Market Snapshot
| Index | Close | Change | % Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| S&P 500 | 7,798.99 | +50.49 | +0.65% |
| NASDAQ | 26,803.03 | +214.54 | +0.81% |
| DOW | 53,839.99 | +69.72 | +0.13% |
| Russell 2000 | 3,052.85 | +7.37 | +0.24% |
| VIX | 14.63 | +0.08 | +0.55% |
The S&P 500 set a record close at 7,798.99 and traded above 7,800 intraday (high 7,816.70) for the first time. The NASDAQ, by contrast, remains roughly 1.1% below its June 2 closing high of 27,093.90.
Breaking News & Macro Events
S&P 500 Notches Record High After Soft Inflation Data — Yahoo Finance
July CPI came in cooler than expected, and the market’s reaction says everything about where the current policy debate sits: money markets cut the implied odds of a September rate hike to roughly 35%, down from about 50% earlier in the week. This is not a rate-cut trade. Three FOMC members dissented in favor of a hike at the July meeting, so a tame inflation print relieves pressure in the direction that actually matters right now. Falling oil prices reinforced the disinflation read.
Silver Lake in Talks to Buy Workday — Reuters (exclusive)
Private equity firm Silver Lake is in discussions to acquire Workday, which carried a market value near $43 billion before the report. Workday shares closed +17.8% — their best day since 2016 — after being halted intraday, lifting market value to roughly $51 billion. Talks are ongoing with no assurance of a deal. The setup matters beyond the single name: Workday entered the day down about 15% year-to-date and more than 40% below its 2024 peak, as investors question the durability of traditional enterprise software against rapidly advancing AI. A buyout at this scale would mark the point where private capital starts treating that de-rating as an opportunity.
Intel Prices Upsized $20 Billion Stock Offering — Intel Newsroom
Intel upsized its offering from $15 billion to $20 billion, pricing 210,526,315 shares at $95.00 for net proceeds of about $19.7 billion, with a 30-day underwriter option on 31,578,947 additional shares. The deal reportedly drew more than $100 billion in demand and closed August 12. Proceeds are earmarked for general corporate purposes including capital expenditures and working capital — in practice, the AI foundry buildout. That a turnaround story can raise $20 billion at a discount to spot and still trade higher afterward says more about appetite for AI capacity than about Intel’s execution to date.
Economic Calendar
Key Data:
| Indicator | Latest | Previous | As Of |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fed Funds Rate | 3.63% | 3.63% | 2026-07-01 |
| CPI (index) | 332.813 | 332.568 | 2026-07-01 |
| Unemployment | 4.1% | 4.2% | 2026-07-01 |
| 10Y Yield | 4.68% | 4.70% | 2026-08-12 |
| Breakeven Inflation | 2.26% | 2.27% | 2026-08-12 |
The July CPI index reading above (+0.07% month-over-month) is the print released this morning that drove the session.
Next FOMC Meeting: 2026-09-15 (33 days away) — a projections meeting. No meeting falls inside the next 14 days.
Upcoming Releases (Next 7 Days):
| Date | Event | Previous | Forecast |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-08-14 | Retail Sales (Jul) | +0.2% | +0.2% |
| 2026-08-14 | U. Michigan Consumer Sentiment (Aug, prelim) | — | — |
| 2026-08-14 | Business Inventories (Jun) | — | — |
| 2026-08-17 | Empire State Manufacturing Index (Aug) | — | — |
| 2026-08-18 | Housing Starts & Building Permits (Jul) | — | — |
| 2026-08-18 | Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization (Jul) | — | — |
| 2026-08-18 | Pending Home Sales (Jul) | — | — |
| 2026-08-19 | FOMC Minutes (July 28–29 meeting) | — | — |
| 2026-08-20 | Philadelphia Fed Index (Aug) | — | — |
| 2026-08-20 | Leading Indicators (Jul) | — | — |
Wednesday’s minutes are the week’s real event — they cover the meeting where three members dissented toward a hike.
Watchlist
Dividend Stocks
COST — Costco Wholesale ($961.85, +1.29%)
- Earnings: 2026-09-24 (42 days away) | Est. EPS $6.56 on revenue $94.6B
- Ex-Dividend: 2026-07-23 (passed) | Yield: 0.62%
- 52W Range: $844.06 — $1,096.50
- News: No significant company-specific developments in the past three days.
NKE — Nike Inc. ($41.23, +1.78%)
- Earnings: 2026-09-29 (47 days away) | Est. EPS $0.45 on revenue $11.4B
- Ex-Dividend: 2026-08-31 (18 days away) | Yield: 3.97%
- 52W Range: $40.00 — $80.17 (3.1% above 52W low) ⚠️
- News: No significant company-specific developments in the past three days. The stock sits near the bottom of a 52-week range that has halved from the high — the turnaround thesis remains unconfirmed by price.
