties. The exchange can change its terms. A bank can increase margin requirements. A financial institution can decide it no longer wants to sell a product.

That does not make every contract fraudulent or useless. These instruments serve legitimate commercial purposes (as well as speculation). It simply means the contract is not the gold itself.

ICBC customers discovered that distinction firsthand. Their bank-operated access to the Shanghai Gold Exchange existed only as long as the bank chose to provide it. When the bank changed its policy, customers had to sell, close their positions or take delivery.

The rules around a promise can change.

An ounce of physical gold remains an ounce of physical gold.

That does not mean physical gold’s price cannot fall. Gold experienced a severe decline this year, and anyone who says its price moves in only one direction is ignoring history.

Nor do I know whether China’s new systems will push gold higher next week, next year or at all. Anyone promising a dramatic price explosion because of a single deadline is selling certainty that does not exist.

Here is what we do know:

China is investing serious resources in the storage, clearing and delivery of physical gold. Its central bank continues to accumulate the metal. At the same time, some of its largest banks are effectively outlawing leveraged retail speculation on gold’s price.

China is not abandoning paper markets entirely. But it is making physical gold bullion a larger and more important part of its financial system.

For Americans concerned about their long-term savings, that distinction is worth understanding. Because there is a big difference between owning an asset and owning a promise based on the price of an asset.

China isn’t about to reset gold’s price on July 24.

Instead, what it’s really doing is reminding the world what gold actually is. They’re reminding everyone who’s forgotten why physical gold matters.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 15:25

Jim Rickards Slams Tech Bros Running The Marxist Playbook

Authored by James Rickards via DailyReckoning.com,

Can Marxism offer a framework for understanding artificial intelligence (AI) and the tech bros behind it?

This is not to suggest that Marxism is a viable economic system or a practical alternative to capitalism. It’s not. But Karl Marx was a heterodox economist before he became an ideologue, and some of his ideas are powerful tools for understanding economics, even if his overall program was a failure.

Let’s use some of those tools to understand the rise of AI oligarchs and the future of AI.

We begin with Marx’s main idea: the abolition of private property. How do tech bros feel about private property? They steal it. If you can simply take private property, then it’s not private. Marx would approve.

The AI gang does this by scraping vast amounts of internet content for use in training their large language models (LLMs). That material includes copyrighted books, magazine articles, academic papers, images, music and countless other forms of intellectual property (IP).

Do tech bros pay royalties? Do they pay licensing fees? Sometimes, but often they don’t. They take what they want like internet pirates, or the Bolsheviks after the Russian Revolution in 1917.

In fact, AI models have used my nine books in their training sets. Google, Apple, Microsoft, OpenAI and Meta have paid me nothing. Anthropic offered to pay me $37,000 for some (not all) of my books. I accepted the offer, but I still haven’t received the payment. Maybe I’ll call my lawyer about that before their IPO.

The point is that much of the AI crowd behaves no differently than the imperialists of the 19th and early 20th centuries, who exploited land, resources and human capital, including slavery, while paying little or nothing in return.

V. I. Lenin called imperialism “the highest stage of capitalism.” But Lenin never met a tech bro. They put imperialists to shame.

YOU Are Paying for the Boom

Marx’s theory was based on the idea that the owners of the means of production (capitalists) used labor but did not pay workers a fair share of the surplus created by the production process. There are a lot of flaws in this theory.

But the tech bros have a better idea: Get rid of human labor completely.

AI allows companies to pay some workers less because a growing share of productivity comes from software rather than labor. More to the point, AI is eliminating certain jobs entirely, as seen in layoffs among software developers and in industries such as healthcare and customer service that are increasingly using AI to perform repetitive or administrative tasks.

In the AI world, capitalists don’t just take more than their share; they take the entire buffet table. The tech bros’ solution to mass unemployment is guaranteed basic income, a handout. This ignores the dignity of the individual, which is achieved largely through productive work.

Other examples of taking public assets for private use include massive demands placed on the electric grid to power hyperscale data centers. Towns and counties around the country could face higher electric bills as hyperscalers compete with residents and businesses for available electricity.

It’s another case of extracting wealth from everyday Americans to feed the AI beast.

Even that’s not enough. AI applications are being crammed into our laptops, tablets and smartphones whether we know it or not and whether we like it or not. This is forcing manufacturers to build more powerful devices, which can increase costs for consumers while requiring additional processing power to handle AI features.

Many of these AI features operate by default, even if users never intentionally engage with them. That means you may be using AI without realizing it.

Never mind that AI output can be inaccurate and, at times, dangerous. The problem is compounded as AI-generated content increasingly circulates online and becomes part of future training data. Meanwhile, many AI features collect large amounts of user data from the devices they run on.

Individual AI users also provide fresh inputs to LLMs through prompts, interactions and, in some cases, data collected from their devices. AI operators are hungry for this kind of information because they have already consumed vast amounts of publicly available internet content, while the quality of that content continues to deteriorate as more AI-generated material floods the web.

Are you getting paid for information that may be collected from your device? Do you even know it’s happening? Almost certainly not. This is just another form of digital extraction that enriches the tech bros while helping fuel trillion-dollar valuations.

In addition to authors, artists, local communities and everyday Americans, the AI mafia is also feeding off the government. Subsidies include streamlined permitting for massive data centers, tax incentives and abatements in many jurisdictions, favorable regulatory treatment in some areas and enormous government contracts.

There are costs associated with all of these government benefits, but they are not borne by the AI companies themselves.

They’re borne by everyday citizens in the form of taxes, higher electricity rates, reduced quality of life as data centers reshape small communities and the risk that increasingly capable AI systems could create serious disruptions in sectors such as banking, telecommunications and healthcare if they malfunction or are misused.

The Extraction Economy… And New Revolutionaries

The Chinese are no better. The success of Chinese AI models such as DeepSeek and Moonshot has been aided by their ability to build on advances made by leading U.S. AI labs. It’s a case of one group of pirates raiding another group of pirates.

Both thrive on information they did not create, but the Chinese have become especially adept at turning those advances into low-cost competitors.

This predatory behavior can be likened to imperialism or piracy. The technical economic term for it is externality. That means the profits and benefits of extracting information are kept by AI firms, while many of the costs are pushed onto the public.

It’s no different than a gold mine that keeps the gold but dumps the cyanide used in refining into public waterways. The miner gets the gold and the public gets poisoned. The fact that AI is digital does not make the behavior any more acceptable from a social perspective.

Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of Silicon Valley’s extractive culture is that many CEOs are not only aware of it; they thrive on it. They have perfected the art of turning their own customers into unwilling guinea pigs. A culture of short-termism, disdain for the public and pure greed keeps the extraction racket going.

If there’s one ray of sunshine, it’s that some members of Gen Z appear to be turning their backs on AI, autonomous agents and endless screen time.

There’s growing fatigue with the amount of time people spend online, along with increasing concern about the pervasive nature of AI. This shift also reflects widespread frustration that much AI output is bland, repetitive or simply wrong.

Some Gen Zers are doing something that now seems almost radical: They’re reading books.

There are many reasons why the AI bubble could burst, but the Gen Z revolt may be one of the least appreciated and most unexpected.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 14:45

OpenAI Slashes GPT-5.6 Luna Price By 80% As China's Cheaper Models Close In

OpenAI just cut the price of its cheapest GPT-5.6 model by 80 percent, three weeks after launch - the clearest signal yet that the company that kicked off the generative AI boom is being dragged into a price war it did not start.

