markets

8/12/25

Nvidia whipsawed by report that China’s internet regulator barred companies from ordering its chips

Plot twist!

Nvidia briefly erased all of its premarket gains of 1% after The Information reported that China’s internet regulator has “ordered local tech companies including ByteDance, Alibaba Group, and Tencent Holdings to suspend their purchases of Nvidia chips, citing data security concerns with the chips, according to three people briefed on the matter.”

Per The Information, this decision was made shortly after reports surfaced that Nvidia would be allowed to sell its H20 chips to China once again.

Chinese demand for these processors had reportedly been white-hot, with Reuters saying that Nvidia quickly reversed plans to sell down just its existing inventory and instead ordered an additional 300,000 chips from TSMC.

I’m so old, I remember when US national security concerns were the reason these chips couldn’t be sent to China. That is, I was born before mid-April 2025, when those export restrictions were put in place.

Nvidia recently reached an agreement with the US government to receive export licenses for the H20 in exchange for providing 15% of revenues generated from their sale to the US government.

The chip designer’s calendar 2025 sales estimates hadn’t been rising too briskly following reports that it regained access to what CEO Jensen Huang called a $50 billion AI data center market, suggesting that analysts had been slow to incorporate any potential top-line boost into their forecasts just yet.

Nvidia took a $4.5 billion impairment charge in its Q1 earnings report related to this loss of its China business, and said that its Q2 revenue forecast would have been $8 billion higher if not for the export curbs.

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SpaceX spectrum deal sends would-be rivals lower

Shares of struggling satellite services company EchoStar soared Monday, after the company — which had recently tottered close to bankruptcy — announced the sale of some of its wireless spectrum licenses to Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s SpaceX for $17 million.

The sale provides a competitive advantage to Musk’s growing Starlink satellite services business, as the licenses it is acquiring from Echostar allows Starlink to operate ground based broadband and cellphone services, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Entities that stood to be hurt by the emergence of a Musk-led SpaceX Starlink service got hit hard on the news. AST SpaceMobile, which has plans to offer a similar satellite-to-consumer cellular service, tumbled.

So did wireless tower providers like Crown Castle and American Tower. Low cost cellular service provider T-Mobile, which had a deal with SpaceX, also slumped, as Luke noted earlier, along with other large wireless telecommunication services providers.

The wireless telecommunications industry grouping within the S&P 500 was down more than 2.5% shortly after noon, making it the worst performing industry within the S&P 500 on Monday.

SpaceX strikes $17B deal to buy EchoStar's spectrum for Starlink's direct-to-phone service | TechCrunch

SpaceX strikes $17B deal to buy EchoStar's spectrum for Starlink's direct-to-phone service | TechCrunch

Entities that stood to be hurt by the emergence of a Musk-led SpaceX Starlink service got hit hard on the news. AST SpaceMobile, which has plans to offer a similar satellite-to-consumer cellular service, tumbled.

So did wireless tower providers like Crown Castle and American Tower. Low cost cellular service provider T-Mobile, which had a deal with SpaceX, also slumped, as Luke noted earlier, along with other large wireless telecommunication services providers.

The wireless telecommunications industry grouping within the S&P 500 was down more than 2.5% shortly after noon, making it the worst performing industry within the S&P 500 on Monday.

Robinhood, Amcor, Applovin surge on after being added to S&P 500

Robinhood, AppLovin vault higher as the "inclusion effect" is in full force

Membership has its privileges.

Matt Phillips3h

markets

J. Edward Moreno

3h

Hims rises, Novo dips after FDA releases “green list” of GLP-1 raw material suppliers

Hims & Hers rose and Novo Nordisk slipped in early trading after the US Food and Drug Administration released a "green list" of foreign GLP-1 ingredient suppliers that it considers in compliance with agency standards.

Some telehealth companies like Hims sell copycat versions of Novo's and Eli Lilly’s blockbuster weight-loss drugs through compounding pharmacies, which take the active ingredients from FDA-approved medications and make adjusted, or "personalized,” versions of the drug for patients.

Novo and Lilly have fought against this, arguing that it infringes on their intellectual property. They've sued smaller telehealth providers, pharmacies, and clinics in lieu of any action against them from the FDA. Instead, the FDA gave compounders a list of suppliers it deems safe.

Recent developments in the cases filed by the drugmakers so far as well as the FDA's recent actions suggest telehealth companies may be in a less risky position than investors previously thought. As of Monday morning, prediction markets pegged the likelihood of a suit from Novo against Hims at 34%, down from about 70% earlier this month.

Gold is outperforming the Nasdaq 100 since the launch of ChatGPT

There’s a bull market in anti-humanity.

Close-up of gold bars

markets

J. Edward Moreno

4h

UNH rises after saying it plans to reiterate outlook

UnitedHealth rose 2% in early trading after it disclosed that it plans to reiterate its full-year earnings outlook when it meets with investors this week.

The company said on July 29 that it was expects to report annual adjusted earnings per share of at least $16. The company had previously pulled full-year guidance and prior to that withdrawal, had told investors it expected to see earnings of $26 to $26.50 per share.

Currently, a analysts polled by FactSet are penciling in $16.23, compared to $17.21 before the guidance came down.

UnitedHealth has had a tumultuous year as he industry has been hit with rising costs of care, and UnitedHealth specifically has been hit with investigations into its Medicare Advantage practices. It recently got a boost after Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway revealed that it's built a stake in the company

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