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Good morning.
Big Blue investors gave into the blues on Tuesday. IBM sank 25%, the most since the 1960s, after executives warned that revenue growth, no less than 7.7% in the previous four quarters, will come in closer to 1% when the company reports its most recent earnings next week. “This quarter we faltered,” IBM CEO Arvind Krishna said in a letter to shareholders. “We did not adapt and move quickly enough.” IBM expects to report $17.2 billion in sales, missing Wall Street estimates. Companies typically only release preliminary earnings to manage investor expectations in advance of a disappointing quarter and, in this case, cooler heads did not prevail.
Krishna said the company failed to close “numerous large deals” as customers shifted spending away from its mainframe business, which sells advanced computers and software, toward data-center infrastructure. On the upside, IBM hasn’t completed its financial reporting for the quarter and said final results may be “slightly different.” Fingers crossed that they’ll be different in a good way.
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*Presented by Sprott. Stock data as of market close on July 14, 2026.
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*Please see important SCOP disclosures below.
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Hawks looking for evidence a rate hike is urgently needed haven’t found it yet.
Consumer prices jumped 3.5% in June, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Tuesday morning. That’s higher than the Fed’s preferred 2% inflation rate, but lower than the 4.2% May rate as well as analysts’ expectations for the data. One month of Consumer Price Index figures isn’t enough for the central bank to toss the idea of a rate hike out the window, but it’s enough to at least give its Federal Open Market Committee an inkling that there’s no rush to increase the benchmark federal funds rate at its meeting later this month.
CME’s FedWatch tool placed the likelihood of a hike at the July 29 meeting at just 16.6% as of midday Tuesday. Traders put the chances of the Fed holding rates steady at 83.4%.
Warsh’s Take
So what does that mean for new Fed Chair Kevin Warsh’s next move? In classic Warsh fashion, he’s not saying. But he made one thing very clear Tuesday morning during his first appearance before Congress as the central bank’s leader: Fed policymakers have “no tolerance” for high inflation. “The Fed’s No. 1 objective is to get monetary policy right, or as near to it as we possibly can,” he said in remarks shared ahead of his testimony. If they get it right, he added, “the inflation surge of the last five years will be a thing of the past.”
How the Fed is going to do that is unclear, and Warsh is dealing with a committee that is split on where interest rates should head. Despite the positive inflation figures, it could be a bumpy ride. Oil prices surged this week as the conflict between the US and Iran escalated, so the nearly 10% drop in gas prices shown in the latest CPI data may not stick around:
- “Tuesday’s weaker-than-expected CPI print suggests the inflation surge driven by the Iran war is fading, but this may just be a temporary relief as tensions have escalated in recent days,” Skyler Weinand, chief investment officer at Regan Capital, said in written comments shared with The Daily Upside.
- “I wouldn’t bet on these more modest inflation readings continuing for the remainder of the year,” Mike Reid, head of US economics at RBC Capital Markets, told The Wall Street Journal.
  Hawks Here: Weinand added that while the latest inflation data reduces the odds of a rate hike for now, investors should remember that “almost every communication that has emanated from Chair Warsh during his short tenure” has been hawkish. “Warsh is looking to get consumer prices under control, and the best tool the Fed currently has is raising interest rates.”
Written by Mallika Mitra
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Photo via EnergyX
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It’s only July, but Tuesday made a case for bears to go into hibernation.
Five of the largest US banks reported a combined $49 billion in second-quarter profits, led by a record $21 billion at JPMorgan Chase. Great things were expected from the Wall Street lenders, but more crucially, executives reported strength on Main Street and in the broader economy, which bodes especially well for the rest of the quarterly earnings season.
Expect Record Bonuses
They are numbers to brag about. In addition to JPMorgan’s $21 billion haul, up 41% year over year, Goldman Sachs’ profit jumped 78% to $6.6 billion during the bank’s best quarter in five years. Citigroup’s profit climbed 45% to $5.8 billion, Bank of America’s gained 27% to $9.1 billion and Wells Fargo’s increased 17% to $6.4 billion.
Two forces drove the mammoth results. First, trading desk revenue benefited from heightened stock trading around Iran War-related volatility. For example, Citi’s revenue from equities trading surged 45% to a company record of $2.3 billion. Second, investment banking revenue was fueled by major deals including the IPOs of SpaceX and chip designer Cerebras, as well as Alphabet’s $85 billion share sale. But equally, if not more, important were the banks’ upbeat readings of the American consumer:
- Revenue at JPMorgan’s consumer banking division rose 8% to $20.3 billion, reflecting the strength of the US economy. Spending on credit cards at BofA, which added 1 million new credit card accounts during the quarter, rose 9% to $266 billion.
