Morning Brief: Micron’s Blowout Earnings Trigger Over 16% After-Hours Surge, Qualcomm Fully Expands Into AI Data Center Business, Gold Drops Below $4,000 For The First Time In Seven Months

Key Snapshot

💾 Micron’s last-quarter revenue tripled with a record gross margin of 84.9%; its stock soared more than 16% in after-hours trading. The firm warned tight AI memory supply will persist well past 2027.

💻 Qualcomm fully enters the AI data center market: Meta signed a multi-generation CPU bulk order, while Microsoft deploys its HBC chips. Qualcomm’s shares jumped over 10% post-close.

🛢️ Crude oil tumbled nearly 5% intraday; WTI briefly breached the $70 psychological mark, and Brent settled at $73.74/bbl. Both benchmarks hit four-month lows, returning to price levels seen before the US-Iran geopolitical conflict.

📉 Spot gold broke below $4,000 intraday for the first time in seven months, silver plunged 6.72%, and the US Dollar Index hit 101.8, a fresh 13-month high in 13 months.

I. Market Outlook

Core Events

Micron released blowout third-fiscal-quarter earnings after Wednesday’s closing bell: revenue hit $41.46 billion, surging 346% year-over-year, with an all-time record gross margin of 84.9%.

Crucially, its Q4 guidance far outpaced consensus: revenue projected at $49–51 billion, EPS ranging from $30 to $32.

Trump publicly pressured oil majors to push crude prices lower at a faster pace, sending WTI briefly below $70 intraday. Gold also slipped under the $4,000 threshold for the first time in seven months.

Market Reaction

The S&P 500 fell 0.10%, extending its losing streak to three sessions; the Nasdaq shed 0.43%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.35%.

Micron stock spiked over 16% in after-hours trading. July WTI crude closed 3.92% lower at $70.34/bbl, July Brent crude fell 4.33% to $73.74/bbl. Spot gold lost 2.86% to $3,999.08/troy oz, and silver crashed 6.72%.

Exclusive Insight

Micron’s earnings deliver major market reassurance for the AI hardware sector, dispelling two prevailing bearish narratives: fears of cooling AI demand and peaking profitability all at once.

Q4 revenue guidance of roughly $50 billion signals the chipmaker will set another quarterly record this fiscal period.

Gold’s break below $4,000 stems from dual headwinds: a strengthening US dollar and rising Fed rate hike bets. Still, Nasdaq futures rallied more than 2% in early Asia trade post Micron’s results, meaning the AI growth narrative has overridden macroeconomic concerns for the time being.

II. Overnight Market Performance

Summary

US equities traded cautiously ahead of key inflation prints; crude and precious metals suffered sharp drawdowns, while Micron’s blockbuster earnings ignited an AI stock rally during after-hours trade.

— US Equities:

Dow Jones Industrial Average: +182.06 pts (+0.35%) to 51,848.90

S&P 500: -7.24 pts (-0.10%) to 7,358.22

Nasdaq Composite: -110.40 pts (-0.43%) to 25,476.64

💡 The three major indexes remained divergent. The Dow edged higher on cheaper energy costs, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq notched three consecutive losses. Investors stayed risk-averse ahead of Thursday’s PCE inflation data, yet Micron’s after-hours results fueled a more than 2% jump in Nasdaq futures at the start of Asia trading.

— European Equities:

STOXX Europe 600: +0.1% close

German DAX: -0.6% close

— Fixed Income:

US 2-year Treasury yield slid to 4.137%, the lowest level since June 17

US benchmark 10-year Treasury yield fell to 4.398%, a trough dating back to May 11

💡 US Treasury bonds staged two straight sessions of gains, with the 10-year yield slumping 10 bps. Markets await PCE inflation figures, while tumbling oil prices ease near-term inflation worries.

— Commodities:

Spot gold: -2.86% to $3,999.08/troy oz

Spot silver: -6.72% to $57.4512/troy oz

July WTI crude futures: -3.92% close at $70.34/bbl

July Brent crude futures: -4.33% close at $73.74/bbl

💡 Gold breached the critical $4,000 intraday support for the first time in seven months, with silver dropping nearly 7%. Crude lost almost 5% intraday to settle at four-month lows; WTI briefly slipped below $70, retracing to pre-US-Iran conflict price levels.

— Foreign Exchange:

The US Dollar Index hit an intraday peak of 101.8, its highest reading since May 12, 2025, before edging down 0.19% to 101.58 at New York close.

EUR/USD: -0.21% to 1.1357

GBP/USD: -0.29% to 1.3165, having touched 1.3137 intraday – a November low

💡 The US Dollar Index touched a 13-month high amid mounting Fed tightening expectations. Sterling sank to its lowest level since November, weighed down by persistent UK political instability.

— Crypto Assets:

Bitcoin briefly breached the $60,000 support mark; Ethereum lost over 3% to $1,609 per ETH.

III. Macro News

💾 Micron’s quarterly revenue more than tripled, vastly topping market consensus; tight AI memory supply set to last beyond 2027

Third-fiscal-quarter revenue reached $41.46 billion (+346% YoY), with a record gross margin of 84.9%. Core data center revenue hit $11.52 billion, 7.5x the figure from one year prior.

Q4 guidance pins revenue at $49–51 billion and EPS at $30–32, both well above analyst estimates. Micron has signed 16 multi-year long-term supply agreements locking in $22 billion in committed sales over the next three to five years.