PFE — Pfizer Inc. ($26.80, +1.86%)
- Earnings: 2026-11-03 (82 days away) | Est. EPS $0.77 on revenue $16.0B
- Ex-Dividend: 2026-07-23 (passed) | Yield: 6.46%
- 52W Range: $23.58 — $28.75
- Executive change this week: CFO Dave Denton departs August 15; Cecile Guegan (SVP Finance, Global Biopharmaceutical Business) becomes interim CFO August 16 while an internal and external search proceeds. Announced June 18; the filing states the departure is unrelated to financial or operating results or to any accounting disagreement. Denton is leaving for a consumer-goods opportunity after guiding the Seagen, Biohaven and Metsera acquisitions.
UPS — United Parcel Service ($105.54, +1.57%)
- Earnings: 2026-10-27 (75 days away) | Est. EPS $1.63 on revenue $22.2B
- Ex-Dividend: 2026-08-16 (3 days away) ⚠️ | Pay date 2026-09-02 | Yield: 6.28%
- 52W Range: $82.00 — $122.41
- News: No verifiable company-specific developments in the past three days.
Growth Stocks
AAPL — Apple Inc. ($305.26, +1.00%)
- Earnings: 2026-10-29 (77 days away) | Est. EPS $1.98 on revenue $113.6B
- 52W Range: $223.78 — $344.57
- News: No significant company-specific developments in the past three days.
AMZN — Amazon.com Inc. ($265.13, −0.80%)
- Earnings: 2026-10-29 (77 days away) | Est. EPS $1.95 on revenue $201.8B
- 52W Range: $196.00 — $287.20
- News: No significant company-specific developments in the past three days. One of the few megacaps red on a record-close day.
CRCL — Circle Internet Group ($75.38, +5.75%) ⚠️
- Earnings: Reported 2026-08-05
- 52W Range: $49.90 — $159.47
- News: Bitwise research head Ryan Rasmussen projects strong stablecoin sector growth, naming Circle as a prime beneficiary — GuruFocus, Aug 11. Worth noting the move came with bitcoin trading in the $64K range, so this is a stablecoin-specific bid rather than a broad crypto beta trade.
GOOG — Alphabet Inc. ($343.94, +0.46%)
- Earnings: 2026-10-28 (76 days away) | Est. EPS $3.00 on revenue $127.0B
- 52W Range: $197.46 — $404.47
- News (Aug 5–6, for context): Jeff Dean is leaving after 27 years to co-found Discovery Loop, an AI-for-science public benefit corporation, taking three longtime Google scientists with him. Demis Hassabis moves to Chair of Google DeepMind and Chief Scientist of Alphabet; Koray Kavukcuoglu steps up to SVP of Google DeepMind reporting to Sundar Pichai, owning Gemini model development and the Gemini app. The stock fell about 4% on the announcement and has not fully recovered.
HIMS — Hims & Hers Health ($28.77, −4.00%) ⚠️
- Earnings: 2026-11-09 (88 days away) | Est. EPS $0.25 on revenue $894.3M
- 52W Range: $13.74 — $65.30
- News: Q2 revenue beat expectations and full-year guidance was raised, but the stock fell — StockStory/FinancialContent, Aug 10. The quarter carried an $81M one-time charge tied to acquisitions and restructuring. Today’s decline came three sessions after the print and had no identifiable fresh catalyst.
INTC — Intel Corporation ($104.56, +3.58%) ⚠️
- Earnings: 2026-10-22 (70 days away) | Est. EPS $0.39 on revenue $16.4B
- 52W Range: $21.90 — $142.35
- News: The $20B upsized offering priced at $95/share closed August 12 — see Breaking News above. Note the 52-week low of $21.90 against today’s $104.56: this has been a violent re-rating, and the equity raise did not interrupt it.
LUNA — Luna Innovations ($1.26 as of 2026-08-12) ⚠️ stale quote
- Earnings: Date unavailable
- 52W Range: $0.62 — $1.75
- Data note: No trade data posted for 2026-08-13. The last available close is $1.26 on 2026-08-12 on 10,700 shares. Volume in this name has been running in the tens of thousands of shares, so quotes are thin and intermittently stale — treat any single print with caution.
META — Meta Platforms ($594.97, +2.78%)
- Earnings: 2026-10-28 (76 days away) | Est. EPS $6.97 on revenue $63.3B
- 52W Range: $520.26 — $796.25
- News: No company-specific developments in the past three days, but Meta was cited as one of the principal drivers of the NASDAQ’s advance today alongside Micron and Netflix.
