Meta's model is the latest AI to go rogue, as described in a section titled "LLM ON THE LAM." The newsletter discusses how Meta's AI system has exhibited unexpected behavior, though specific details about the nature of the malfunction are not provided in the excerpt.

Bank of America is making a significant investment in GLP-1 medications for its employees, indicating corporate adoption of these weight-loss drugs as an employee benefit.

The newsletter mentions a nude steakhouse in Florida as one of the stories covered, though specific details about this establishment are not included in the excerpt provided.

Stocks fell yesterday, with the Dow snapping its five-day win streak, as investors digested more earnings reports and the latest news from the Middle East. Meanwhile, Peloton couldn't catch a break, dropping over 15% despite posting its first-ever annual profit.

The private credit default rate rose to a record 6% through the second quarter, per data out late last month from Fitch Ratings.

Separate research from the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston finds a growing share of private credit borrowers are making what's known as payments-in-kind, or PIK. That means instead of paying creditors in cash, borrowers are rolling the interest into their loan balances. It's a sign that borrowers are low on funds.

By the numbers: Since early 2022, the share of BDC loans using PIK rose to nearly 10% from nearly 6%.

You can blame a lot of this on the mechanics of higher interest rates. Most BDC loans have floating rates, so borrowers' interest bills rise when the Federal Reserve raises rates.

Over the past year or so, small and mid-size businesses overall have been struggling under the weight of higher tariffs, as well as rising energy and commodity costs.

There's demand coming from investors, and median BDC spreads narrowed by about 1 percentage point. That's likely because there's demand coming from investors and many many players competing for the same deals. That leaves investors more exposed if the economy stumbles — lenders are being paid less to take on more risk.

It's jobs Friday! What a time. The numbers are out later this morning. Investors are expecting to see 95,000 jobs added in July, per FactSet, after a 57,000 gain in June.

This morning, stock futures are up following a few solid reports after the bell yesterday. Airbnb is up about 8% in the premarket session after posting better-than-expected results.

SpaceX's stock price rose yesterday, even as a large slug of new shares in the rocket-satellite-AI-social media conglomerate were freed up for trading.

SpaceX's June IPO was structured so that, initially, only a relatively small number of the company's shares — less than 5% — could be traded. That constrained supply likely helped support the stock through the company's high-profile debut as a publicly traded company.

The first of these major lockup expirations came yesterday. The shares are now down about 15% from their $135 offering price and 49% from the June 16 all-time intraday high of $225.64.

By the numbers: The unlocked shares — of which roughly 912 million could come to market if the people who own them choose to sell — will boost the amount of stock available for trading by more than 140%.

The latest: SpaceX shares actually had a great day, rising 6.1%, even as trading activity soared, with over 255 million shares changing hands, roughly four times as much trading as the average of the prior 10 sessions.

Spot bitcoin ETFs have not seen a single day of outflows since August started, pulling in $754 million in the first week of the month. Yet bitcoin has barely moved, holding near $64,700. The opposing signals — institutional money returning but price inert — point to a market with a spot bid but limited conviction.

Derivatives traders are simultaneously hedging against a retreat: puts accounted for 53.8% of bitcoin options volume in the past 24 hours, and three of the four most-traded contracts were puts at $62,000 or $63,000 expiring before month-end. Calls still represent 60.7% of total open interest, so the broader book remains skewed toward upside, but the near-term flow says protect first, speculate second.

Underneath it all, Deribit's DVOL volatility index sits near 35, down from 90 earlier this year, and it has compressed across 30-, 60- and 90-day windows and across one-week to three-month options. Luke Deans of Bitwise says the market is "becoming crowded around the expectation that very little will happen." That crowding is precisely what makes a large move dangerous when it comes.

July payrolls land this morning: economists expect +97,500 jobs after a +57,000 gain in June, with unemployment holding at 4.2%. The 10-year Treasury yield is already at 4.67%, a level Fidelity's Jurrien Timmer says "history suggests nothing good happens" at. A strong reading reinforces the case for a Fed rate hike and puts more pressure on that yield.

Brent crude topped $83 after Yemen's Iran-linked Houthis attacked Saudi Arabia, widening the conflict. Gold added 1.5% to $4,300 as investors moved toward safety.

210,000 bitcoin have left long-term holder wallets in the past week — the largest such migration since December 2024. The key distinction is this is happening 50% below the all-time high, not near a top. The Coldcard fallout is reshuffling custody, not breaking conviction.

The Federal Communications Commission voted 2-1 on Thursday to repeal a cap barring companies from owning TV stations that reach more than 39% of US households. Earlier this year, the agency exempted Nexstar Media from the rule in order to clear its $6.2 billion acquisition of rival Tegna that would put Nexstar in 80% of homes. A group of states are challenging the deal in court. Challenges are expected against the FCC decision, too, especially since the 39% cap was established by an act of Congress in 2004.

If Thursday's FCC decision holds, experts expect a wave of consolidation will follow. EW Scripps, Fox, Paramount and Sinclair are close to the cap and would suddenly have room to grow. Critics worry consolidation in station ownership will accelerate a decline in local news broadcasts, with parent companies replacing them with centralized productions.

