US Space Stocks Experience Sharp Decline as Virgin Galactic Falls Over 12%

On June 22, Coinbase Markets announced that spot trading for GEODNET (GEOD) will launch on June 23, 2026. Per the announcement, the GEOD-USD trading pair will begin trading at 9:00 AM either Beijing Time or Pacific Time (PT) on June 23—timing will depend on liquidity conditions—and will only be accessible in eligible trading regions. GEODNET will roll out across Coinbase, the Coinbase App, and Coinbase Advanced at the same time, while institutional clients can access the asset directly via Coinbase Exchange.

June 22 — Africa-focused crypto lending project Goldfinch, backed by venture capital firm a16z, has suffered a major setback amid multiple loan defaults and restructurings. The project’s native token, GFI, has crashed roughly 99.8% from its all-time high, with its market capitalization plummeting from a peak of around $390 million to under $6 million. Per disclosures from project contributors and depositors, roughly 8 borrowers were in Goldfinch’s lending portfolio: 2 have defaulted, while 6 more are in restructuring, leaving tens of millions of dollars in total losses and impairments. One user said their invested funds are “essentially lost.” Launched in 2021, Goldfinch positioned itself as a decentralized credit protocol aimed at Africa and other emerging markets, securing backing from Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Coinbase Ventures, and other investors. At its early peak, the project had issued over $100 million in cumulative loans to financial and consumer enterprises across multip

June 22 – Per Bitget market data, the Nasdaq index opened higher then fell sharply, finishing down 1.09%. A broad selloff among major tech giants was a key drag on the index: Alphabet (Google) slumped more than 6%, Amazon dropped over 4.5%, and Meta fell nearly 3%. The downturn is widely attributed to profit-taking following an earlier rally in AI-themed stocks. Strong U.S. non-farm payroll data has reinforced expectations that the Federal Reserve will keep interest rates elevated—or even implement additional hikes. Investors are staying cautious ahead of this Thursday’s upcoming PCE inflation reading. A rising U.S. dollar is also pressuring high-valuation growth stocks, especially in the tech sector. By contrast, the Dow Jones held relatively steady, leaving the broader market in a state of high-level consolidation. U.S. aerospace stocks saw steep declines too: Planet Labs tumbled over 4% at one point, Satellogic dropped 6.22%, Redwire fell 8.24%, SpaceX slumped 8.92%, Rocket Lab sl

June 22 — Multiple Japanese media outlets including JNN and Kyodo News reported that, as the yen neared its lowest level in nearly 39 years, Japanese Finance Minister Kaori Kuroda held an online meeting with U.S. Treasury officials on the evening of June 22 local time. Sources familiar with the talks say Kuroda likely exchanged views with U.S. Treasury Secretary Bennett, and their discussion covered foreign exchange market trends and the potential for foreign exchange intervention. Earlier, the USD/JPY currency pair saw a sharp decline during the trading session, which sparked market speculation that Japanese authorities had intervened to prop up the yen.

June 22, AI infrastructure startup Upscale AI announced it has closed a $190 million new funding round, with investors including Nvidia and Salesforce Ventures, bringing the company’s valuation to $2 billion. This round is part of Upscale AI’s Series A-1 financing, lifting the startup’s total funding raised to $500 million. Premji Invest led the deal, with participation from new investors such as Temasek and Seligman Ventures, plus follow-on investments from existing shareholders including Maverick Silicon, Mayfield, Prosperity7 Ventures, StepStone Group, and Tiger Global. Upscale AI specializes in building network infrastructure for large-scale AI clusters, focusing on solving the “compute-communication bottleneck” in AI model training and inference. The firm is developing a full-stack AI network architecture spanning chips, systems, and software, with the goal of creating an open-standard network interconnect solution tailored for large-scale AI workloads. The company noted that a

As of June 22, Bitget market data shows West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil fell below $74 per barrel, posting an intraday decline of 4.22%, while Brent crude oil dropped below $77 per barrel, down 3.91% on the day. Turning to key news developments: During ongoing constructive talks in Switzerland, Iran has committed to ensuring free and unobstructed passage through the Strait of Hormuz and granting International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors access to its territory. Under the terms of the framework agreement, the U.S. Department of the Treasury has issued a 60-day temporary general license authorizing the production, delivery, and sale of Iranian oil.