MSTR — Strategy ($97.10, +2.39%)
- Earnings: 2026-10-29 (77 days away) | Est. EPS $12.63 on revenue $129.1M
- 52W Range: $81.81 — $381.00
- News: Strategy sold 1,690 BTC between August 3 and 9 for about $108.6M at an average of roughly $64,262 per coin, using proceeds to repurchase approximately 1.15 million STRC preferred shares. This is the company’s third bitcoin sale at a loss in 2026, and it follows a separate 1,638 BTC disposal. The largest corporate bitcoin holder has turned net seller to service preferred dividends — a structural shift from the accumulation thesis, and the reason the stock sits 75% below its 52-week high.
NNE — Nano Nuclear Energy ($20.52, +7.94%) ⚠️
- Earnings: Reported 2026-08-12
- 52W Range: $14.71 — $60.87
- News: Q3 FY2026 results and business update — GlobeNewswire, Aug 12. The NRC accepted for review the Construction Permit Application for the KRONOS MMR Energy System at the University of Illinois. Regulatory acceptance is a procedural step, not an approval, but it is the gate this entire cohort has to pass.
NVDA — NVIDIA Corporation ($225.30, +0.54%) ⚠️
- Earnings: 2026-08-26 (13 days away) ⚠️ | Est. EPS $2.08 on revenue $91.8B
- 52W Range: $164.07 — $236.54 (4.8% below 52W high) ⚠️
- News: No significant company-specific developments in the past three days. The most consequential print on the watchlist calendar lands in under two weeks, with the stock within 5% of its high.
OKLO — Oklo Inc. ($46.45, +2.92%)
- Earnings: Reported 2026-08-07
- 52W Range: $36.61 — $193.84
- News (Aug 7, for context): The Groves isotope facility reached first criticality on August 5, roughly 11 months from greenfield to operational — Investing.com. Today’s gain looks like sector sympathy with NNE rather than a company-specific catalyst.
RKLB — Rocket Lab USA ($80.10, −1.32%)
- Earnings: 2026-11-09 (88 days away) | Est. EPS −$0.02 on revenue $253.2M
- 52W Range: $37.57 — $151.00
- News: Q2 results were reported around August 10, but the specific figures circulating could not be traced to a primary source and are omitted here rather than reported unverified.
SMCI — Super Micro Computer ($39.16, +4.12%) ⚠️
- Earnings: 2026-11-03 (82 days away) | Est. EPS $0.76 on revenue $12.1B
- 52W Range: $19.48 — $58.78
- News: Q4 FY2026 net sales of $11.1B with gross margin of 17.5% versus 9.5% a year earlier, and net income of $1,178M versus $195M — Quartz, Aug 11. New orders exceeded $60B in the quarter, producing a record backlog, and FY2027 revenue guidance of $65–72B towers over the roughly $54.4B consensus. The catch sits in the near-term line: Q1 FY2027 gross margin is guided to 10.4–10.8%, well below the 17.5% just reported. Order volume is abundant; margin per unit is the open question.
SMR — NuScale Power ($9.85, +2.71%)
- Earnings: 2026-11-05 (84 days away) | Est. EPS −$0.12 on revenue $5.4M
- 52W Range: $7.21 — $57.42
- News: Reports of new contract activity circulated today but only from low-reliability outlets, so they are not repeated here. The move is consistent with the broader nuclear cohort bid (NNE +7.9%, OKLO +2.9%).
SOFI — SoFi Technologies ($18.43, +2.73%)
- Earnings: 2026-10-27 (75 days away) | Est. EPS $0.17 on revenue $1.3B
- 52W Range: $14.88 — $32.73
- News: No significant company-specific developments in the past three days.
TEM — Tempus AI ($54.29, −0.59%)
- Earnings: 2026-11-03 (82 days away) | Est. EPS −$0.07 on revenue $410.0M
- 52W Range: $40.77 — $104.32
- News: No significant company-specific developments in the past three days.
TSM — Taiwan Semiconductor ($430.49, +0.31%)
- Earnings: 2026-10-15 (63 days away) | Est. EPS $4.45
- 52W Range: $223.70 — $479.00
- News: July revenue rose 45% year-over-year to a record NT$467.58B, with 2026 revenue growth guidance raised to slightly above 40% and capex guidance increased on AI chip demand — Motley Fool, Aug 12. The monthly revenue disclosure remains the cleanest real-time read on AI hardware demand available to public investors.
UNH — UnitedHealth Group ($399.06, −1.61%)
- Earnings: 2026-10-27 (75 days away) | Est. EPS $4.12 on revenue $111.5B
- 52W Range: $255.97 — $461.62
- News: No verifiable company-specific catalyst for today’s decline. The largest watchlist decliner among the megacaps on an up day.
