Ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz drops to a 3-week low.

According to Goldman Sachs, the U.S. stock market is heading for another strong earnings season. The investment bank forecasts S&P 500 constituents will post a 22% year-over-year earnings jump in the second quarter, with AI infrastructure-related stocks contributing nearly 60% of that growth—of which Micron Technology and NVIDIA together account for over 40%. If the forecast materializes, this would mark the S&P 500’s second consecutive quarter of earnings growth exceeding 20%. Goldman Sachs’ report stresses that the market’s current core focus is not the performance of tech giants themselves (after all, hyperscale cloud computing firms’ AI spending is already well-documented), but whether a broader range of companies across the supply chain can turn AI demand into tangible earnings.

BMO Capital has raised Alphabet’s stock price target from $435 to $455, while maintaining its "Outperform" rating on the company. The BMO Capital research report notes that forecasts for Google Cloud’s fourth quarter and fiscal 2027 were lifted by 2% and 13% respectively, aligning its projections with consensus estimates, backed by strong cloud sector fundamentals, scaling capabilities, and the company’s substantial order backlog. Additionally, Google’s leading position in search remains intact, delivering mid-to-high double-digit growth, though new concerns have emerged regarding the intelligence of its Gemini model. The firm added that Gemini Pro 3.5 was reportedly delayed due to insufficient benchmark testing.

HSBC has upgraded Apple Inc.’s stock to a Buy rating, stating the tech giant is at an “operational inflection point.” The bank also raised Apple’s price target from $260 to $366. HSBC notes Apple can avoid high capital expenditure controversies: its capital investment equals just 2.5% of its 2026 projected sales, compared to 39% for hyperscale cloud service providers. Additionally, Apple is well-positioned to leverage its 2.5 billion installed device base to launch its upcoming updated Apple Intelligence system. The bank views Apple’s hardware product line as strong, including the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max launching this fall, the iPhone Air scheduled for April 2027, and “most importantly,” a book-style foldable phone.

Glassnode released a market note stating that Bitcoin's options market has started to turn constructive. Implied volatility has dropped from 48 to 40, while the put/call ratio fell to a six-month low of 0.59. The data shows options traders are cutting downside hedges and rebuilding upside exposure, indicating market sentiment is gradually improving from the June panic, though volatility remains higher than May's lows. Currently, Bitcoin is consolidating around $63,000, with a dense negative gamma zone between $68,000 and $70,000. A breakout above this range could trigger more procyclic dealer hedging and amplify volatility.

According to Lookonchain's monitoring, Abraxas Capital has accumulated 12,477 ETH over the past three hours. In the last week, the firm has withdrawn a total of 45,996 ETH (valued at $84.39 million) from Binance, Bybit, and Bitfinex.

Beata Manthey, Citigroup’s head of European equity strategy, shared her views on the stock market, stating that the current weakness is not a signal of a market crash, but rather a "violent rotation" of market conditions spreading to broader sectors. She said, "The long-awaited broad market rally is now underway, and achieving this requires a sharp sector rotation. While current market volatility is intense, it is essentially capital hunting for new undervalued pockets." Manthey recommended the European financial sector, particularly bank stocks, labeling it an "anti-AI trade". She noted that European bank stocks have their own independent upside drivers, not dependent on tech themes. Currently, European corporate earnings revisions are near historical highs, and 80% of sectors are seeing analysts upgrade their valuations. She believes that if investors can look past short-term volatility, the outlook for holding stocks over the next 6 to 12 months remains positive.