On Thursday the company said GPT-5.6 Luna, its speed-focused model, now costs 20 cents per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens, down from $1 and $6. GPT-5.6 Terra, the mid-tier model, gets a 20 percent trim to $2 per million input tokens and $12 per million output. Pricing for the flagship GPT-5.6 Sol remains unchanged.

"Our strategy remains focused on advancing both capability and efficiency so each generation of intelligence can accomplish more work at a lower cost," OpenAI said in its announcement.

The move arrives as companies that once encouraged unconstrained "tokenmaxxing" have started looking hard at AI bills that sometimes run into the billions. Enterprises want clearer returns before committing to the most expensive models, and they now have more alternatives than they did in the early ChatGPT era.

OpenAI is framing the cuts as the fruit of efficiency work rather than a margin sacrifice - a day earlier the company said GPT-5.6 had helped make itself cheaper to run, and it is passing those gains through to how usage is counted in Codex and ChatGPT Work subscriptions, with the lower prices rolling out on AWS as well.

Chinese open-weight models have closed the gap quickly. Moonshot AI's Kimi K3, released earlier this month, has beaten some leading proprietary systems on industry benchmarks and can be run on a company's own infrastructure. That development helped spur a round of competitive responses.

The scale of the challenge is hard to overstate. At 2.8 trillion parameters, K3 is the largest open-weight model ever released, and blind developer testing put it in first place in LMArena's front-end coding arena, ahead of Anthropic's frontier Claude Fable 5. Demand has been heavy enough that Moonshot has capped new subscriptions and API access over capacity constraints, and the company's daily revenue has grown roughly sixfold since launch as it seeks a $50 billion valuation ahead of a potential Hong Kong IPO. The economics underneath are brutal: on Artificial Analysis's cost-per-task index, K3 completes a task for 94 cents and DeepSeek V4 Pro for four cents, versus $1.04 for OpenAI's flagship Sol and $1.80 for Anthropic's Claude Opus 4.8 - and Moonshot reports cache-hit rates above 90 percent in coding workloads that cut K3's effective input cost to 30 cents per million.

Anthropic followed with Claude Opus 5, which it pitches as approaching the performance of its top-tier Fable 5 model at half the price - and beating it outright on some knowledge-work benchmarks - while holding the same rate card as its Opus 4.8 predecessor. Microsoft has been loudly promoting its own cheaper models, including MAI-Cyber-1-Flash, a new cybersecurity-focused offering that AI chief Mustafa Suleyman says delivers "world-leading performance at 50% of the cost." Google, meanwhile, launched a trio of new Gemini Flash models this month and claimed its top Flash model undercuts Kimi K3 and other Chinese systems on a per-task basis.

OpenAI's GPT-5.6 family consists of three tiers: Sol (highest capability), Terra (balanced), and Luna (fastest). By aggressively discounting the middle and low ends while leaving the top model alone, the company is trying to keep volume customers from migrating to open-weight or rival proprietary systems without fully abandoning the premium pricing that funds frontier research.

Whether the cuts are enough to slow the shift toward cheaper alternatives remains to be seen. What is clear is that the era of unconstrained AI spending is giving way to a more pragmatic one - one in which even OpenAI has to compete on price.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 14:25

Republican Senator Cynthia Lummis Slams Democrat Lawmakers For Dragging Their Feet Over Clarity Act

Authored by Mathew Di Salvo via BitcoinMagazine.com,

Pro-crypto Senator Cynthia Lummis on Wednesday slammed Democrats for holding back the Clarity Act. 

Speaking on the Senate floor, Senator Lummis, of Wyoming, spoke of the bipartisan work that had gone into the bill — but questioned why it was stalling. 

Lawmakers are hoping the Clarity Act gets passed before Congress departs for August recess.

While the bill has been drafted bipartisanly, some Democrats are unhappy with the current version. 

JUST IN: 🇺🇸 Republican Senator Cynthia Lummis calls out the Democrats for holding up the Clarity Act:

"After nearly 11 months of giving almost everything asked of us, I genuinely don't know what else my Democrat colleagues need before we act." 👀
pic.twitter.com/1SMzfkNVfQ

— Bitcoin Magazine (@BitcoinMagazine) July 29, 2026

“This is a very good bill: good for the country, good for consumers, and good for the people we all represent on both sides of this aisle,” said Senator Lummis. 

“And after 11 months of giving nearly everything that was asked of us, I am genuinely struggling to understand what else my colleagues across the aisle think it needs before we act.” 

Major financial institutions, lawmakers and companies have thrown their weight behind the new bill, but a group of Democrats last week said in a statement that the bill in its current form falls short.  

A number of lawmakers are hoping the bill gets passed before Congress departs for August recess. 

Despite being passed in the house of representatives last year with strong bipartisan support, the Clarity Act has been in a deadlock for much of 2026, partially due to the banking lobby raising concerns over stablecoin yield. 

An updated bill of the Clarity Act was introduced last week that addressed ethics concerns - banning government officials and their families from issuing or promoting crypto. 

Republicans are hoping to gain bipartisan support for the bill this week to advance the legislation. If passed, the long-awaited bill would create a regulatory framework for the cryptocurrency market.

Conservative Lummis earned the name “Bitcoin Senator” over the years for her pro-crypto approach on Capitol Hill.

The 71-year-old senator has admitted owning the leading cryptocurrency since 2013 and has been vital in pro-crypto legislation, including by helping draft the Bitcoin Act for a Bitcoin strategic reserve, and co-sponsoring the 2025’s GENIUS Act to regulate stablecoins.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 14:05

"Diesel Is At Epicenter Of Supply Squeeze,": Goldman

Goldman analysts are out with an eye-opening note showing that global refinery runs have plunged to their lowest seasonal level since the Covid era as conflict-related outages hammer Russia and the Gulf while Chinese processing remains subdued.

Analysts, including Yulia Zhestkova Grigsby and Daan Struyven, introduced a new global refinery-runs nowcast, estimating that global runs declined by 6.5 million barrels per day from a year earlier in late July.

Non-OECD throughput dropped by 7 million barrels per day, led by the Middle East, Russia, and China. Higher utilization in the Americas and Africa offset only about 30% of the weakness elsewhere, even as U.S. refinery utilization exceeded 97%, the highest since 2018.

The decline in global refinery runs is tightening fuel supplies just as demand heads toward the fourth-quarter peak season. The analysts said diesel inventories remain below seasonal norms while exports continue to slide, leaving the fuel especially vulnerable to further supply disruptions.

"Diesel is at the epicenter of the supply squeeze," the analysts warned.

Europe's benchmark diesel futures have surged this week to the highest level in almost three months. Global diesel exports have fallen by about 2.6 million barrels per day, or 35%, from a year earlier, while jet fuel exports have also slumped, further tightening middle-distillate markets.

We pointed out on Wednesday just how tight the products market is.

The European gasoil crack has surged above $70 a barrel as refiners run near capacity, with diesel and jet supplies constrained by outages, shipping risks, and reduced Russian exports.

Related:

• WTI Holds Spike After Big Crude Draw, SPR Drain Continues As Cushing Stocks Stuck At 'Tank Bottoms'

The analysts recommended clients seeking to hedge ongoing geopolitical turmoil to take a long position in the December 2026–March 2027 European diesel timespread:

Hedging escalation with diesel length. Given the extreme tightness in refined products supply, which we think can linger for longer, we still recommend that investors and consumers seeking to hedge persistent geopolitical shocks in the Mideast and Russia go long the Dec26-March27 European diesel (gasoil) timespread.

