liveUpdated 13 minutes ago
Later on Wednesday, Alphabet's earnings should give a sign of whether the hundreds of billions going into AI is paying off.
Bitcoin holds near $66K (CoinDesk)Google's cloud revenue jumps 82%, helping Alphabet beat earnings estimates
Alphabet (GOOGL) topped Wall Street expectations for the second quarter as surging demand for AI services fueled another breakout quarter for Google Cloud.
The company reported $119.8 billion in revenue, ahead of analysts' $116.93 billion estimate.
Google Cloud revenue climbed 82% year-over-year to $24.8 billion from $13.6 billion a year earlier, easily surpassing analysts' forecast of $22.4 billion, which had implied 64% growth.
The firm also reported a 30% increase in operating income as its operating margin expanded to 34%. Meanwhile, capital expenditure rose to $44.9 billion in the second quarter, doubling in a year.
CEO Sundar Pichai said AI investments are driving growth across the company, pointing to strong demand for Google Cloud Platform's AI infrastructure and enterprise AI solutions.
Shares were 0.4% higher following the report at $343 post-market hours, after slipping 1.4% during the session.
Tesla holds bitcoin position steady in second quarter
Tesla (TSLA) did not buy or sell any bitcoin (BTC) during the second quarter, maintaining its holdings at 11,509 BTC, according to the company's latest earnings release.
The position was worth roughly $825 million at the end of the quarter. Bitcoin currently trades at $65,840.
The company booked a $112 million after-tax impairment loss on its bitcoin holdings under accounting rules that require digital assets to be measured at fair value, with changes in value recognized in net income each reporting period.
Tesla remains one of the largest publicly traded corporate holders of bitcoin. It is currently the 12th largest public holder of the crypto asset with Elon Musk’s other company, SpaceX (SPCX), being in the eighth spot with 18,712 bitcoin on its balance sheet.
Oil surge and tariffs add to market uncertainty
Markets are facing a challenging mix of geopolitical tensions, trade uncertainty and corporate earnings, according to Ryan Kirkley, co-founder and CEO of Global Settlement (GSX).
Kirkley said the renewed U.S.-Iran conflict, which has pushed oil prices higher, and President Donald Trump's 50% tariffs on selected Canadian imports are combining to create inflationary pressure that markets may be underestimating. Rather than viewing the developments as separate events, he argued investors should consider their cumulative impact on growth and central bank policy.
He also pointed to Alphabet's earnings after the close on Wednesday as a key test of whether heavy spending on AI can continue to support equity valuations amid a more difficult macroeconomic backdrop.
In digital assets, Kirkley said bitcoin's (BTC) recent gains on optimism around U.S. crypto legislation are now facing headwinds from geopolitical risk and higher-for-longer interest rates.
Bitcoin slips below $65,700, crypto stocks extend slide after Clarity Act text
Bitcoin (BTC) and digital asset-related stocks slid lower in the afternoon after the new Clarity Act text failed to boost sentiment.
Coinbase (COIN), the largest U.S. crypto exchange, fell 4.9%, while Circle (CRCL), the stablecoin issuer behind USDC, declined 7.6% during the session. Crypto custodian BitGo (BTGO) lost 5.7% and Bullish (BLSH), digital asset exchange and parent company of CoinDesk, was down 4.7% during the same period.
Meanwhile, bitcoin (BTC) modestly slid to $65,660 after trading above $66,000 earlier in the session, down 1% over the past 24 hours.
The pullback came as traders are growing more skeptical that the bill will become law this year, with Polymarket pricing the odds now at just 33%.
For comparison, the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 fell 0.2%, while the S&P 500 was little-changed during the session.
New Clarity Act text emerges but Polymarket odds of passage fall below 40%
A new working draft of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act is circulating in the U.S. Senate, offering the clearest look yet at legislation lawmakers hope to send to President Donald Trump before the end of the year.
The latest text includes a provision barring the president and other senior government officials from holding direct crypto interests, though the restriction would expire in 2029 and leave the Department of Justice responsible for enforcing related ethics complaints, CoinDesk's Jesse Hamilton reported. The ethics language has been one of the bill's biggest sticking points as lawmakers negotiate a final compromise.
Despite the progress, prediction market participants remain skeptical the bill will cross the finish line this year. Polymarket traders currently assign only a 39% chance that the legislation will be signed into law in 2026, down from nearly 50% earlier this week.
