Section
Technology
Cerebras pops 68% in Nasdaq debut to hit $95 billion valuation
Shares of AI chipmaker Cerebras Systems surged 68 per cent in their first day of trading, closing at $311.07 and giving the company a market capitalisation of roughly $95 billion in the largest US technology IPO since Uber.
AI Rally Broadens Beyond Chips Before Nvidia Earnings
Wall Street strategists say the AI bull market is entering a new phase where software and services overtake chipmakers as the primary driver of market gains, with Nvidia's May 20 earnings report serving as the next major test.
Quectel sues Pentagon over Chinese military company blacklist
The Shanghai-based wireless technology firm argues its January 2026 designation under Section 1260H was made in error and is inflicting escalating commercial damage on a company that says it has never had ties to China's military.
Big Tech earnings deliver 'wake-up call' to AI skeptics, Wedbush says
First-quarter results from the largest U.S. technology companies showed AI-driven demand holding firm across chips, cloud infrastructure, and enterprise software, with 94 percent of the sector beating earnings estimates.
SpaceX IPO Tests Limits of Market Liquidity Depth
SpaceX plans a $75 billion IPO at a $1.75 trillion valuation. The record listing could drain investor capital from smaller issuers and reshape market flows.
Asia's chip titans create single-point stock market risk
TSMC, Samsung and SK Hynix now dominate Taiwan and South Korea's stock indices, creating concentration risk as hyperscalers pour $500 billion into AI infrastructure.
As commissions vanish, the hidden costs of stock trading come into focus
Commission-free stock trading is now an industry standard — 19 of 22 major brokerages charge zero per trade. But the real costs have simply moved: margin rates ranging from 5.14 to 12.33 per cent, options contract fees of up to $0.65, and execution-quality gaps driven by payment-for-order-flow arrangements. Here is what investors actually pay in 2026.
South Korea floats AI profit social tax as tech giants boom
South Korea's top policy official proposed redirecting AI and semiconductor excess profits to citizens as a "national dividend," triggering a sharp Kospi sell-off.
Meta to cut 8,000 jobs as AI spending push reaches $145bn
Meta plans to cut roughly 8,000 jobs this month, or about 10 per cent of its workforce, as the company channels a record $125bn to $145bn into artificial intelligence infrastructure in 2026.
NewSquare trims $14.8m QTEC position after 60% technology run
NewSquare Capital cut its $14.80m position in the First Trust QTEC ETF to just 0.03 per cent of assets, according to a 13F filing. The trim follows a 60 per cent technology rally and stretches QTEC's P/E above 38.
AI lifts S&P 500 to record as valuations outrun earnings
Wall Street ended the week with the S&P 500 at a record 7,209 and the Nasdaq at 24,892, the latest peaks in an AI-led rally that has carried US equity valuations to their most stretched levels since the dot-com era. Earnings beats have closed only part of the gap.
SK hynix HBM capacity hits zero as Big Tech offers fab funding
SK hynix told customers its high-bandwidth memory output is sold out and that Big Tech buyers are offering to fund new fabs and ASML lithography purchases.
Nvidia AI equity bets top $40 billion as circular-deal scrutiny grows
Nvidia's stakes in OpenAI, Corning and IREN top $40 billion, sharpening debate over whether the chipmaker is building a moat or funding a closed loop.
S&P 500 and Nasdaq notch records on AI and earnings optimism
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite closed at record highs on Friday, lifted by AI chipmaker gains and a first-quarter earnings season running well ahead of estimates.
Broadcom slides 4% as OpenAI custom chip financing stalls at $18bn
AVGO shares fell about 4 per cent on Thursday after The Information reported Broadcom and OpenAI are at an impasse over $18bn in first-phase financing for the planned custom-chip rollout.