Readers should revisit Struyven's note from earlier this month outlining three reasons gas prices are likely to remain elevated (here).

Professional subscribers can read more on energy markets our new Marketdesk.ai portal

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 13:45

The Latest Wildfire Panic Is Refuted By Data

Authored by Kit Knightly via Off-Guardian.org,

Wildfires are in the news. With a hot, dry summer it was bound to happen. And, naturally, this is bringing with it talk of climate change.

The Independent is screaming and rending its garments:

Europe is on fire – will the continent’s climate change deniers finally wake up?

The Guardian has an opinion piece calling for prosecutions for climate crimes. Twitter experts are calling for changes to the way we live our lives.

Prince William is saying stuff:

Wildfires ‘stark reminder’ of extreme climate challenge, says William

I suppose we should make the usual point, that wildfires are a natural phenomenon that are an important part of the life cycle of many ecosystems. And that some years are bound to be worse than others.

But there’s just one issue, wildfire activity is actually down.

A new study from the University of East Anglia, published in May, found that 2025 was 16% below the average in terms of burnt area, and that’s despite policies known to increase both the chance of wildfires starting and the area they will burn.

But that was last year, this year must be different given the coverage, right?

Wrong.

Data from the EU’s Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service shows that, to the end of June, this year had substantially lower wildfire activity – across every continent – than any year since they began collecting data in 2003.

Of course, this data does not yet include the fires from the past couple of weeks, and there is a chance that 2026 will not remain a record-breaking low in fire terms, but this is largely due to the known effect of El Nino years.

The authors note in the conclusion [emphasis added]:

The record low total biomass burning emissions for the first half of 2026 continues the overall downward trend related to changes in savanna fires in tropical Africa and Asia. However, the observed onset of many large-scale wildfires across Eurasia and North America in the last couple of weeks of June, could increase the global total emissions through the rest of the summer. Looking further ahead, the predicted El Niño conditions have the potential to increase global fire emissions, as we observed during the previous El Niño years of 2015 and 2019 when persistent biomass burning in Indonesia caused widespread regional haze and severely degraded air quality.

In fact, the yearly global area burnt by wildfires has been steadily decreasing for over a century (we recommend following Bjorn Lomborg on X, a great source of data):

So, why the panic?

The caveat here – according to the University of East Anglia paper – is that while the number of fires, and total area burnt is down, “severity” is up.

In short, less overall wildfire activity seems to be somehow translating to greater human cost, both in lives and money. Evacuations are allegedly up, insurance costs are allegedly up, and fatalities are allegedly up:

A new analysis of global wildfire activity in 2025 reveals the world experienced some of the most destructive and deadly fire events in recent history, despite the second lowest area burned since 2002. It highlights a continued trend toward fires becoming increasingly extreme, costly, and disastrous—both economically and in lives lost.

Now, first instinct would be this is either linguistic or statistical manipulation designed to camouflage research that failed to correctly serve the climate change agenda.

A case of cope to cover misbehaving data: 

“Fine, wildfires are down, but the ones we’ve had are SO much more DESTRUCTIVE!”.

That’s entirely possible. But supposing the stated data is accurate, what does this mean?

Well, there are several potential explanations

It could be the predictable result expanding human habitation and growing population.

It could be that the areas of fire activity shifting to more populated areas by some as yet not understood natural process.

It could be that fires being deliberately started close to inhabited areas in order to create fear.

It could be that these statistics are manipulated or fabricated.

…Or it could be any or all or a mixture of several.

We don’t know, but we can’t rule anything out at this stage.

The data is clear though, there’s no need to panic. No matter what the press says.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 13:25

IRGC Boasts Of Fully Intact Speedboat Fleet For 'Swarm Attacks' In Hormuz

Via Middle East Eye

As renewed attacks between Iran and the US expand into Iraq and Yemen, the Hamshahri daily, which has close ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), has dedicated its front page to a report on the force's speedboats in the Gulf.

On Wednesday, the daily described the boats as the "winning card in the Persian Gulf" and said they are one of the main elements of Iran's deterrence against an expansion of US attacks. "The fleet has become one of the most complex challenges facing American forces in the Persian Gulf over the past two decades by relying on the 'swarm attack' tactic. It has also served as Iran's strategic tool in the Strait of Hormuz over the past five months," Hamshahri wrote.

via Reuters

According to the report, Iran's naval strategy is based on developing small, high-speed, low-cost boats in large numbers. Rather than competing directly with larger fleets, the strategy aims to increase the enemy's costs and limit its freedom of action.

On the role of the boats in keeping the Strait of Hormuz closed, Hamshahri added: "The combination of speedboats, naval mines, cruise and ballistic missiles, and drones has completed the puzzle of Iran's strategic encirclement of the Strait of Hormuz."

Brigadier General Hossein Alaei, the first commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Navy and a former Iranian defence official, has joined political figures calling for an end to the war with the United States, saying Iran's true victory lies in restoring peace and stability.

Alaei, who served as a senior IRGC commander during the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988), commented on the conflicts launched against Iran by the United States and Israel since June 2025.

"In war, while it is true that Iran defends itself, stands firm, and strikes back at its enemy, the very existence of war is to the detriment of the Iranian people," he said.

The former IRGC commander also criticized the collapse of the memorandum of understanding (MoU) between Iran and the United States. He described the agreement as a complete victory for Iran and a defeat for Israel. "In this agreement, we gave up virtually nothing," Alaei said.

"The US believes it has stripped, damaged and destroyed Iran's nuclear program. The maximum we have conceded is that we will discuss the nuclear issue in the future, while from the beginning Iran's position was not to possess nuclear weapons."

Iranians sing "Bella Ciao" to mock the Americans while cruising through the Strait of Hormuz, as a vessel waits in the background for permission from the IRGC to pass. pic.twitter.com/C08QEKkFWn

— The Saviour (@TheSaviour) July 26, 2026

He also said the agreement had put pressure on Israel to halt its military strikes on Lebanon. "Israel wanted to strike Lebanon every day; through this agreement, we stopped Israel's daily attacks on Lebanon. This is a very big victory," he said.

While hardline factions in Iran have called for an end to all negotiations with the United States and for the war to continue since military clashes resumed on July 7, some figures from the older generation of the IRGC, including Alaei, are advocating an end to the fighting.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 12:05

Red Cross Declares National Blood Crisis As Type-O Supply Falls Below One-Day Inventory

The American Red Cross declared a national blood crisis Monday, warning that its supply of type O positive blood has fallen below a one-day national inventory and that summer donations are running at their lowest level in four years.

The shortfall has already caused the organization to restrict distributions of type O blood to hospitals, a step that can force providers to prioritize among patients awaiting transfusions. The Surgeon General's office has joined the Red Cross in calling on eligible donors to schedule appointments.

Type O accounts for roughly 60% of Red Cross blood distributions and is used in both routine care and emergency treatment. O positive, the most commonly transfused type, can be safely given to about 80% of patients, while O negative serves as the universal type used when a patient's blood type is unknown.

Blood demand generally rises during the summer months, but collections this year have failed to keep pace. Red Cross officials attributed the gap to extreme heat, poor air quality and widespread foodborne illnesses, each of which can reduce donor turnout or disqualify would-be donors, the organization said.