Traders are rushing into bets on Fed rate hike next week
The odds of the Federal Reserve hiking interest rates at its meeting next week surged to 36% minutes ago. Just one week ago, the odds were less than 10%.
Expert rate-watcher Jim Bianco reminds that new Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh isn’t a fan of forward guidance, so don’t expect “leaks” about what the central bank might do.
Instead, not having locked himself into any particular action, Warsh could be more likely than predecessors to rely on market signals.
If the market all of a sudden appears to “want” a rate hike, that’s exactly what it might get.
Bitcoin retakes $66,000 as stocks claw back from big early declines
Nasdaq futures were lower by more than 1% before the open on Wednesday as the continued surge in oil prices and interest rates sapped some strength from risk assets.
The dip has been bought, though, with the Nasdaq returning to flat a bit more than two hours into the session. The S&P 500 and DJIA are modestly higher for the day.
That’s boosting crypto a bit, with bitcoin (BTC) climbing back to $66,000, now down just 0.75% over the past 24 hours. Ether (ETH), XRP (XRP), and solana (SOL) are all showing small gains.
Looking ahead, Google reports its second quarter after the closing bell, and investors will be eyeing what the company has to say about changes in AI-related capex spend.
Morpho plunges 5% as SEC warns vaults may fall under securities laws
SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce said in a statement that some crypto vaults and onchain lending strategies could fall under U.S. securities laws, cautioning that moving financial activities onto blockchain rails "does not take those activities outside the scope" of existing regulations.
Peirce said whether a vault falls under securities laws depends on its design, particularly if managers or curators exercise discretion over investment decisions.
Her remarks rattled the sector: the native token of Morpho (MORPHO), one of the largest providers of vault infrastructure, declined 5% following the statement.
U.K.'s Revolut valued at $115 billion: WSJ
The digital bank recently launched a secondary share sale at $2,017 per share, the WSJ reported, citing an internal email sent by CEO Nik Storonsky.
That puts the company’s value at $115 billion, or up by roughly 50% from $75 billion at its previous share sale late last year.
Putting that number in perspective, Barclays, the U.K.’s largest bank, has a valuation of about $95 billion.
Neocloud stocks outperform again as OpenAI reportedly ups data center spending pal
A WSJ report this morning said OpenAI was upping its projected data center spending by 2030 from $600 billion to $750 billion.
Already having a big week after big leasing deal announcements on Monday from IREN (IREN) and Hut 8 (HUT), bitcoin miners turned AI data center providers are higher again on Wednesday.
IREN, HUT, RIOT (RIOT), and Keel Infrastructure (KEEL) are all up roughly 4% even as the Nasdaq slips 0.5%.
Trump vows retaliation for any Strait attacks
“From this point forward, any time the Islamic Republic of Iran shoots at a ship in the Strait of Hormuz, whether it be by Missile, Rocket, Drone, or any other device or weapon, the United States will bomb and destroy ONE BRIDGE OR POWER PLANT, including those located next to, or in, the Capital City of Tehran,” said President Trump minutes ago on Truth Social.
His remarks don’t seem to be affecting markets much, with oil continuing to trade sharply higher for the day and stocks and crypto remaining under pressure.
OpenAI ups computing spend to $750 billion by 2030: WSJ
Sam Altman-led OpenAI has raised its expected spending on computing power from $600 billion to roughly $750 billion through 2030, according to the WSJ.
The investment is necessary as OpenAI seeks to secure the computing power needed to run its AI models.
This includes its own data centers, including today’s announcement of a $20 billion campus in Georgia named “Project Camellia.”
Read more: AI compute stocks bounce as Hut 8, IREN land billions in new contracts
Benchmark hikes Hut 8 price target, sees 80% upside
Benchmark’s Mark Palmer reiterated his buy rating on Hut 8 (HUT) and lifted his price target to $195 from $165 following the company’s signing of a second $9.8 billion, 15-year lease at its Beacon Point data center campus.
That would be nearly 80% upside from HUT’s close last night of $108.98.
“Our revised price target is based on a sum-of-the-parts (SOTP) analysis that includes (1) our estimate of the value of HUT's contracts at River Bend and Beacon Point, (2) the market value of its 60% ownership stake in American Bitcoin Corp., and (3) the market value of the 10,667 bitcoins held on its balance sheet as of March 31,” wrote Palmer.