- “Consumer spending is higher, charge-offs and delinquencies are lower, and savings and investments are growing across consumer segments,” said Wells CEO Charlie Scharf. “Concerns around affordability and inflation exist, but the labor market and wage growth remain strong.” His firm’s consumer banking revenue rose 8% to $7.3 billion.
All Things Must Pass: The Invesco KBW Bank ETF, which is weighted toward big banks, has climbed 14% this year, but some investors worry that the conditions favoring lenders today have all but maxed out. Oppenheimer analysts, who acknowledged there is “nothing on the fundamentals that strikes us as particularly worrying at present,” nevertheless advised bank shareholders last month to cash out, “take the money and run.” Similarly, JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon cautioned Tuesday that the record paydays won’t last forever: “It’s getting close to as good as it gets,” he said. “We just don’t know how long it’s going to last.”
Written by Sean Craig
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Photo via Superhuman AI
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Mere weeks after SpaceX’s mega IPO, founder Elon Musk is reaping some early rewards from his ambitious goals for Starlink.
On Tuesday, low-budget airline Frontier became the latest carrier to use Starlink’s satellite network to power in-flight Wi-Fi, with service launching next year. For Starlink, it’s a small step in its plans to become a global wireless powerhouse.
Star Gazing
When it comes to actually making money, Starlink is the brightest star in the SpaceX constellation of various future-flung business units. In its IPO prospectus, the company said that Starlink, with its 10.3 million subscribers, accounted for just over 60% of its $18.7 billion in revenue last year; that share ticked up to nearly 70% in the first quarter of this year. More importantly, Starlink is the only unit that’s actually profitable, generating $4.4 billion in income last year.
In its prospectus, SpaceX identified “Airborne Altitude” as one of six areas where “terrestrial infrastructure” falls short that Starlink is uniquely positioned to service, listing it alongside low-density rural areas and deep-sea environments. Still, the company is betting that it can expand Starlink’s aperture:
- In late June, following the IPO, the Financial Times reported that SpaceX had been telling investors it plans to launch a direct-to-consumer mobile service to challenge AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile in the US. In September, the company agreed to pay competitor EchoStar $17 billion for wireless spectrum licenses in a move many saw as laying the foundation for such a network.
- Also late last month, Bloomberg reported that SpaceX had held discussions with Charter Communications to discuss partnering on a consumer mobile phone offering.
Traditional telecom stocks have been hammered in recent months over fears of satellite-based disruption. In May, the Big Three even formed a joint venture to launch a satellite-based service of their own.
The Final Frontier: The deal makes Frontier one of many airlines that now rely on Starlink for in-flight Wi-Fi, with United, American, Southwest and countless smaller players already signing on for the satellite internet. Unlike most of those competitors, this will mark the first time the ultra-budget carrier Frontier has ever offered Wi-Fi on its flights, meaning one of the last remaining email-free sanctuaries left on earth will be eliminated.
Written by Brian Boyle
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- Time Out New York: New York State Gov. Kathy Hochul ordered an unprecedented one-year moratorium on building large data centers, citing concerns about electricity bills and water.
- Sharing the Wealth: Warren Buffett, 95, is accelerating giving away his Berkshire Hathaway shares to family foundations, saying he plans to exhaust his holdings in about eight years.
- Final Day to Invest Is Tomorrow. Over 50,000 people have already invested in EnergyX. Global giants like General Motors and POSCO have too. Don’t miss your chance to join them. Invest before tomorrow night’s deadline.**
**Partner
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Disclaimers
*Sprott Asset Management LP is the investment manager to the Sprott Physical Copper Trust (the “Trust”).
Important information about the Trust, including the investment objectives and strategies, applicable management fees, and expenses, is contained in the prospectus.
Please read the document carefully before investing. You will usually pay brokerage fees to your dealer if you purchase or sell units of the Trust on the TSX or the NYSE. If the units are purchased or sold on the TSX or the NYSE, investors may pay more than the current net asset value when buying units or shares of the Trust and may receive less than the current net asset value when selling them. Investment funds are not guaranteed, their values change frequently, and past performance is no guarantee of future results.
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