"The Red Cross takes its responsibility as the nation's largest single provider of blood products incredibly seriously and has worked tirelessly to strengthen the blood supply for our hospital partners," said Chris Hrouda, president of Red Cross Biomedical Services. "Following our first-ever national blood crisis in 2022, we put additional safeguards in place to help prevent a crisis like that from happening again. But this summer, blood donations simply are not keeping pace with hospital demand, and inventories, especially type O blood, remain under significant strain. Every donation has the potential to help save lives, and we urgently need everyone who is eligible to make an appointment to give blood as soon as possible."

An extended shortage could delay elective surgeries, complicate trauma care and slow other treatments that depend on timely access to transfusions.

The declaration is the second national blood crisis in the organization's history. The first, in January 2022, followed a convergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, winter storms and staffing shortages. In 2024, the Red Cross warned of an emergency blood shortage but did not escalate the designation to a crisis.

The organization is offering incentives to draw donors. Those who give blood by July 31, 2026, will receive a Fandango Movie Ticket by email valued at up to $15, including fees. Donors who give between August 1st and August 31st will receive a $20 Amazon gift card by email.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 11:45

Heavy Russian Attacks Reach Far West In Ukraine - Missile Slams Into Poland

Another alleged Russian projectile has breached NATO airspace, which resulted in Polish warplanes being scrambled as they prepared to shoot it down.

However, what's been declared a probable Russian ballistic missile crashed to the ground in an uninhabited field in eastern Poland, leaving a huge crater and scattered debris in its wake. Some European outlets have more simply called it an 'unidentified object'.

10-meter wide crater at impact site, via The Telegraph

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Thursday addressed the overnight incident while visiting the impact site, saying, "All the indications are that it was a Russian Kh-101 ballistic missile, but we want to be 100% certain about the type of missile and who launched it."

"There was no direct threat because the missile landed in an uninhabited area. We were ready to shoot it down had it continued its flight," he added.

The operational command of Poland's armed forces said that "a helicopter crew located the probable crash site of the object in an undeveloped area near the village of Tarnawa-Kolonia in Lublin province," after it was seen at 3:40am local time.

"Officers discovered a crater and scattered debris from an unidentified object in a field located about 2 kilometers from the nearest buildings, between the villages," local police also stated on X.

There were reports of Polish air sirens sounding in some border areas overnight, given that across the border in Ukraine Russia was busy launching another major drone and missile attack.

President Zelensky addressed the huge scope of the latest overnight attacks, describing that at least eight people were killed across the country, with dozens more injured. 

The attacks focused on the capital and another nine regions, he said, reaching as far west as Lviv region. In all the military said it intercepted by various means 265 drones and 55 missiles, while "preliminary information" indicated 11 missiles and 17 drones impacted across 20 sites.

"In a situation where we critically lack missiles for air defense from our partners, our soldiers are doing the seemingly impossible, demonstrating a very high level of professionalism," Zelensky stated. "This extraordinary expertise saves lives when the supply of missiles for air defense systems is insufficient or delayed."

As for these breaches of European or NATO airspace, which is spillover from the Ukraine war, there's been an uptick in these of late.

The sound of a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile impacting near the village of Targowisko, eastern Poland, this morning.

In the video, you can hear the missile releasing two sets of flares as a countermeasure against air defence systems, confirming it was still intact up to one… pic.twitter.com/5FLhfTqx3L

— AMK Mapping 🇳🇿 (@AMK_Mapping_) July 30, 2026

In prior recent instances of drones entering neighboring airspace, particularly in Baltic countries and also Poland, NATO jets were scrambled - and in some cases drones are safely brought down via electronic intercept means.

But each instance creates new tensions between Russia and NATO, and the typical accusations and threats then fly. The Kremlin has of late been especially alarmed at the Trump administration transferring 5,000 US troops from Germany to Poland, near Russia's doorstep.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 11:05

Feedom Of Navigation

By Bas van Geffen, senior market strategist at Rabobank

The Houthis are considering charging fees on vessels sailing through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. Reuters reported that the plan was discussed with Iran’s leadership, who have offered help to set up an authority to collect the toll.

Besides the potential revenue source, the aim of the Bab el-Mandeb fees would reportedly be to normalize the idea of charging fees on international waters.

But freedom isn’t fees. President Trump has repeatedly rejected the idea of Iran levying a toll in the Strait of Hormuz, so why would the US president accept such a plan in any other strait? European countries have also vehemently opposed that idea. Moreover, the Houthis indicated that Chinese vessels would be exempted from these fees – creating a clear split in the freedom of navigation for different camps. So, the plan could also be used to put further pressure on the US and its allies.

The US has, meanwhile, stepped up its attacks against Iran, in retaliation for the Iranian strikes on its military bases Jordan. According to the Wall Street Journal, Trump has been briefed on a two-week campaign of air strikes that could impact Iran’s missile capabilities. However, Iran managed to recover relatively quickly after operation Epic Fury.

Moreover, according to press reports, China is sending hundreds of rocket launchers to Iran. The shoulder-fired weapons are harder to take out, due to their mobility. And these mobile air defences make any US campaign more difficult and riskier.

The potential implications of the weapons sale reach far beyond the Middle East. China’s support for Iran could indicate that Beijing is hoping to use this as a proxy war or a war of attrition against the US – with reports of dwindling weapons stockpiles. Or, at least, to expose the US’s vulnerabilities.

At the very least, the arms deal goes against President Xi’s promise to Trump not to supply any weapons to Iran. That, in turn, could perhaps cause the White House to reconsider its own arms deliveries to Taiwan. President Trump paused these deliveries after meeting with Xi in May.

The renewed escalation in the Middle East is putting some upward pressure on energy prices again. Brent touched $93 per barrel this morning.

Despite the ongoing inflation risks from the Iran war, the Fed refrained from any policy action. However, the Fed’s “family fight” did cause a big split between the central bankers: three FOMC members cast a dissenting vote, favoring a rate hike instead.

These dissents clearly demonstrate that support for a rate hike is building. That should keep market speculation of a rate hike alive in the coming weeks. We acknowledge that the risk of a rate hike in the coming months has increased, but we still believe that the Fed is more likely to stay on hold through 2026.

The policy statement was largely identical to last month’s, and Chair Warsh talked a lot about the FOMC’s commitment to meeting its 2% inflation target. However, the lack of policy action may have damaged Warsh’ inflation fighting credentials yesterday. Long-term US yields rose after the policy decision: the 30-year yield hit a 19-year high in Asian trading and remains above 5.2%.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 10:45

Carvana Crashes After Earnings Outlook Disappoints Wall Street

Carvana shares plunged in premarket trading after the online used-car retailer issued full-year earnings guidance that may fall short of Wall Street expectations, as vehicle sales growth slowed and profit per car declined. The outlook raises questions about whether Carvana's rapid expansion can justify its high stock valuation.

Carvana reported a record second-quarter adjusted EBITDA of $769 million, narrowly beating the $766.2 million consensus estimate among analysts tracked by Bloomberg, as vehicle sales rose 38% to more than 197,300. Still, sales growth slowed to its weakest quarter since 3Q24, while gross profit per unit declined, suggesting margin pressures remain a major problem.

"This marks 10 straight quarters of being the fastest-growing and most profitable automotive retailer — achieving both by large margins," CEO Ernest Garcia wrote in a letter to shareholders. "We have said that we believe the biggest driver of our results for the foreseeable future will be our execution, and we still believe it."

The online used-car retailer forecasted full-year adjusted EBITDA of $2.7 billion to $3 billion, with the midpoint below the Bloomberg Consensus estimate of $2.99 billion.