Insight: Micron’s operational results push back near-term pessimism around slowing AI demand and peak margins. Its forecast that HBM supply-demand imbalance will persist past 2027 means memory chips retain a growth stock investment thesis for at least another 18 months.

💻 Qualcomm fully expands into AI data center hardware: Meta secures multi-generation CPU supply deal, Microsoft deploys HBC chips

At its Investor Day, Qualcomm unveiled the mid-2028 launch of its Dragonfly C1000 CPU, with Meta onboard as one of its first major deployment clients. Microsoft Azure will roll out Qualcomm’s high-bandwidth computing (HBC) chips across its cloud infrastructure.

Qualcomm forecasts its data center segment will generate billions in annual revenue by fiscal 2027, surpassing $150 billion in top-line revenue by fiscal 2029.

Insight: Qualcomm completes a landmark strategic shift from a mobile chip specialist to a full AI data center hardware player. Endorsements from Meta and Microsoft mark a transformative breakthrough. Its HBC architecture leverages standard memory instead of costly premium HBM, creating a differentiated competitive model against Nvidia’s high-cost, high-barrier ecosystem.

🏛️ Trump pressures oil corporations: crude prices must fall faster, or face Department of Justice investigations

Insight: Trump’s intervention on oil pricing has escalated from verbal jawboning to formal legal threats. WTI’s intraday drop below $70 reflects the market pricing in this regulatory risk. However, US Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) inventories sit at their lowest since 1983; depleted reserves will amplify price volatility amid any future supply disruptions.

🇯🇵 BoJ Governor Ueda delivers first remarks post-illness: further rate hikes will come in due course, upside inflation risks remain

Reports indicate Japan plans to overhaul its foreign exchange reserve management framework; Mizuho economists warn the policy shift implies potential US Treasury bond sales.

Insight: Ueda’s commentary citing persistent inflation upside risks lays groundwork for additional monetary tightening. Should Japan offload US Treasuries to prop up the yen, the move would create upward pressure on US Treasury yields.

🏠 US May new single-family home sales slide unexpectedly, dragged down by elevated mortgage rates and rising property prices

Insight: New home sales logged a second consecutive monthly decline, showing high interest rates continue to suppress residential real estate demand. Hopes for a housing market recovery have faded further.

IV. Corporate News

🚀 Micron’s blowout earnings spark a more than 16% after-hours surge; tight memory supply to extend past 2027

Third-fiscal-quarter revenue $41.46 billion (+346% YoY), record gross margin 84.9%. Q4 revenue guidance $49–51 billion, EPS $30–32, both exceeding consensus estimates, with $22 billion locked in multi-year supply pacts.

— Micron delivers a critical reassurance to the entire AI hardware complex. Q4 gross margin guidance near 86% confirms profitability is still expanding, not peaking. The rally spilled across memory chip peers after hours: Western Digital and SanDisk rose over 10%, while Qualcomm jumped more than 10%.

💻 Qualcomm fully enters the AI data center arena: Meta signs bulk CPU order, Microsoft rolls out HBC hardware, stock gains over 10% post-close

Qualcomm announced the Dragonfly C1000 CPU launch for mid-2028 at Investor Day, with Meta as a flagship launch customer. Microsoft Azure will deploy its HBC chips. The firm targets data center segment revenue above $150 billion by fiscal 2029.

— This represents Qualcomm’s most transformative business pivot since its founding. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg appeared via video to back the partnership, marking Qualcomm’s first formal large-scale CPU supply contract with a top-tier global hyperscaler.

🧠 Jensen Huang addresses Nvidia Annual Shareholder Meeting: AI ROI has been proven, the current infrastructure buildout cycle will span decades

Huang stated “usable, revenue-generating AI is already here.” He framed data centers as “AI factories,” where every processed token translates to incremental profit. Mass production of the Vera Rubin chip has commenced, and the present AI capital expenditure cycle operates on a multi-decade timeline.

— Huang’s remarks serve as a direct rebuttal to the AI bubble narrative. Framing AI infrastructure as industrial production facilities rather than experimental tech redefines the investment thesis as a closed-loop capital spending-to-profit model.

🚀 OpenAI partners with Broadcom to launch its proprietary AI accelerator Jalapeno, cutting inference costs by roughly 50%

Initial sample batches of the custom inference chip have been completed. Broadcom’s CEO stated the hardware delivers around 50% lower operational costs compared to traditional AI GPUs, with a full design-to-tapeout cycle of only nine months. Gigawatt-scale mass deployment is scheduled before the end of 2026.

— OpenAI is evolving from Nvidia’s largest single customer into a direct competitor in the inference chip space. The nine-month development timeline sets a record for ASIC speed in high-performance semiconductor design. Jalapeno is currently limited to inference workloads; training tasks still rely on Nvidia GPU hardware.

V. Key Focus Today

📊 US Q1 real GDP, May core PCE price index, personal income and spending: The market’s flagship inflation gauge; PCE is the Fed’s preferred inflation metric and will directly reshape pricing for Fed rate hike odds.

📋 US weekly initial jobless claims, May durable goods orders: Gauge labor market resilience and underlying manufacturing demand momentum.

🗣️ Speeches from Fed’s Williams and Chicago Fed President Goolsbee: Direct monetary policy signals immediately following the PCE inflation release.