Micron surges 38 per cent in a week on AI memory demand
Micron Technology shares surged 38 per cent over five trading sessions to close at a record $746.81 on Friday, pushing the chipmaker's market capitalisation past $840bn. The rally was driven by AI-fuelled demand for high-bandwidth memory, which is sold out for the whole of 2026.
White House weighs vetting frontier AI models in sharp policy reversal
The Trump administration is considering government vetting of frontier artificial intelligence models before their release, a sharp reversal from a hands-off approach triggered by national security alarms over a model that can find and exploit software vulnerabilities.
US nears $400m TikTok settlement over child privacy violations
The Justice Department is finalising a $400 million settlement with TikTok over allegations the platform collected personal data from millions of children under 13 without parental consent.
Intel shares surge 16 per cent on reports of preliminary Apple chip manufacturing deal
Intel shares rose as much as 16 per cent on Thursday after reports surfaced that the chipmaker is in preliminary talks with Apple over a manufacturing agreement that would see Intel’s foundry business produce chips for the iPhone maker.
Anthropic Leases SpaceXAI's 300MW Memphis Data Center for AI Compute
Anthropic has leased the full 300-megawatt capacity of SpaceXAI’s Colossus 1 data center in Memphis, Tennessee, securing approximately 220,000 Nvidia GPUs in one of the largest single-tenant cloud compute transactions the AI sector has seen.
Baidu chip unit Kunlunxin files for Shanghai IPO alongside Hong Kong plan
Baidu's AI chip arm Kunlunxin has filed for a Shanghai STAR Market IPO in addition to a separate Hong Kong listing already in train, with Baidu's Hong Kong shares closing up 5.75 per cent on the news.
TSMC April sales jump 17.5% on AI chip demand
TSMC reported April revenue of NT$410.73 billion ($13.08 billion), up 17.5 per cent year-over-year, as sustained demand for AI chips continued to drive growth at the world's largest contract chipmaker.
Qualcomm shares surge 8% on earnings beat, OpenAI chip deal
Qualcomm shares rose more than 8 per cent after the chipmaker reported stronger-than-expected second-quarter earnings and announced a partnership with OpenAI to develop custom chips for running AI models on smartphones.
AMD beats on Q1 as data-center revenue jumps 57%, lifting AI chip rally
Advanced Micro Devices reported $10.25 billion in first-quarter revenue and $1.37 EPS on Tuesday, with data-center sales up 57 per cent to $5.78 billion. Shares rose 18 per cent on Wednesday and lit a wider chip-stock rally.
Arm beats on Q4 but stumbles on AGI CPU supply as $2bn data center orders pile up
Arm topped Q4 estimates with $1.49bn in revenue and 60-cent EPS, then watched its US shares give back gains after executives said only the first $1bn of $2bn-plus AGI CPU orders has secured chip supply.
Samsung crosses $1tn market value as AI memory boom rewrites Asia chip order
Samsung Electronics crossed a $1tn market value on Wednesday, only the second Asian company after TSMC to reach the threshold, after a 14 per cent share-price jump driven by record memory-chip earnings and tightening AI supply.
Big Tech AI capex now drives three-quarters of US GDP growth
Capital expenditure on AI infrastructure by Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet, Meta and Oracle is now responsible for roughly 75 per cent of all US economic growth in Q1 2026, according to estimates compiled this week. Stop the AI build-out and you print a recession headline within two quarters.
PayPal to cut 4,500 jobs in $1.5bn AI restructuring as it tries to 'become a technology company again'
PayPal will cut roughly 20 per cent of its workforce, more than 4,500 employees, over the next two to three years as part of a $1.5 billion cost-saving plan that the company is pitching as an artificial-intelligence-driven turnaround, chief executive Enrique Lores told investors on a first-quarter earnings call.
AI build-out costs are reaching consumer pockets, tech earnings show
The cost of the AI build-out has begun to flow through to consumer-electronics buyers, with the latest Big Tech earnings revealing rising prices on devices, subscriptions and cloud services as hyperscalers funnel profits into AI capacity.