Barclays auto analyst John Babcock commented on the earnings:

2Q26 Review: Guidance not as hoped, but we think there is more upside risk

CVNA 2Q26 adj. EBITDA below Barclays, just above Street. 2026 EBITDA guidance ($2.7-$3.0bn) in-line to below Street forecasts and likely disappointed investors seeking upside levers. However, we think there is more upside risk to our forecasts. We maintain OW rating with new PT of $93.

Carvana shares fell about 8% in premarket trading. The year-to-date decline through Wednesday's close stands at around 21.5%. The stock has remained range-bound for 13 months, repeatedly bouncing between resistance near $80 and support around $60.

Here is what other Wall Street desks are saying, courtesy of Bloomberg:

Bloomberg Intelligence

• "Carvana is likely to favor market-share gains over near-term margin expansion in 2H as management prioritizes scale, inventory and customer reach"
• "Lower customer financing rates are supporting demand but weighing on near-term economics before inventory fully catches up and conversion improves"

Morgan Stanley (overweight, PT to $90 from $102)

• Following results, trimming estimates on lighter financing gross profit per unit (GPU)
• "Every GPU-specific question was met with directional color, and management declined to offer quarter-specific or line-item- specific guidance"

JPMorgan (overweight, PT $100)

• Carvana reported a mixed quarter, with 2H forecast looking conservative with operational constraints easing.
• Shares are lower as "the company cycles past a combination of internal, external, and tougher y/y comparisons that have impacted the y/y margin profile"

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 10:30

DeepSeek Pauses Fundraising After Founder's Remarks Leaked

Authored by Arthur Zhang via The Epoch Times,

Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) startup DeepSeek has paused a second fundraising round after founder Liang Wenfeng’s remarks at a conference circulated online, including a statement that the company could obtain some processors he described as “noncompliant.”

Liang made the remarks during a May 20 closed-door investor meeting on why DeepSeek was receiving fewer Huawei processors than China’s major internet companies. The transcript of the meeting was shared online and posted on GitHub on July 22.

“For us, we can buy some noncompliant cards,” he said.

He did not identify the chips, suppliers, purchasing route, or rules he was referring to.

DeepSeek has not publicly confirmed the transcript. Chinese state media National Business Daily reported that institutions involved in investing in the company confirmed that the meeting occurred and the transcript’s content was accurate.

Bloomberg reported on July 25 that DeepSeek representatives verbally told some prospective investors they would not be signing agreements in the coming days. Discussions continued, and the company could resume the fundraising process later, they said.

DeepSeek was seeking a valuation of about 500 billion yuan ($74 billion) after raising approximately $7.4 billion in its first outside financing round. The pause was driven partly by Liang’s frustration over online reports about his comments to investors, according to Bloomberg.

Chip Access

Liang described advanced processors as DeepSeek’s most valuable use of capital.

He said the company would be willing to turn all available funding into Nvidia chips and pay a premium if enough hardware could be obtained.

“The best thing would be to turn all the money into cards,” he said, using an industry term for graphics processing units (GPUs), the processors used to train and run advanced artificial intelligence models.

Liang said spending 20 billion yuan ($2.8 billion) on processors during the year would represent an exceptional performance by DeepSeek’s purchasing team. Nvidia B200 processors would be worth buying in any available quantity at a reasonable price, he added.

The remarks come as Washington continues to examine how DeepSeek obtained its computing hardware.

In April 2025, the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party said DeepSeek appeared to use tens of thousands of Nvidia processors that are restricted from export to China.

The committee separately asked Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang for records concerning DeepSeek’s acquisition of export-controlled chips, including communications with customers in China and Southeast Asia.

The committee’s findings did not establish that the processors Liang called “noncompliant” were Nvidia products or identify how DeepSeek obtained them.

U.S. controls have continued to evolve. In guidance issued on May 31, the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security said a license is required to export covered advanced computing items to companies headquartered in China or whose parent companies are based there—even when the immediate recipient is located in another country.

Compute Gap

DeepSeek drew global attention in January 2025 after releasing lower-cost models that appeared to challenge assumptions about how much computing power companies needed to compete with leading U.S. developers.

Investor concern that less expensive models could reduce demand for costly data centers and processors drove Nvidia shares down nearly 17 percent in one trading session, wiping almost $594 billion from the company’s market value.

Liang’s private account described limits that DeepSeek’s engineering efficiencies had not eliminated.

He said the company possessed computing power equivalent to approximately 20,000 Nvidia H-series processors. Liang did not specify which H-series model he used for the comparison and said much of the equipment had arrived recently or was still awaiting installation.

Even if DeepSeek spent 50 billion yuan ($7 billion), it could not train a model at the scale of the largest U.S. systems, he said.

Liang estimated that such a training run would require approximately 50,000 Nvidia GB300 processors or 200,000 Huawei Ascend 950 processors. That figure did not include the numerous experiments needed before a final model-training run, he said.

He put Chinese developers one to two years behind their U.S. competitors while operating with about a 20th of the computing resources.

Chinese companies could outperform U.S. rivals in selected tasks through engineering efficiency, Liang said, but could not achieve broad superiority while the hardware gap remained so large.

Hardware is not DeepSeek’s only constraint.

Liang said roughly half of the company’s core researchers were working on data annotation—the process of reviewing and correcting material used to refine an artificial intelligence model after its initial training.

He said U.S. developers OpenAI and Anthropic had accumulated an advantage in high-quality post-training data that additional funding could not quickly erase.

Huawei’s Limits

Huawei has become central to Beijing’s effort to reduce China’s dependence on Nvidia and other U.S. semiconductor companies.

Liang said Huawei was allocating DeepSeek about 16,000 Ascend 950 processors, while major Chinese internet companies were receiving allocations in the hundreds of thousands.

DeepSeek’s allocation would provide computing power equivalent to about 4,000 Nvidia B-series processors, by Liang’s estimate.

That would be enough for DeepSeek’s current model generation but not its next one, he said.

Liang said four Huawei processors were needed to match the computing capacity of one Nvidia processor. He also estimated that Nvidia hardware could remain economically useful for about five years, compared with no more than three years for Huawei processors.

Huawei systems would become more expensive to operate as they aged because of their electricity consumption, he said.

Production capacity posed another problem. Huawei could not provide enough processors to satisfy demand from both DeepSeek and China’s major internet companies, according to Liang.

He said DeepSeek was purchasing the Huawei processors partly to help Huawei improve its chip and software ecosystem, even though the allocation was too small to train DeepSeek’s next model.

DeepSeek was also developing software intended to make its models easier to move among Nvidia, Huawei, and other processors. Nvidia’s Compute Unified Device Architecture, its widely adopted programming platform, has made switching hardware costly because developers have built years of software and expertise around it.

Liang also described lower prices as a way for Chinese developers to compete despite their hardware disadvantage. DeepSeek could accept smaller margins than U.S. rivals, he said, while companies trying to operate its publicly released models independently would struggle to match its costs.

Before the May meeting opened to investor questions, the moderator said Liang had disclosed sensitive information and instructed participants not to circulate figures—including processor quantities—or share recordings and screenshots outside the meeting.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 10:15

US Grows Only 1.5% In Q2, Badly Missing Estimates, Despite Strong Spending, Investment

The US economy grew at a far weaker than expected pace in the second quarter despite a pickup in consumer spending and solid business investment. According to the BEA, GDP (inflation adjusted) rose just 1.5% in the period, according to the first estimate issued Thursday by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. This was well below the 2.0% median estimate. 

