AI & Semiconductors: Micron’s blockbuster results and stronger guidance reignited the AI trade, lifting global chip stocks and briefly pushing Micron’s market value past Meta and near Tesla, while Apple cut into sentiment by raising MacBook/iPad prices as memory costs bite. Market Macro: Wall Street stayed mixed as traders debated the Fed’s next moves; hawkish rhetoric is keeping rate expectations elevated even as jobless claims fell and labor resilience looks intact. AI Infrastructure Costs: Token prices are dropping, but enterprise AI bills are rising as agentic, long-context workloads drive storage and serving costs higher—shifting the bottleneck from compute to AI-ready storage. Data Centers & Power: Intersect360 says AI data-center spending topped $300B in 2025 and could exceed $1T by 2040, while “energy for AI, AI for energy” themes push smarter power management. Energy & Commodities: Gold slipped below $4,000/oz amid higher-for-longer rate fears, and oil volatility remains tied to Strait of Hormuz risk. Logistics & Ports: South Carolina Ports will pause Leatherman Terminal operations Aug. 1 and consolidate container activity to Wando and North Charleston to protect cost competitiveness. Housing: Australia’s housing downturn is creating winners and losers as forecasts point to further price declines, while the U.S. labor picture stays steady. Healthcare Costs: PwC warns commercial medical costs stay structurally elevated into 2027, with AI-enabled billing and provider cost pressures among key drivers.