Commodities & FX
| Asset | Price | Change | % Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gold | $4,406.20 | −$2.70 | −0.06% |
| WTI Oil | $81.15 | −$2.12 | −2.55% |
| Brent Oil | $86.95 | −$2.03 | −2.28% |
| EUR/USD | 1.1531 | −0.0012 | −0.11% |
| USD/JPY | 159.55 | +0.28 | +0.18% |
| 10Y Yield | 4.641% | −0.041 | −4.1 bp |
| US Dollar (DXY) | 99.98 | −0.03 | −0.03% |
Crude did the heavy lifting on the disinflation narrative, with WTI off 2.6% and Brent off 2.3%. Gold was essentially unchanged despite the softer inflation print — notable, given that a dovish repricing would ordinarily support it. The dollar barely moved, leaving the 4-basis-point drop in the 10-year as the cleanest expression of the rate-hike-odds decline.
Notable Voices
Jamie Dimon on Dollar Dominance and Military Power — Jamie Dimon, Fortune (2026-08-11)
The JPMorgan Chase CEO argued that the dollar’s reserve currency status rests on the United States sustaining both military and economic primacy over the next 25 years, and that losing either would eventually cost it that status and produce a more fragmented, more dangerous world. It is a structural argument rather than a market call, but it lands in the same week the market is debating whether the Fed’s next move is a hike — a reminder that reserve-currency privilege is what lets the US run this policy mix at all.
Searches across Dan Ives, Tom Lee, Chamath Palihapitiya, Cathie Wood, Jim Cramer, Stanley Druckenmiller, Howard Marks, Ray Dalio and Warren Buffett surfaced no substantive commentary dated within the last three days.
Market Outlook
The S&P 500 closed at a record 7,798.99 and printed above 7,800 intraday for the first time, after a cooler-than-expected July CPI cut implied odds of a September rate hike to roughly 35% from about 50% earlier this week. The direction of that repricing is the story: with three FOMC members having dissented toward a hike in July, disinflation is currently relieving pressure from the tightening side rather than pulling forward cuts, and a 4-basis-point decline in the 10-year alongside a 2.6% drop in WTI gave equities the cover to extend. Breadth warrants caution, though — the Dow added just 0.13% and the Russell 2000 0.24% while the NASDAQ’s 0.81% leaned on Meta and AI infrastructure, and the NASDAQ itself remains 1.1% below its June high, so this record is being set by a narrow cohort. Supermicro’s $60B order book set against Q1 gross margin guidance of 10.4–10.8% captures the tension underneath the AI trade cleanly: volume is abundant, profitability per unit is not, and that question gets its most important test when NVIDIA reports in 13 days. Watch Friday’s July retail sales print and next Wednesday’s FOMC minutes for whether the hike-risk repricing has any durability behind it.
This digest is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice.
References
- Yahoo Finance, “Stock market today: S&P 500 notches record high, Nasdaq rallies after soft inflation data,” 2026-08-13
- TheStreet, “Stock Market Today (Aug. 13, 2026): S&P 500 sets new record, clearing 7,800 for the first time,” 2026-08-13
- Reuters via Investing.com, “Exclusive: Silver Lake in talks to buy Workday,” 2026-08-13
- Intel Newsroom, “Intel Announces Upsize and Pricing of $20 Billion Common Stock Offering,” 2026-08-10
- Quartz, “Supermicro Q4 FY2026 earnings: margins surge, fiscal 2027 guidance tops estimates,” 2026-08-11
- Pfizer, “Pfizer Announces Chief Financial Officer Transition,” 2026-06-18
- Motley Fool, “Taiwan Semiconductor’s July Revenue Rose 45%,” 2026-08-12
- GlobeNewswire, “Nano Nuclear Reports Q3 FY 2026 Financial Results and Provides Business Update,” 2026-08-12
- Investing.com, “Oklo Q2 2026 slides: first criticality achieved, $3B liquidity,” 2026-08-07
- crypto.news, “Strategy is selling: what happens when the biggest corporate Bitcoin holder turns net seller,” 2026-08
- Quartz, “Jeff Dean leaving Google after 27 years to co-found Discovery Loop,” 2026-08-05
- StockStory via FinancialContent, “Hims & Hers Health (NYSE:HIMS) Exceeds Q2 CY2026 Expectations But Stock Drops,” 2026-08-10
- GuruFocus, “Circle Internet Group (CRCL) Shares Rise as GF Score Highlights Growth Potential,” 2026-08-11
- Fortune, “Jamie Dimon on dollar dominance and military strength,” 2026-08-11
- Federal Reserve, “FOMC Meeting Calendars,” 2026
- Scotiabank Economics, “Calendar of Economic Release Dates (August 2026),” 2026-08
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, “FRED Economic Data” (FEDFUNDS, CPIAUCSL, UNRATE, DGS10, T10YIE), accessed 2026-08-13