The contributors to the increase in real GDP in the second quarter were increases in consumer spending, investment, and exports that were partly offset by a decrease in government spending. A decline in volatile net exports masked strength in underlying demand as imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased. Consumer spending, which comprises about two-thirds of economic activity, rose at a 3.2% rate. Business investment continued to boom amid a debt-fueled rush to invest in artificial intelligence.

A closer look at the underlying data:

• Business investment remained a key driver of growth in the second quarter. The massive AI investment push continued to play a critical role as did demand for industrial and transportation equipment. After the Fed decided to keep interest rates unchanged on Wednesday, Chairman Kevin Warsh described the economy’s resilience as “impressive” but noted its “most striking” feature is the strength of business investment. 

  • The GDP report showed nonresidential fixed investment rose at an 8.4% pace. Investment in industrial equipment surged by the most since 2011, and outlays for transportation equipment jumped by the most in two years. Information processing equipment and software outlays rose at a strong, albeit slower rate. 

• Net exports subtracted a percentage point from the calculation of GDP in the second quarter. That likely reflected a mix of factors, including efforts to get goods into the country before a new wave of tariffs and the rapid pace of capital investment. 
• Inventories stripped an additional 0.67% from GDP, suggesting many businesses drew down their inventories during the war.
• Federal government outlays declined, reflecting sales of crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, according to the report. But because sales of the oil are reflected in other components of GDP, there is “no direct effect” on GDP. Even so, spending on national defense increased amid the war with Iran. 

Meanwhile, the strength in household outlays was fueled by spending on durable goods like furnishings and motor vehicles. Within services, consumers ramped up outlays on discretionary categories like recreation and food services and accommodation. 

Because swings in trade can distort GDP, economists pay close attention to a narrower metric of underlying demand known as final sales to private domestic purchasers that excludes net exports, changes in inventories and government spending. This measure climbed 3.9% in the second quarter, more than double the first quarter pace and the strongest since early 2023.

As Bloomberg notes, the latest data highlight an economy that’s so far powering through the fallout of the Iran war, while getting the benefit of a historic credit-fueled spending spree behind AI spending. While the conflict has pushed prices higher and weighed on sentiment, a slide in gasoline costs at the end of the quarter alongside higher-than-usual tax refunds and sales promotions helped support household spending.

As reported earlier, more up to date data released on Thursday showed inflation-adjusted consumer spending climbed a robust 0.4% in June, matching the strongest since July 2025. The Federal Reserve’s preferred measure of inflation - the personal consumption expenditures price index - fell 0.1% last month. Excluding food and energy, the index rose less than forecast. 

Looking ahead, Bloomberg notes that the recent flare-up in the Middle East and President Donald Trump’s new tariffs underscore the uncertainty around the outlook. Though the US central bank opted to keep rates unchanged on Wednesday, three policymakers voted to raise borrowing costs amid above-target inflation.

But with layoffs limited, economists generally expect consumer spending to stabilize in the second half of the year. Executives at companies like JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Levi Strauss & Co. have underscored shoppers’ resilience, even as some like PepsiCo Inc. and General Mills Inc. have noted that Americans are growing more discerning in their spending.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 10:00

Hormuz Ship Traffic Edges Higher, But Kpler Warns Gulf Crude Exports Remain Impaired

Shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz slightly increased as US-Iran negotiations remained ongoing in an effort to restore peace after the memorandum of understanding collapsed amid two weeks of tit-for-tat strikes, according to Pakistan's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Tahir Andrabi, who provided no further details.

Still, the security situation in the Gulf deteriorated overnight after the US launched a new wave of strikes on Iran following attacks on US forces in Jordan. Additionally, reports emerged that a US-owned LNG vessel was struck at an Egyptian port.

Bloomberg cited Kpler data showing that fourteen commodity vessels transited the Hormuz chokepoint in both directions on Wednesday, up from single digits the previous week.

Kpler wrote on X:

Hormuz shipping bottleneck endures

A four-day pause in US strikes on Iran has done little to restore Middle East Gulf crude exports. Confirmed clearance remained close to recent lows, while Gulf loading activity fell by more than half for the first time in six weeks. The crude backlog has shifted between the Gulf and the Gulf of Oman rather than disappeared. Persistent maritime security risks, war risk insurance costs and Iranian interdiction now appear to be the main barriers. Offshore ship to ship transfers are helping manage inventories, but not expanding export capacity. For energy markets, physical shipping data remain a clearer measure of supply conditions than geopolitical headlines.

Hormuz shipping bottleneck endures

A four day pause in US strikes on Iran has done little to restore Middle East Gulf crude exports. Confirmed clearance remained close to recent lows, while Gulf loading activity fell by more than half for the first time in six weeks. The crude… pic.twitter.com/e9aZ5cfGCP

— Kpler (@Kpler) July 30, 2026

Qatar's Al Areesh exited the Persian Gulf carrying the country's first LNG shipment in three weeks, while a supertanker was provisionally booked at nearly $500,000 a day to load Gulf crude for China.

US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said about 6.5 million barrels of oil a day moved through the strait over the past week with US support.

"We are using the United States military to escort out oil and gas out of the Strait of Hormuz,” Wright told Bloomberg Radio, saying about 6.5 million barrels of oil a day exited the Gulf via the strait over the past week. "We are restoring supplies of global oil and refined products to the world out of that region."

Maritime Chokepoint Developments:

Strait of Hormuz

• A Norwegian-flagged products tanker appears to be preparing to exit
• Two Iran-linked Suezmaxes, Chloe and Kariz, sailed into the strait and are now idling off Iran's Bandar Abbas
• Very large crude carrier Jamaica Prosperity was provisionally fixed by the shipping unit of a Chinese charterer to pick up a Persian Gulf cargo on Aug. 3 at 465 Worldscale points, or nearly $500,000 per day

Southern Red Sea

• Twenty-one commodity vessels crossed the Bab el-Mandeb strait in either direction on Wednesday, compared to 38 a day earlier: Kpler
• Only Russian crude left via the chokepoint, totaling about 3.5 million barrels, although some vessels may have transited with transponders off
• South Korean-controlled VLCC V Glory seen approaching Gulf of Aden recently before going dark; Saudi-flagged Samha seen doing so on Thursday
• On Wednesday, some ships were provisionally booked to load from Yanbu in August, with the option of exiting via Bab el- Mandeb to reach South Korea

Northern Red Sea

• Two LNG carriers were struck late Wednesday at Egypt's Damietta port near the mouth of the Suez Canal; no one has claimed responsibility yet
• Japanese-flagged VLCC Takamatsu Maru is the latest to divert to Egypt's Sidi Kerir on the Mediterranean coast as a destination from US previously; ship is currently southeast of Africa
• Bidbid and VL Prosperity have arrived at and loading from Sidi Kerir, with previously reported destinations in Asia
• Three VLCCs — Olympic Luck, DHT Gazelle and DHT Mustang — that departed Yanbu are currently idling off Sidi Kerir with no clear destination

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 09:30

'Coordinated Cyberattack' Hits More Than 30 Minnesota Water Systems

Authored by Owen Evans via The Epoch Times,

A “coordinated cyberattack” targeted more than 30 community water systems ‌in Minnesota on July 26 and July 27, the state’s information technology agency said in a statement.

Minnesota IT Services (MNIT) stated on July 28 that it activated its incident response capabilities immediately after learning of the attack. MNIT stated that an investigation remains active, and responders continue to “assess affected systems.”

“At this time, they are not aware of any active requests from Minnesota cities to have their residents modify their drinking water usage,” the agency stated.

John Israel, MNIT assistant commissioner and Minnesota chief information security officer, said such attacks require “a coordinated, whole-of-government response.”