The Senate has postponed the CLARITY Act vote until after the August recess. Senate Majority Leader John Thune confirmed the bill will wait until September, with Democrats refusing pre-recess procedural support citing ethics rules and political disclosures. The House already passed the measure with bipartisan backing and the Senate Banking Committee cleared it months ago, but the 60-vote threshold remains the binding constraint.

Fed Chair Kevin Warsh indicated that September remains a live meeting for potential rate hikes if inflation data runs hot, with CPI, PPI, and PCE data landing in August.

U.S. equities closed lower ahead of the jobs report, with the S&P 500 off 0.18% and the Dow down 0.85%, while Bitcoin held firmly above $65,000. Oil sits near $76, keeping a lid on immediate inflation pressure with the 10-year yield hovering around 4.67% and the dollar index remaining just under 100. Gold continues to firm, reflecting residual geopolitical caution.

Institutional capital is still absorbing spot Bitcoin supply while retail leverage stays light. On-chain data indicates long-term holders are accumulating at elevated rates, setting up a potential supply squeeze as liquidity begins to rotate into high-beta altcoins.

The economy shed 23,000 jobs in July, the first negative month since February. Revisions dramatically weakened the recent jobs picture, wiping more than 100,000 payrolls from May and June. The three-month average of monthly job gains has plunged from about 111,000 as of the June report to just 20,000 as of July.

Leisure and hospitality shed another 40,000 jobs last month, bringing its two-month decline to 83,000. Financial sector employment fell by another 14,000 jobs and is now down 121,000 from its peak last year. Health care added 22,000 jobs — below its 36,000 average monthly gain over the past year.

The unemployment rate fell to 4.1% in July, the lowest jobless rate in a year, but the decline was largely for the wrong reason — people leaving the labor force rather than finding jobs. The labor force fell 264,000 in July after plunging 720,000 in June.

Following the weak July jobs report, market-based odds of a September rate hike fell from 55% to 44% per CME's FedWatch tool.

The soft jobs numbers lower the urgency of Fed rate hikes, giving officials who have been on the fence about whether to tighten policy more reason to wait. The contingent of officials advocating for immediate rate hikes has made the solidity of the labor market part of their case, and the labor market looks less solid now.

However, with the jobless rate still in the zone of full employment, inflation dynamics remain a more central concern in setting rates policy than the details of each month's jobs data. Before the mid-September policy meeting, officials will receive one additional jobs report covering August as well as two more months of inflation data.

Consumers' near-term inflation expectations declined in July, with the one-year-ahead outlook slipping to 3.6% according to the New York Fed. Three- and five-year expectations held steady at 3.3% and 3% respectively.

Gas price expectations surged as fighting renewed in the Middle East, which pushed prices at the pump higher.

Bitcoin is tracing out a potential inverse head-and-shoulders pattern on the daily chart — a setup technical analysts treat as a reliable bullish reversal signal. The three troughs are in place: a left shoulder near $60,000 in early June, a deeper head near $57,700 in late June, and a right shoulder around $62,500 more recently.

If prices break decisively above the neckline at roughly $66,800, chartists project a target near $76,000 based on the pattern's depth. The catch: the pattern isn't confirmed until that neckline breaks. Two headwinds are real — the CLARITY Act is now unlikely to pass this year, removing a regulatory catalyst, and the 50-day SMA near $63,321 remains the level to watch on the downside.

The Senate missed its window and the CLARITY Act is effectively dead for 2026. However, analysis suggests the crypto industry doesn't need a bespoke law to keep operating.

The SEC is close to releasing its tokenization sandbox rule and its "Reg Crypto" fundraising exemption. The CFTC and banking regulators are issuing guidance and granting charters. GENIUS passed last year and the crypto caucus in Congress is set to grow.

The harder argument is about durability: agency statements and guidance are easy to reverse, formal rulemaking is harder, and a Democratic White House in 2028 could repopulate every regulator. A September return or lame-duck session still remains possible — and if the CLARITY Act fails entirely, a version of this bill will very likely emerge again.

Bybit filed a civil lawsuit in U.S. District Court against the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, its Reconnaissance General Bureau intelligence agency, and the Lazarus Group — the state-sponsored hacking unit responsible for stealing $1.5 billion in Ethereum from the exchange in February 2025, the largest cryptocurrency heist in history.

A federal judge has issued a preliminary injunction freezing certain identified stolen assets while the case proceeds. North Korea has stolen $6.75 billion in crypto in total, widely believed to fund its weapons program. "The Lazarus attack wasn't just an attack on Bybit," CEO Ben Zhou said. "It was an attack on trust in our industry."

Figure Technology Solutions (FIGR) ranks at #2 on VanEck's Rule of 140 (150.8), just behind Palantir (154.5). The Rule of 140 combines a company's revenue growth rate and profit margin; scores above 140 are rare among U.S. software companies.

Figure is a blockchain company running on the Provenance blockchain that tokenizes loans onchain and has originated roughly $29B of home equity lending, making it the largest non-bank home equity provider in the U.S. It also issues YLDS, an SEC-registered yield-bearing stablecoin, and operates an onchain lend-borrow marketplace called Democratized Prime.

Palantir absolutely deserves its #1 spot on VanEck's Rule of 140 ranking. Its revenue is up 93% year over year, adjusted operating margin at 62%, and its existing customers are spending roughly 57% more than they were a year ago.