Wash: Whether AI will lead to inflation hinges on the Federal Reserve.

According to Iran's Tasnim News Agency, a spokesperson for Iran's Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that the country's armed forces have made clear that any aggression against Iranian territory will inevitably be met with an equivalent response. There are currently no plans for negotiations, and Iran is focusing on defense. A memorandum of understanding is a set of mutual commitments; if the other party violates it, Iran will cease fulfilling its obligations, a principle that will be followed moving forward.

Decentralized perpetual contract trading platform Aster DEX has announced the launch of its "Hold & Share" reward program for SKHYB, the SK Hynix token under Binance’s tokenized US stock product line bStocks, with a total prize pool of SKHYB worth $15,000. The program’s core mechanism is "Hold & Trade": after users deposit SKHYB into their Aster perpetual contract accounts and enable multi-asset mode, SKHYB can be used as collateral, with a maximum collateral value of 90% of its market value. This allows users to trade any perpetual contract market without selling their SKHYB holdings. Aster also announced that SKHYB spot trading is now live, enabling users to "hold stocks while trading with stocks". The program runs from 10:00 UTC on July 15 to 10:00 UTC on July 22, spanning 7 days. To participate, users must meet three requirements simultaneously: enable multi-asset mode, hold at least $100 worth of SKHYB in their perpetual contract accounts, and execute at least $1,000 in trades across any perpetual contract market during the program period. Rewards are distributed proportionally based on individual scores, calculated as SKHYB balance multiplied by holding hours (full hours only). The maximum individual reward is capped at 3% of the total prize pool, and rewards below $1 will not be issued.

Federal Reserve Chair Walsh attended a Senate hearing today, where he repeatedly voiced dissatisfaction with inflation. He stated: "Recent inflation data does not perfectly reflect underlying inflation conditions. The labor market appears quite solid, but the inflation situation is not very optimistic. I am not satisfied with any inflation metrics. We will review our policy tools, including the balance sheet and interest rates, to see if adjustments are needed to address inflation."

Lithography giant ASML (ASML.O) has announced plans to raise prices for its chip manufacturing equipment. According to market data from BIT (bit.com), ASML reversed its intraday decline to trade higher, with a current gain of 0.08%. This morning, ASML reported second-quarter revenue and profit that both exceeded market expectations, as demand from artificial intelligence (AI) chip manufacturers offset uncertainties surrounding its sales to China. Based on LSEG's median estimate, ASML generated revenue of €9.33 billion (approximately $10.9 billion) in the three months ended June 30, surpassing analysts' forecast of €8.8 billion. Net profit stood at €2.92 billion, also above the market consensus of €2.62 billion.

Aave V4 has been deployed on the Avalanche network, marking the first multi-chain rollout of Aave V4’s Hub & Spoke architecture. The deployment comprises a core liquidity hub and three sub-markets: the main market supports lending and borrowing of assets including WAVAX, BTC.b, USDC, USDT, and WETH.e; the AVAX-focused market centers on AVAX liquid staking strategies, enabling users to deposit sAVAX at a 95% collateralization ratio to borrow WAVAX; the foreign exchange market facilitates collateralization and lending among three stablecoins: EURC, USDC, and USDT. The core liquidity hub adopts a shared liquidity pool design, with all sub-markets sharing the same pool to prevent liquidity fragmentation. Aave noted that since its initial deployment on Avalanche in 2021, cumulative inflows from its V2 and V3 markets have exceeded $15 billion, while the stablecoin utilization rate in its current V3 market stands at over 90%.

Perpetual decentralized exchange (Perp DEX) Ostium has issued an official announcement confirming issues with its OLP vault, suspending all trading while the team launches an investigation. Earlier, the Arbitrum-based real-world asset (RWA) perpetual contract trading platform Ostium was hacked, with estimated losses of $18 million.