HUT is lower by 1.35% pre-market.
Oil's surge to six-week high stalls crypto rally
President Trump’s continued escalation of threats against Iran has pushed WTI crude oil higher by another 3.2% on Wednesday to $87.38 per barrel.
That’s the highest amount since early June, when oil was in a fast retreat thanks to the Iran-U.S. ceasefire.
The surge in oil prices in July and subsequent inflation fears have the bond market crumbling, with both the 10-year and 2-year U.S. Treasury yields hitting fresh cycle highs on Wednesday morning.
Just days ago, traders had more or less priced out any chance of a Fed rate hike at the central bank’s policy meeting next week, but the odds have now risen to just shy of 30%.
That’s stinging risk markets a bit, sending Nasdaq 100 futures down 0.8%. Crypto markets are lower as well, with bitcoin slipping just under $66,000 after rising to as high as $66,900 one day ago.
Bitcoin's $63,000 floor is the level to watch, traders say
Bitcoin's direction still comes down to the same three macro drivers, the U.S.-Iran conflict, risk appetite through earnings season and the Fed's policy path, said Daniela Hathorn, senior market analyst at Capital.com, in a message to CoinDesk.
On the charts, she flags $63,000 as an important support level, an area where buyers have repeatedly stepped in. Holding above it would suggest the recent correction is stabilizing, while a decisive break below could trigger another wave of profit-taking.
To the upside, she sees $65,000 to $66,000 as the level that matters. A move back above that band would improve momentum and strengthen the case for a push toward recent highs.
Tesla's AI problem is the opposite of Big Tech's, and the market wants it to spend more
Tesla reports Wednesday with a rare setup.
Where investors want Alphabet and the other tech giants to prove their massive AI spending is paying off, they want Tesla to spend more.
The stock is down 16% this year, and unlike its peers, a higher outlook for AI capital spending would likely lift the shares rather than weigh on them, per Bloomberg.
U.S. bitcoin ETFs post sixth straight day of gains, longest run since April
U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs extended their winning run, adding $203 million on Tuesday and taking the streak to six days of net inflows. That's the longest run of gains in three months, according to SoSoValue data. Ether ETFs pulled in $37.5 million.
While the bitcoin ETFs added $930 million during the six-day advance, that's less than half the $2.5 billion that exited in the eight-day outflow at the end of June. Total assets are now just shy of $81 billion, the most since the middle of last month.
Bitcoin (BTC) rose about 2.8% over the period, climbing as high as $66,900 on Tuesday, the highest since June 16, according to CoinDesk data. It was recently trading around $66,950.
Bitcoin holds below $66,000 as the market waits on Alphabet to judge the AI trade
Bitcoin traded near $65,900 on Wednesday, holding just below the two-week high it touched earlier, up 1.5% on the week, per CoinDesk data.
The pause matches the broader market, where a two-day rebound in chip stocks stalled as traders waited on Alphabet's results after the U.S. close.
Nasdaq 100 futures fell 0.8% and South Korea's Kospi trimmed strong early gains, with tech lagging in Europe too.
The trigger is Alphabet, which said last quarter it would more than double capital spending to as much as $190 billion this year. Investors want evidence that spending is generating returns, and the report lands just as chipmakers have been whipsawed by fears the pace of AI investment cannot hold.
Bitcoin has moved with the AI trade all month, up when the chip complex is strong and down when it wobbles, because the same risk appetite drives both and because bitcoin miners have rebuilt into AI data-center operators.
The majors were quiet otherwise. Ether held near $1,917, up 2% on the week, while Hyperliquid lagged at down 2% over seven days. The Fed meets July 28 and 29, six days after Alphabet gives the market its first hard look at whether the AI build-out is still worth paying for.
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Crypto Flows, Share and the Selective Rotation
Crypto Flows, Share and the Selective Rotation
Markets repositioned since June, but Binance held share (~55% user funds, ~24% spot) and drew net inflows in early July while the tracked market saw outflows.
6 hours ago
Markets repositioned since June, but Binance held share (~55% user funds, ~24% spot) and drew net inflows in early July while the tracked market saw outflows.
Why it matters:
Markets repositioned since June, but Binance held share (~55% user funds, ~24% spot) and drew net inflows in early July while the tracked market saw outflows.
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