“[The agency] is working side by side with our partners to share intelligence, support affected communities, and help utilities restore operations safely while strengthening defenses against future attacks,” he said.

Emily Zimmer, a spokesperson for the agency, told Reuters in an email that while the investigation remains ongoing, “the timing, methods of access, and targeted infrastructure share characteristics with other coordinated cyber incidents our federal partners have observed involving critical infrastructure.”

Zimmer said the agency could not yet discuss formal attribution or specifics of the incidents. She noted that ‌the agency used the term “attack“ to describe the situation ”because investigators identified unauthorized access with malicious intent directed at these systems.”

The FBI said in a statement that it ‌was ⁠aware of the incident and was in contact with the victims “to resolve the matter.”

In a June 16 article about safeguarding critical water infrastructure, Microsoft stated that while cyberattacks typically “wreak havoc” on digital systems, at a water utility, a network breach “can move quickly into the physical realm.”

“Online systems can give an attacker access to operational technology—physical equipment like pumps, sensors, and chemical treatment systems,” it stated.

It stated that local utilities make prime targets because of their size and that most U.S. water utilities are tiny operations.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), 97 percent of the nation’s 156,000 public water systems serve fewer than 10,000 customers.

While it is not yet clear who is responsible for the attacks, Iranian-linked hackers have, for years, targeted U.S. water systems to varying levels of success.

Handala Warning

Iran’s state-run Press TV, which the U.S. Treasury has sanctioned for acting as a propaganda arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, reported on July 23 that the Handala hacking group warned that it will continue targeting U.S. industrial control systems.

Handala is one of several public personas used by a hacking unit operating ​under the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) as part of the agency’s psychological ⁠operations, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

An April 7 U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) ​advisory warned that Iranian-affiliated ​hackers were attacking internet-facing ⁠programmable logic controllers, computer devices used to interact with machinery and other critical infrastructure networks, manufactured by Rockwell Automation.

The group said on July 23 that attacks targeting programmable logic controllers and supervisory control and data acquisition systems represented only a portion of its capabilities and warned that wider campaigns could target sectors including water, electricity, and transportation networks, Press TV reported.

A July 22 update to the advisory expanded the ​scope of the targeting to include devices manufactured by Schneider Electric, Siemens, and ​potentially other manufacturers.

CISA stated in its advisory that some hacking activity resembles operations previously attributed to CyberAv3ngers, also known as the Shahid Kaveh Group, which is affiliated with the Cyber Electronic Command of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

CISA acting Director Nick Andersen told The Epoch Times by email: “CISA is aware of multiple potential incidents affecting local water utilities and is coordinating with the EPA and other government and industry partners to understand the scope and provide any information or technical support to help critical infrastructure owners and operators protect their systems.”

On June 11, the cybersecurity company Dataminr issued an alert about Handala, stating that the hacking group had claimed to have compromised California Water Service (Cal Water), one of the largest investor-owned water utilities in the United States, serving approximately 2 million customers across 100 California communities. The hackers published 5 gigabytes of data.

“CISA’s ⁠updated reporting shows a worrying expansion in Iran-linked critical infrastructure targeting focused on the United States,” Joe Slowik, director of threat research and cyber engineering at Dataminr, said in a July 27 blog post on the company’s ⁠website.

CyberAv3ngers struck a small water utility in Aliquippa, Pa., in November 2023, gaining control of a device at the Municipal Water Authority, according to a 2025 report by the Maryland Cybersecurity Council.

Cyberattacks on Water Systems

According to Xylem, a global water technology provider, there’s “no lack of examples” of cyberattacks involving water systems.

In October 2024, New Jersey-based American Water, the largest regulated water and wastewater utility company in the United States, which serves more than 14 million people in 14 states and on 18 military installations, had to shut down computer systems due to a cyberattack.

In January 2024, the Russian hacktivist group Cyber Army of Russia Reborn claimed responsibility for attacks on water facilities in the United States and Poland. In Muleshoe, Texas, one breach resulted in the loss of tens of thousands of gallons of water.

Authorities have assessed that a Chinese Communist Party state-sponsored cyber group known as Volt Typhoon is seeking to pre-position itself on IT networks for disruptive or destructive cyberattacks against U.S. critical infrastructure.

In a 2024 statement, CISA said that Volt Typhoon uses hacking techniques that avoid installing malware, which can be relatively easily detected, and instead rely on built-in tools that are harder to spot.

This means that they exploit weak admin passwords, factory-default logins, and unpatched internet-connected devices

In a January report from the Congressional Research Service, Chris Jaikaran, a specialist in cybersecurity policy, said that the U.S. Intelligence Community assesses that China is “the most active and persistent cyber threat” to U.S. institutions.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 09:10

AI Exhaustion? Samsung Earnings Beat Expectations But Stock Abruptly Reverses Kneejerk Gains

Samsung Electronics delivered another good quarter last night, underscoring that the AI infrastructure boom appears to continue to funneling enormous profits toward the companies supplying the memory chips powering. Shares were up 10% at one point but finished the session red.

The South Korean technology giant reported second-quarter revenue of 171.5 trillion won and operating profit of 89.5 trillion won, according to CNBC, beating analyst expectations of 79.3 trillion won and marking another record quarter. Operating profit surged more than eighteen-fold from a year ago, while revenue more than doubled, driven overwhelmingly by demand for AI memory.

The company's memory division once again carried the business, posting record DRAM and NAND sales as hyperscalers and enterprise customers continued racing to build AI infrastructure. According to CNBC, Samsung said it is rapidly expanding production of next-generation HBM4 memory, has already shipped its first HBM4E samples to major customers, and continues investing aggressively in new fabrication facilities and advanced research to keep pace with demand.

Samsung now believes industry supply constraints will likely persist through at least 2028 as AI workloads expand beyond today's large language models into increasingly compute-intensive agentic AI applications. The company said demand for general-purpose computing is accelerating alongside AI, while customers are increasingly seeking multi-year supply agreements to lock in memory capacity years in advance.

Samsung also indicated that AI infrastructure spending remains remarkably healthy heading into the second half of the year. Management expects continued strength across server DRAM, enterprise SSDs and high-bandwidth memory, noting it has already finalized supply agreements with five of the world's largest data center operators while negotiations continue with several more major customers.

Despite this, shares posted a loss for the day on Thursday as investors continue showing caution related to deals in the AI/hyperscaler space. Domestic rival SK Hynix reported record profits of its own earlier this week and also disappointed investors.

Per Reuters, SK Hynix posted operating profit of 60.5 trillion won, up more than six-fold from a year earlier, yet fell short of lofty Wall Street expectations after slower-than-anticipated HBM4 shipments delayed revenue recognition. Investors responded harshly, sending the shares sharply lower despite management insisting demand from AI customers remains exceptionally strong.

This could be starting to show just how unforgiving the AI trade has become. Neither company is describing weakening demand. Samsung sees chip shortages lasting until 2028, while SK Hynix says customers continue requesting additional memory supply and is signing five-year agreements to secure future business.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 08:55

US Savings Rate Tumbles Despite Lowest Jobless Claims Data In 57 Years

The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits remained near its lowest levels since 1969 last week at just 197k (below the 200k exp)...

Continuing jobless claims are also falling back to cyclical lows...

Additionally, both income and spending are also trending higher...

But overall, the savings rate is tumbling...

So, the 'low hire, no fire' economy leaves Americans still spending but higher prices are forcing savings to be drawn down to maintain quality of life.

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 08:49

Headline PCE 'Deflates' In June, First Time Since COVID

After three months of significant acceleration in prices, The Fed's favorite inflation indicator - Core PCE (a measure of price changes in consumer goods and services that excludes volatile food and energy costs) - was expected to slow in June data released today.

And it did - more than expected - Core PCE rose 0.1% MoM (below the 0.2% MoM expected) pulling the YoY rise down from +3.4% to +3.3%...

The headline PCE saw 0.1% MoM drop in June - its first 'deflationary' print since April 2020 (COVID)

Services once again dominated the MoM rise in PCE prices...

And of course, while this is June data, we have seen oil prices rise since then (as Iran reignited), but it's not enough to trigger a rebound in the PCE Energy sub-index...

Seems like Warsh was warranted in his hawkish hold?

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 08:40

IRGC Strikes Jordan Again After 2-Hour US Bombardment Kills Iranian Troops, Civilians - Hormuz Traffic Creeps Higher

In the wake of the overnight fresh round of US airstrikes on Iran, which resulted in destruction and casualties especially along coastal areas, Iran's military has retaliated once again especially on Jordan.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) announced that it completed a "heavy" wave of strikes on the Islamic Republic, in response to "attempted missile attacks" on American bases in the region earlier this week. This US wave lasted two hours, the Pentagon said, striking "military command centers, missile and drone facilities, coastal surveillance and defense sites, and maritime capabilities". 

via Iran state media

It accused Iran of a "surprise attack" the prior night, Tuesday, but said that "all Iranian missiles were successfully intercepted."

As a result of the US bombing, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRTC) said three of its troops were killed in a missile attack, according to semi-official Tasnim. The three IRGC members died while "defending Iran’s borders and people" in what it described as a "brutal attack by the criminal terrorist regime of the United States."

Iranian officials are also saying that US bombardment of Qeshm island has killed a family. In Qeshm island, the Director General of Crisis Management of the Hormozgan Governorate said search and rescue efforts are underway amid mounting casualties there.

"So far, two children have been pulled out from under the rubble and transferred to medical centers, and efforts are ongoing to rescue three other members of this family," Mehrdad Hassanzadeh said. 

Iran launched ballistic missiles at Jordan's Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in response to US strikes, but Jordan says it intercepted all five missiles. pic.twitter.com/25MxHgn1LR

— Clash Report (@clashreport) July 30, 2026

In response Iran says it has again targeted a US airbase in Jordan, and claims to have taken out three F-35 stealth fighters, though there's been no indication of this from the Pentagon side. According to details via Al Jazeera:

In a statement directed to Jordan, the IRGC says in response to a US attack on Qeshm island that killed two parents and their child, aerospace fighters targeted a ramp and maintenance shed at the al-Azraq airbase, which hosts US F-35 fighter jets, with several ballistic missiles, state news agency Fars reports.

The IRGC said that it had completely destroyed three F-35 aircraft and caused “heavy damage” to three others.

The IRGC stated that "A number of enemy officers and technical and maintenance personnel were also killed in this attack. Our region is no place for the infanticidal army that cruelly slaughters innocent families in the middle of the night while they sleep."

They added that the war will continue until "the last American occupier is expelled from the Islamic lands" and that Muslims in Jordan and the region want this too.

Aftermath of US attack on a residential area of Iran's Qeshm Island:

Footage shows aftermath of a US missile strike on civilian residences in Qeshm.

As a result of the US attack on homes in Qeshm's Chah-Tangu, three members of the family were killed, while two of their children sustained injuries and were taken to a hospital for ongoing care. pic.twitter.com/43vjC6qjw5

— IRNA News Agency ☫ (@IrnaEnglish) July 30, 2026

Despite the new fighting, shipping data surprisingly suggests an uptick in transit in the Strait of Hormuz. "Shipping across the crucial Strait of Hormuz has picked up in recent days despite a continuation of hostilities in the Middle East, with the US claiming its navy escorted some tankers across the waterway," Bloomberg writes.

But this still constitutes a tiny trickle compared to pre-war normal times:

The Al Areesh openly exited the Persian Gulf early Thursday carrying a liquefied natural gas cargo from Qatar, the country's first shipment in three weeks, while the liquefied petroleum gas carrier CYH Yongchun appeared to transit the strait with its transponder off, according to ship-tracking data.

Fourteen commodity vessels crossed Hormuz in both directions on Wednesday, data from market intelligence firm Kpler shows, up from single digits last week. The figures may still be revised with new information. A crude supertanker has also been provisionally booked at nearly $500,000 per day to collect a cargo at an unnamed Persian Gulf port next week for delivery to China.

Simultaneously the Bab El Mandeb strait is getting choked off to Saudi shipping and is being squeezed by Yemen's Houthis. Per a Bloomberg note, the British marine insurance market has widened the area in the Red Sea it deems as high risk in the wake of new Houthi targeting of foreign vessels.

Iran may be responsibility for Wednesday's unprecedented alleged (and still subject to contradictory reporting) drone attack on a tanker docked at Egyptian port:

Two Iranian sources said the drone strike on the U.S.-owned LNG vessel in Egypt was intended to demonstrate that Iran could disrupt global shipping and energy supplies more broadly if it chose to escalate.

Source: NYT pic.twitter.com/UWWyK6oCkH

— Clash Report (@clashreport) July 30, 2026

However...

NYT didn't even say they are Iranian "source". Just two Iranian "individuals", whom NYT thinks their statements are important to manufacure a narrative. pic.twitter.com/F1kqJ15yzl

— Monjed Al-Tarifi منجد الطريفي (Uncivilized) (@MonjedTarifi) July 30, 2026

The Lloyd's Market Association expanded the areas where underwriters can charge war risk premiums after a meeting earlier this week. Per Bloomberg:

Listed area in the Red Sea increased to 25.5 degrees north, but doesn’t include Egyptian territorial waters. That would, however, include Saudi Arabia’s port of Yanbu, which has been a vital lifeline for the kingdom’s oil exports

“The decision today to amend those Listed Areas reflects the recent escalation by the Houthis and their attacks on Saudi vessels in the Red Sea,” said Neil Roberts, Head of Marine and Aviation at the Lloyd’s Market Association

President Trump is said to be 'exasperated' by the situation and frustrated at his advisors' inability to agree on war strategy, meanwhile.

BREAKING: Trump exploded and lost his temper during a security meeting, shouting and cursing out of frustration over the military options presented to him and the lack of progress toward a deal with Iran, per NBC News.

A US official adds "after all this time, there is no unity"…

— The Hormuz Letter (@HormuzLetter) July 30, 2026

NBC on Thursday cites that "The president is exasperated" citing a Trump ally. "I don’t think he believed it was going to be this difficult to get the Iranians to agree to a deal.” The source added "there was not a real strategy for how long or what they should do to get to the endpoint."

Reported new Iran strikes on Kuwait as well on Thursday...

Video shows the aftermath of missile strikes from US forces in Kuwait on targets in Abadan, Iran, with fires burning following the attacks tonight. pic.twitter.com/eFAu0iqamV

— Faytuks Network (@FaytuksNetwork) July 30, 2026

As a reminder, University of Chicago political scientist and foreign policy realist author Robert Pape that the war will stumble along and likely expand even through the midterms: "The victory rhetoric [from Trump] doesn't match escalation reality," he said. "It is out of sync." Then he emphasized: "I think it will actually be after the midterms," he said. "Between now and January, this is not going to be over."

Tyler Durden Thu, 07/30/2026 - 08:35